Another hole has been torn in the fabric of Scottish rallying this this week, a big hole. His may not be a household name to many but to those who organised rallies and championships and especially to all Coltness Car Club members the loss of Alex ‘Eck’ Lindsay will be hard to bear. He passed away on Sunday morning after a short illness which followed a period of poor health. Even so, the news came as a shock.
After leaving school it could be argued that Alex got in with the ‘wrong crowd’ at Motherwell Technical College because that was where the seeds of an interest in motor sport were sown which burgeoned into a life long passion for all things fast and four-wheeled, especially on loose surfaces. And yet his own automotive career started in a much more modest way, travelling to and from Motherwell Tech on a Yamaha FS1E – a 50cc moped. Never was such a modest conveyance so badly abused.
A succession of jobs after completing his apprenticeship in various garages and in the Fire Service led to him establishing his own ‘Alex Lindsay Motor Engineers’ service for which was purchased a Land Rover and the name proudly emblazoned along its flanks, but by this time he was already steeped in rallying folklore. Early memories recall him at the wheel of a large Toyota Crown estate car in the mid 1970s servicing for the likes of Allan Arneil and others. The Toyota was a 2 acres of tin service barge 15 feet long and over six feet wide with a full length roof rack decorated with spare wheels and jerry cans and riding on its bump stops with the throttle ‘flat to the floor!”
After marrying Jean the arrival of the two boys John and Allan calmed him down (somewhat!) and he turned his attention to supporting their interests and efforts while he contented himself by joining the Coltness CC committee becoming an integral part of the growth and success of the car club. Latterly he served as Club Secretary a duty he also performed for the Scottish Rally Championship management committee for a number of years.
In the early days, the club organised road rallies and the Coltness Stages Rally, which used a multitude of private roads and estates in southern Lanarkshire, before organising the hugely successful Strathclyde Park Hillclimb till its reputation outgrew the limits of a public park. The club then achieved greater notoriety when it created the Colin McRae Forest Stages Rally first in the Tweed Valley and then later in Perthshire. From starting out as an event Marshal and Official, Alex was soon heavily involved in the planning, promotion and organisation of the club and its events where another talent revealed itself. He produced all the club paperwork (once Jean had tidied it up) and printed all the club’s event decals and stickers. He even assumed editor-ship of the club newsletter and its distribution.
Alex wasn’t just a big presence in the sport he was a big noise and often expressed his opinions audibly and without ever giving the consequences a thought. At least folk knew where they stood, they also understood that he never held a grudge. On that basis Alex could work with anyone, and they could work with him. Friends and enemies would be greeted with the same measure of robust ‘geniality’. In fact if he missed out on insulting someone, they often felt slighted or wronged.
This carefree attitude led him and fellow club members into many scrapes which no doubt led to and encouraged the growing reputation of the ‘Coltness Bears’. Nor was he any respecter of authority or celebrity. As ‘cheerleader in chief’ he accompanied the Coltness CC Quiz team and supporters to the depths of Englandshire to participate in the 1988 Ford Motor Company British Motorsport Quiz and whilst the CCC team won the top prize and claimed the top club award, Alex hoovered up all the stage equipment, props and promotional materials and spirited his loot away back north for the benefit of the club and its members.
And the least said about ‘the gun incident’ on the Island of Mull, the better. Suffice to say, the Police Sergeant was mollified to the extent that he ended up having a pint, or two, or more, with the Bears afterwards!
Thankfully this force of nature ‘matured’ in later years but behind the scenes he was an integral and vital part of the glue that kept Coltness Car Club together, regularly hosting committee meetings and event organising teams in his garage-converted office behind the family home in Burnbank.
There at home he had a rather different personality, the caring husband and kindly, generous father, far removed from the noisy imposing figure that could terrify and mollify, enthuse and encourage, insult and praise all in the same words of conversation.
For sure he gave out more than he received, but it’s folk like him who keep this sport alive and more folk like him that the sport needs. But to Jean and the boys, they have lost a husband, father and grandfather and our thoughts must be with them at this sad time.
