National Status
In view of the good reports gained on the 59 event, the RAC gave 'National British' status to the 'Star' for 1960. The BTRDA also confirmed that the rally would qualify for its annual 'rally star' competition. The increasing interest in the event was shown by the entry of Robin Richards, the BBC motorsport commentator.
Once again the rally had several starting points: fifty nine cars started from the Staffordshire Motor Tyre Co premises in Chapel Ash, Wolverhampton, fifteen from Liverpool, six from Hereford, forty four from Oxford and seven from Nottingham. The first car away from Wolverhampton was Bill Bengry, last year's winner, followed by Tony Fisher the 1958 winner. The Wolverhampton starters were flagged away once more by racing driver Innes Ireland, just returned from the South American series in his F1 rear-engined Lotus. Harry Morgan, once again Clerk of the Course, said that he expected no clean sheets.
After an equal distance main road route, the cars from the various starting points converged on Control X which was situated at Knighton where the crews restarted after being given map 128 (1") with all 31 time controls pre-marked. The route was not marked between controls and local knowledge about the 'goers' was vital to success. Twenty cars failed to find the right whites to Control 1 and lost much time in the process or failed to arrive at all. The weather was extremely cold and many of the experienced marshals were seen to have equipped themselves with coke (ie a form of coal !) and braziers (ie with a z !). The winner, Tom Gold, who was the reigning British Rally Champion, lost just four minutes and a tie for third place was resolved by the performance on a special section in Elan Valley.