The Mideastern Rally was held on September 25.
VCS Round 6 – 1976 LCCA Mideastern Rally
What would turn out to be the final round of the 1976 Clubman Series was the Mideastern Rally, conducted in the ranges of South Gippsland. Peter Haas directed this non-championship rally in late September on behalf of the Light Car Club of Australia.
Whilst the event attracted most of the regular VRC runners a feature for spectators was that the Datsun Rally team were running several of their Southern Cross Datsun 710s as zero cars in preparation for the Southern Cross Rally a couple of weeks later. Finish star Rauno Aaltonen teamed up with Jeff Beaumont and George Fury / Monty Suffern were both in the brand new Datsun 710 coupes. The effort was fully supported by a complete Datsun service crew setup.
The exercise certainly added spice to the Rally which started at Morwell. The route ran in traditional classic territory and included a Grand Ridge Road stage.
Chris Power / Steve Hollowood put up a fine performance in their Brad Boyden Datsun 1600 to win the event with a loss of 23 points. Local crew Ross Nielson and Peter Burley finished close behind on 25 points, from John White and Wayne Beaumont.
George Fury had fuel pump issues during the night, whilst Rauno Aaltonen had an impressively fast night in the new 710. As car zero they were obviously not eligible for results but scored a hypothetical loss of just 12 points .
