EVERY day of the past 17 years has been a bonus for daredevil pensioner Arthur Senior, who will gear up today for a nostalgic 1,200-mile drive of gratitude.

One of the top rally drivers of the 1950s and 1960s, Mr Senior, 72, enjoyed the thrills and spills of racing over the roads of Britain and Europe.

His only break from the sport was when, close to death in 1984, he needed a sextuple heart bypass operation at Newcastle's Freeman Hospital.

As he sets off in his newly-restored Riley 1.5, Mr Senior and his co-driver Tony Mason will be "giving something back" by raising money for the British Heart Foundation.

They will be crossing the country in the Rally of the Tests, a re-enactment of RAC rallies of 40 years ago.

The pair are two of Britain's most experienced rally competitors and will be proving that age is no barrier when you are behind a wheel.

Mr Senior, from Etherley Grange, near Bishop Auckland, drove Jaguar and works Austin and Reliant models in the 1950s, and enjoyed many international successes in RAC, Alpine and Monte Carlo drives. He was Best British Driver in Monte Carlo in 1959.

Mr Mason, from Banbury, was an outright winner of the RAC before going on to present Top Gear. He now works mainly for Sky TV.

Although both stalwarts of the Morecambe Car Club, this is their first drive as a team.

Mr Senior, who has two Rileys as well as two Mini Cooper S Mark Is, said: "With classic cars the drivers are all ages, although I must be one of the oldest. That is where experience takes over from youth. I don't do too badly.

"The Riley will do 100mph but the roads are a lot different from the old days when there were no speed restrictions.

"This is the first time I have asked people to sponsor me on a rally but without the doctors I wouldn't have been here."

Together with his wife, Dorothy, he has supported the charity since his illness. He had a heart attack on a rally in 1982 and it was thanks to Dorothy, now chairman of the foundation's Bishop Auckland branch, that he went for treatment.

He said: "I thought it was a pulled muscle but she recognised the signs and made me see a doctor."

Six months after his operation he was back behind the wheel. He said: "I felt well enough, so I just got on with things. I was lucky to get a second chance."

The rally starts in Blackpool tomorrow and ends in Brighton on Sunday. For information on the British Heart Foundation telephone (01937) 835421