The 7th BP Rally, organised by the Light Car Club of Australia, was held from May 5 to 10. The Director was Donald Thomson, assisted by Graham Hoinville and John Pryce. Ross Runnalls summarises the event …
“Antarctica 1” VW conquers a dry BP
Ray Christie and Joe Dunlop won a very tight contest in their VW just back from a twelve month stint at Mawson base of the Australian National Antarctic Research expedition.
Once again, crews rallied from four interstate locations to Geelong. Only five crews cleaned the 500 mile Rally Stage. The Trial Stage commenced at noon on Thursday 7 May from Fyansford after a police escorted convoy through the city. Three divisions, each made up of up to three a, b or c components followed with breaks at Hamilton, overnight (depart 8. am Friday), Mt Gambier (depart 2.15 pm), Horsham (depart 7.45 pm) Sea Lake, for the first time, (depart 2.30 am Saturday), Stawell (depart 11.30 am) to another overnight break at Bendigo (depart 7 am Sunday), to Ringwood before parade into the waiting 12,000 people at Chadstone Shopping Centre finish.
Divisions 1 a and b caused few issues with two crews clean and three crews one minute down at Mt Gambier. A trap at Haven just before Horsham caught out ten crews, costing Ellis/Guymer the event. McPherson/Home led down 1 at Horsham.
Three controls within two miles at Lorquon created some grief, but not as much as the sand after Burroin, which brought about McPherson’s fall from grace. The novices Watson/McAuliffe cleaned the Division to lead by one point at Sea Lake.
Other than Waitchie the run towards Stawell was easy until crews had to find a way through the Deep Lead forest to the final control into Stawell. One journal of the day reported that “Rally Director, D.K. Thomson, flanked by his assistant “foxes”, was seen dancing a jig of pure joy on the last control into Stawell, where a constant procession of cars passed, re-passed, turned, studied their maps again in an attempt to find the correct route into control. Even the novice competitors had become familiar faces by the time they finished cruising backwards and forwards on the two alternative tracks. Ray Christie, in Antarctica 1, came back from one trip into the scrub in such a hurry that he flattened a fence after hitting a stretch of ball-bearing gravel. Six crews managed to clean, including Laurie Graham/Bruce Ford (VW), Harry Firth/Frank Kilfoyle (Cortina GT), Tony Theiler/Tony Denham (VW) and Leo Squires/Jack Wilson (EH Holden).
Watson now had a comfortable lead at Stawell, before the mayhem to follow on the division to Bendigo. Getting through Mt Cole and Mt Lonarch was fine, but finding the way out of the Ben Major forest to Lexton West was the “greatest point stripper of the Rally”. Further strip shows at Percydale, Archdale West and Arnold North saw Christie move into a narrow lead at Bendigo, and despite losing a scrutineering point at Chadstone, won by one point over the Hartigan brothers, Martin and Bill in a VW. Ian Vaughan/Geoff Thomas snuck into third in their Ford Anglia and Leo Squires and Jack Wilson went mapping in Argyle. The Teams prize went to the Ford combination of Harper and Hughes in Falcons and Firth in a Cortina.
43 crews started and 32 finished.
Report in Australian Motor Sports
