1958 Volkswagen on Top
The Clerk of
the Course and Director of the Rally was Donald Thomson, National Secretary of
CAMS at the time, and the Assistant Clerk of Course was John Pryce, Manager
Motor Racing at BP.
Three
“All-Victoria” car rallies had been conducted in 1953, 1954 and 1955 by Thomson
and Maurie Monk, leading to this 1958 edition, the first of 16 consecutive
annual rallies to be conducted by the Melbourne based Light Car Club of
Australia under the exclusive sponsorship of BP.
This was the beginning
of a long and wonderful relationship between BP, the LCCA, Broadbent’s Maps,
the South Eastern Australian countryside and many keen competing crews.
While meant
to provide a shorter version of the very long distance round Australia events
common at the time, it was considered by some to be more difficult due to the
intense navigation and diverse terrain available in Victoria.
The regulations
for the event required a £10/10/- entry fee ($334 in basic CPI present day
terms, or $2500 in economic terms), competitors had to use only BP fuel and
lubricants, no four wheel drives were permitted, but given that Landrovers were
probably the only option, why would you bother?
A set of 12 excellent Broadbent’s maps had to be supplied by navigators. On the event, instructions were handed out a
section at a time, and special tests were included, not to be scored as part of
the event, but to be used as tie breakers.
As per
practice with the Monte Carlo Rally, eight competitors started from Adelaide,
six from Sydney, and 65 from appropriately, The Melbourne Zoo at 7.30 am on
Thursday 13 March and traversed separate 480 mile Rally Stages to Deniliquin,
where all joined up for the 1500 mile Trial Stage, commencing 6 am Friday
morning on the Moomba Festival weekend. The
entry list gave the home address of each entrant. Interestingly 25 of the 63 Victorian entrants
came from outside the Melbourne metropolitan area. Competitors were promised at least 9 hours
and at most 15 hours rest over the next three days. 30 minute rest and refuel breaks were
provided at Ararat, Horsham (depart 7pm Friday), Ballarat (depart 5.30am
Saturday), Wangaratta (depart 7.30pm Saturday), fuel only break in Omeo,
Bairnsdale (depart 6 am Sunday), Heatherton, an eastern suburb of Melbourne
(depart 1.30pm for Albert Park race circuit finish).
The first
division down to Ararat included a bonus points section from Emu, entering
Moyreisk from the east. Only Harry
Firth, Vanguard and Jack Cox Zephyr earnt a ten points bonus by being 2 minutes
early finding their way across the paddock to pick up the gate out. Another bonus section on the last division
required navigators to report on foot to Mrs Esme Livingstone on the front
verandah of “Tullaree” Homestead out of Fish Creek in South Gippsland. Four Volkswagen crews achieved the maximum
ten points.
79 crews
started and 53 finished. The winners
were a novice crew of three 21 year old lads from Deniliquin; Bernie Taylor,
Tom Smith and Ian McDonald in a Volkswagen losing only 2 points. As outright, class and novice winners, they
pocketed £325, around $10,000 in basic CPI present day terms, or $80,000 in
economic present day terms. Second
was A.C. (Arthur) Withers in an FJ Holden and third was R.L. (Bob) Foreman in a
Volkswagen. Navigators did not get a
mention in entry list or results! Volkswagens
were the most popular car in the event.
27 entered, but only 16 finished.
The director
produced his standard comprehensive post event report, including statistical
analysis, which is always interesting to compare with media reports at the
time. Don noted that all sections were
cleaned by at least one crew, and this became a record that he strove to keep
in future BPs. He also acknowledged the
many country based car clubs at the time that helped provide the 200 officials
required.
Details:
General Supplementary Regulations
Final Supplementary Regulations
Preliminary Instructions to Crews
Route Instructions (collection of all those slips of paper handed out at each
control)
Route map (These files are large and may be slow to download)
Corrections to Provisional Results
Official Results incorporating Director’s Summary Report
Media
reports: BP Accelerator April 1958, Number 190
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