Guild members triumph in Awards

A well-deserved Lifetime Achievement award for Mike Rutherford topped a successful evening for Guild members at the sixth annual Newspress Awards, held at the Bicester Heritage Campus in Oxfordshire yesterday (21st July).

Hosted by Alan Dedicoat, widely known as the National Lottery’s ‘Voice of the Balls’ and for Strictly Come Dancing, the event culminated in the presentation to Mike by Newspress managing director Tim Barfoot (above).

Much earlier in the evening the very first journalist award of the event had been won by a Guild member, George Barrow taking the Commercial Vehicle Writer of the Year trophy.

This was followed by the Automotive Business Journalist award for Mark Smyth, who then later added the Technology Writer title to his trophies.

A popular winner of the Classic Car Writer of the Year award was Charlotte Vowden, a recent recruit to the Guild having only joined us in the last year.

At the other end of the scale Ray Massey added to his considerable trophy cabinet with the Automotive News Journalist title.

Nick Williams was named Automotive Photographer of the Year, while in the Road Tester category, James Taylor triumphed.

The event was held as part of Newspress Live! – a networking afternoon which saw several of the automotive businesses on the Bicester Heritage campus opening their doors to visitors, and several current and classic cars available for those present to try out. 

Attendees with classic or interesting cars were also encouraged to bring them to the event for display, and this added an extra bit of gloss to the evening for Guild member Alex Grant – his Volkswagen Polo G40 was declared the initial winner of the Newspress Star Car of the Year award sponsored by Footman James.