The 53rd Banbury Run, staged by the Vintage Motorcycle Club, was like stepping back in time.

The gathering was without doubt a Mecca for more than 500 competitors of veteran and vintage motorcycles eager to take home an award for completing the 30 to 60-mile routes in their allocated time.

This event was a window on a bygone era when the British motorcycle industry dominated the world.

Banbury has been a hub for motorcycling since the 1920s when test riders from the Coventry and Birmingham factories of Norton, AJS, Humber and Triumph headed south to use the steep hills of Sunrising, The Knoll, and Tysoe to put new bikes through their paces.

The Banbury Run began in 1949 when Ivor Mutton - a member of the newly formed Vintage Motor Cycle Club - suggested a reliability trial from Birmingham to Banbury.

Eighty entries were received and they set off from the Wagon and Horses in Sheldon, Birmingham, on Sunday, June 26. The ride was such a success that the Run became a regular fixture in the VMCC's calendar.

In fact, the Banbury Cross was used regularly by the Auto Cycle Union as a destination for the Quarterly Trials.

They began in north-west London and the route went through the Chiltern Hills to Banbury, before the riders headed home.

This year's Vintage Motor Cycle Club event was split into three groups according to the age of their machines. The pre-1915 machines had a gentle 30-mile route through the Oxfordshire countryside, and the younger 1916 to 1930 machines had 50- or 60-mile routes, that included Sunrising Hill.

The Run attracted huge crowds along the route. They saw the dedicated riders nursing and coaxing their beloved mounts around the various courses.

Machines entered reflected the evolution of the motor cycle from the first primitives to the machines of the 1930s, whose basic layout is shared by the hi-tech machines of today.

Such is the appeal of the event that competitors travelled from the four corners of the world to appear on the start line with their pristine machines.

There were competitors from Sweden and Germany, plus 11 Ner-a-Cars celebrating their 80th birthdays - probably the largest gathering of Ner-a-cars ever seen. The grandson of the original designer, Carl Neracher, flew from the US to start them on the course.

The range of other rare machines was almost endless - Calcott, Calthorpe, Campion, Carfield, CEDOS, Centaur, Chater-Lea, Connaught, De Dion Bouton, Diamond, D-Rad Model, Dunelt, Edmund, Excelsior, FHW, Frera, Gnome et Rhone, Henderson, Henley, Humber, Humphreys & Dawes, Indian, Large, Levis, McEvoy, Morgan, Motosacoche, NUT, Peugeot, Precision, Premier, Quadrant, Raleigh, Rex Acme, Rover, SOS, Sarolea, Sun-JAP, The Massey, Wall Auto Wheel, Wanderer, White & Poppe, Wilkinson, Wolf and Wooler were all there.

Banbury town mayor Jim Vine flagged away the first, and oldest, machine - a 101-year-old De Dion Bouton ridden by John Marsh, of Cheltenham.

It was a full two hours before the last competitor, Harold Sillifant, of Lutterworth, riding a 1930 AJS Model S2 996cc, was launched on his way.

As the riders readied themselves for the off, vintage fans also had the chance to pick up a souvenir or plunge into the world of restoration by visiting the autojumble. There were 115 stalls selling everything from flying hats to rusty heaps of vintage machines.