COMPETITION SECRETARY’S REPORT

June 2010
 

30^th May KHP Transport Khanacross Series Round 2 VWCSA Tailem Bend

Phil and I drove to Tailem Bend on the Saturday before the event to set up the courses, place bunting in the appropriate places and clean out the “canteen” and toilets. As there is no lighting and power (or so we were told) we used our newly acquired but second-hand Honda powered generator for the lights in the canteen. I enlisted the aid of Adam Spurrier to hang a fluoro from the ceiling advising him he could use whatever I had bought including my toolbox and then left him to it. When I went to get some lunch I was very impressed with his work. Well done and thank you Adam!

The weather report for Tailem Bend during the week had Sunday’s temperature at 15 degrees with a chance of a shower. There was a howling wind blowing all day with a smattering of rain and it was decidedly cold; not that Phil Southam noticed as he was walking around in his polo shirt for most of the day. (No sense, no feeling some say!).

There were 39 entries out of a possible 40 but only 32 actually started the event. Phil decided not to drive as he wanted to concentrate on officiating (it also helped save the car!) so he acted as a floater while Mal Dodd and I were competing and acting as Assistant Directors. The field was made up from members of the VWCSA, SDCC, NDCC, SCCSA, WACC, and MSCA (Honda). SDCC had the most competitors and it was great to see some new faces from that club coming up to Tailem Bend to compete.

The event ran smoothly with the help of the start and finish officials who were sitting in their Kombi’s out of the cold and rain. There were no breakdowns during the day and apart from a few hiccups with the timing and the radios needing new batteries it all went smoothly.

The winner of what is actually the first event of the KHP Khanacross series was Paul Whiting (Datsun 1200) followed closely by Steve McKenzie (Honda Civic) with Mal Dodd (Volkswagen Beetle) and Paul Verway (Datsun 1600) tying for third place. Congratulations to all the trophy winners and to all the competitors for braving the conditions.

My sincere thanks to all the officials with whom the event could not function:

·           Pat and John Short (timekeeper and scorer respectively)

·           Fred Severin (scrutineer/timekeeper)

·           Ben Stacey (timekeeper)

·           James Tuckwell (secretary/timekeeper)

·           Ian Hamilton (assistant timekeeper/runner)

·           Paul Kennedy (scrutineer)

·           Mark Warner – Honda Car Club (scrutineer/tidy up)

·           Julia Rozleja and her good friend Dawn – sorry, forgot Dawn’s surname (canteen – plus providers of the gratis cake and lollies)

·           Phil Southam (cleaning/tidy up/general official)

·           Malcolm Dodd (timekeeper relief)

·           Mal Leo and Stephen McKenzie – Honda Car Club (tidy up)

·           Skot Carter – offwiththepixels http://www.flickr.com/photos/offwiththepixels/ (photographer).

I would like to extend my appreciation to all the other competitors and spectators who helped tidy up at the end of the day. Your help and effort was greatly appreciated and enabled the presentation to occur immediately after the event. A special thank you to John Short who has results available within five minutes to enable the placegetters to be announced and trophies presented on the day.

1^st Outright – Paul Whiting

2^nd Outright – Steven McKenzie

3^rd Outright – Malcolm Dodd and Paul Verway

1^st Junior – Dylan Schumacher

1^st Lady – Henny Southam

Henny Southam

2^nd-5^th April – National Bug-In, Stanthorpe Queensland – VWDCQ

In my last report I wrote that a small but enthusiastic group of our members were heading to Stanthorpe for the Bug-In. When I arrived at the Top of the Town tourist park I was surprised to see a couple of South Aussies that I didn’t even know were members of the Club. Some of the members that we do not get to see at meetings were there to fly the SA flag which would have made us the biggest group behind the host club at the Bug-In.

As I cannot take holidays without finding someone to take over from me, I flew into Brisbane on Good Friday and was taken care of by Sonja and Colin Gambold (friends and fellow SA club members). I caught up with their daughter Lisa and son-in-law Avon Collis (son of VWC of Victoria members Gary and Leslie Collis of Wolfsburg Automotive fame) who were visiting from Darwin for a short time, but soon Sonja and I were on our way to Stanthorpe. The scenery was outstanding with greenery everywhere unlike our very dry South Australia, and after about two and a half hours of driving we were at the Top of the Town meeting up with fellow Bug-In attendees.

