1959 A Triumph for Standard Cars
The previous
first year must have frightened a few off as the field was down to 45 starters
with only three from interstate, two from SA including the winner and Ken
Tubman from NSW.
The March
long weekend date was retained, but there would be an eight hour rest after the
12 hour Rally Stage and a 12 hour rest after 24 hours of the Trial Stage before
a 30 hour run to the finish.
Graham
Hoinville, also a BP employee, joined the Thomson/Pryce organising team.
Competitors
started from Mt Gambier, Sydney, and Melbourne Zoo at 9.30 pm on Wednesday 11
March and converged on Shepparton after separate 480 mile Rally Stages through
the night. The 1,429 mile Trial Stage, commenced at 9pm Thursday night on what
was going to be a dry and dusty event.
Rest and
refuel breaks of 30-60 minutes were provided at Wangaratta, Hotham, Maffra and
Seville before an overnight break at Ballarat.
The field set off again at 8.30 am Saturday with breaks at Camperdown,
Hamilton, Ararat and Bendigo, before assembling at Tullamarine at 12.30pm
Sunday for the run into the finish at Royal Park.
Broadbent’s
produced a special map “Treasure’s Station” of a portion of the Dargo High
Plains based on the Thomson/Pryce survey.
The instructions from Mt
Hotham were: “Go to Dargo via Mt St Bernard and Treasure’s Station. This is quite a usable and well defined
track, except over Treasure’s Station on the Dargo High Plains, where it is a
“walking pace and watch out” job. The
final 12 miles or so into Dargo are very steep downhill grades, you must back
up and make way - there is no way of passing after Spring Hill. The special (Treasure) map was produced
because the next earlier lands Department map was dated 1878, when there were
four or five mining townships between St. Bernard and Dargo. Some of these sites are now so haunted that
even the ghosts are neurotic. Watch out
for wandering cattle - they are Herefords and weigh about 2 tons each. If you do break down, make for Treasure’s
homestead, St. Bernard or Dargo, whichever is nearest.”
Average speed
sections and tight route charts through unmapped areas kept crews on their
toes. At the end of a drop off route chart from Dunolly that included “sapling
about 10 feet high in centre of track”, navigators were handed an instruction
to “Enter Tarnagulla from the West”.
Even though it was 3 am Sunday, this provided great amusement to the
gathered locals.
The results
were a triumph for the Standard Motor Company over the favoured Volkswagens,
with Vanguard Spacemasters finishing first in the hands of A.J. Theil/R.D.
Seidel/G. Chapman and second D. Hughes/R Burns/H Firth and dominating Class D,
while the smaller Standard Tens took out second and third in Class A as well as
the All Women’s’ crew award by Mrs Lorna Gamble/Miss S. Upton and Mrs J. Hughes
from Hamilton.
Ray Christie
was excluded from the results for not using the sponsor’s products!
45 crews
started and 34 finished.
A media
report refers to an organisers claim that this was a “Blue Riband” event, the
term being derived from the prize for the fastest Atlantic crossing by passenger
ship. This became formalised into the BP
Rally by line of “Australia’s Blue Ribbon Road Classic’. In later years the LCCA was to continue this
tradition, conducting lower level “Blue Ribbon” Rallies.
We are light
on records from this particular year.
Details:
Dear Friend pre -event promotion letter
Route Instructions (collection of all those slips of paper handed out at each control, and including the “Treasure’s Station” Broadbents map)
Route map
Provisional Results, that includes full Entry List, but no Director’s report
Media reports: Australian Motor Sports April 1959
Extract from Australian Motor SportsReview 1958-1959
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