FORMER Le Mans 24-hour race winner Guy Smith will help flag away over 160 cars when the Trackrod Rally Yorkshire roars into action at Pickering Showground on Friday evening.

Beverley-born Smith, who won the famous French endurance race for Bentley in 2003, is a rallying enthusiast and admits that, if his other motorsports commitments had permitted, he would rather be behind the wheel of one the extraordinary array of cars on show than guest of honour at the ceremonial start, which gets under way at 7pm.

His father, Peter Smith, contests the Trackrod Historic Cup, which forms the final round of the West Wales Rally Spares RAC Historic Championship and penultimate round of the Motoscope Northern Historic Rally Championship, and which sets the weekend’s action in motion with two night stages.

Vehicles, split into different age groups from the 1960s to mid-1980s, will bring back the sights and sounds of a by-gone era, and hurtle against the clock through the dark in the famous North Yorks Moors stages.

Following the Historic Cup runners into action will be half a dozen Armed Forces Land Rovers, some of which have travelled back from Iceland in order to contest the Armstrong Massey Land Rover Challenge.

After tackling Staindale and Dalby at night, the crews and their vehicles restart on Saturday around 8.30am, when they will be joined by competitors in the Trackrod Forest Stages Rally, a separate event which forms the eighth of the nine-round REIS/BTRDA Championship, plus rounds of several regional title races.

Both events use the same five stages - Langdale, Gale Rigg and Cropton, plus Staindale and Dalby again - but in a slightly different order.

While Cheltenham’s Nick Elliott has already secured the overall WWRS RAC Historic crown, the battles for class and category success still rage.

The iconic Mini Cooper of Athenry’s Ray Cunningham starts favourite to win the pre-1968 category where Bob Bean, of Cleckheaton, will have the distinction of being the oldest man in the competition.

Former works-driver Bean, is well over 70, and has been rallying since his Lotus Cortina was new.

Matt Edwards, of Colwyn Bay, defends the Historic Cup after a surprise victory over multiple Trackrod champion Steve Bannister, from Butterwick near Malton, 12 months ago.

Bannister is back looking to avenge that defeat, while a third Mk2 Escort - driven by Ripon’s Matthew Robinson - and a sparkling Porsche 911, in the hands of 2006 Trackrod Rally Yorkshire winner Ryan Champion, of Whitby, are also expected to figure prominently.

Former British Historic champion Julian Reynolds, from Narberth, will debut a replica of the late 1970s works Fiat 131, which has been been built over the course of two years by Kevin Theaker at rally car specialists RSD in Malton.

The car was first unveiled at January’s Autosport International Show in Birmingham and the experienced Welshman Reynolds said: “What Kevin has done is amazing - it’s a fantastic project.”

The rallies are due to finish with the customary spraying of champagne back at Pickering Showground on

Saturday afternoon, at around 1.30pm for the Historic Cup, and 3.25pm for Forest Stages competitors.

The Showground also plays host to rally administration, servicing and an inaugural motor show, which includes displays of cars, attractions for children and a ‘rally simulator’, where spectators, mechanics and everyone else can pit their reactions and skills against each other.