Fortunately Colin left a little later and was able to pick Mal and Karen Dodd up from the airport to save them a five-hour wait for West Australians Pete and Trish Summerfield with whom they were supposed to share a rental car, but whose flight from Perth had been significantly delayed.

At the previous Bug-In in Victoria, Director Neil Penboss said that he was going back to basics in running this event and we were pleased to see the club had kept to that theme all weekend with a well run event with all the history and tradition of the Bug-In intact. Well done to everyone who helped run the weekend as it was a fantastic event. Even the weather turned it on in Stanthorpe as it was fine and warm during the weekend with temperatures in the mid twenties.

The Motorkhana was won by Mal Dodd again, with Becky Southam first lady, and Phil Southam taking the Mal Dodd Memorial Flag for being the only competitor to break a car. The Gold Cup was presented as originally intended by its initiator Chris Harper, and was awarded to Dave and Colin Anderson from NSW who showed true Bug-In spirit by lending their car to Becky and I to use for the rest of the Motorkhana.

Our ever reliable (not anymore) Commodore let us down with overheating, transmission, and starter motor problems over the whole trip but it did get there and home in one piece, which is more than can be said for “Bruce” (Becky’s Mk 3 Golf GTI rally car) after Phil broke a cv joint in only his second run for the day.

18^th April – Khanacross Round 1, Lanac Park, Mt Compass – SDCC

Becky Southam, her boyfriend Johnno Peecock and I decided to enter this event and I in particular was interested to see if all the work my brother Gerry van Caspel had done to “Bruce” had improved the performance and reliability. It was entries on the day so we were there early as we did not want to miss out on being accepted before the entry limit was reached. There were thirty eight entries out of a possible field of forty five with the pit area filling fast on what was a beautiful day at Mt Compass (not often we can say that!) The lack of officials was evident early so I helped send out cars onto the track until it was my turn to compete. Then Becky took over and we swapped roles for the rest of the day.

“Bruce” surprised all of us by finishing the event with not one problem all day (Phil wasn’t driving!) The limited-slip differential works well with the rear end coming out a lot more which means more steering work but so much more fun to drive. Becky had what would have to be the best result ever against the boys by coming seventh outright and first lady. I was 13^th outright and Johnno ended the day with a respectable 18^th outright.

1^st May – Day/Night Rallysprint, Walky Park, Truro – WACC (was to run as the Wombat Rally)

There are not many events held on Saturday apart from rallies but this event was actually calendared as the Wombat Trial and was changed to a day/night Rallysprint. It was a well run event but the dust was the worst I have ever seen. There was not a breath of wind during the late afternoon which made conditions treacherous and forced the organisers to abandon the event after only one night run as you could not see two feet in front of you. Johnno Peecock had the upper hand against Becky Southam and me, but with results still to come I am not sure if it is true Becky had beaten me again. (I must be losing my touch!) As Walky Park has longer and slightly rougher tracks it was with great expectations that “Bruce” would end the day/night intact and he did not let us down with not a spanner touching it until we put the light bar on. It is great credit to my brother Gerry van Caspel who had the car for five weeks and removed a lot of wiring and under dash parts that are no longer needed to reduce some of the weight. He also fitted the diff and the new motorsport clutch which is just fantastic. We helped where we could but he did the majority of the work.

The Golf has now proved it can be reliable so with improved driving from Becky it may come home with a better result in the Rally of South Australia (ROSA) than previous outings. ROSA will be held in late June this year from 25^th-27^th June.

9^th May – KHP Transport Khanacross Round 1, Tailem Bend Racecourse – MSCA (Honda Club)

This event had to be postponed by the Director Mark Warner as late as Friday 7^th May after the Coorong Council rang Mark and advised him they had double booked the track. There was not enough time to organise another venue which would also require a greater number of officials, so the decision was made to postpone to another date. It’s very disappointing for Mark as I know how much work had been done in preparation for the event.

I was also disappointed as the trophies that had been supplied by our business, i.e. Phil and Henny Southam’s, KHP Transport had the date, round and club etched on them, and are now destined for the rubbish bin. The consolation is the council said that they would reimburse the cost of replacements seeing it was their error.

Keep a look out for a new date if it can be fitted into the competition calendar.

Henny Southam

Competition Secretary

To see a definition of event types click here