2016 Victorian Club Rally Championship

The 2016 Victorian Club Rally Championship was won by Andrew Pannam (Driver, in a Subaru WRX) and Nathan Lowe (Navigator) although they weren’t part of the same crew. The 2WD championship was won by Keith Millard and Nathan Lowe in a Datsun 1600. They also won Class D. The Champion Club award was won by HRA on 2,409 points with NECC second on 1,528 and NCAA third on 1,439.

Other awards were:

Novice and Class E: Driver – Stuart Stevenson, Navigator – Daniel Stevenson (Subaru WRX)

See below for Senior and Junior Cup and Class awards.

To see what else happened during 2016 in Victorian rallying, go to the 2016 year page.

To see other years of the Victorian Club Rally Championship, go to the VCRS page.

Series Regulations

These were specified in the VCRS Regulations, which were substantially the same as previous years.

The VCRS was made up exclusively of Special Stage events with competitive distances ideally between 100 and 160 km. Some rounds were “stand alone” events and others piggy-backed on a Victorian Rally Championship round. Where run in conjunction with a VRC event, the VCRS course was always shorter, typically by excluding the last special stage of the VRC event.

Pace noting was not permitted. For “stand alone” rounds, A-B timing was used and some night time running was encouraged. Using driver state seedings to determine the start order was introduced this year.

Eligible vehicles were PRC, Group N, Historic Rally Cars, Classic Rally Cars, Club Rally Cars and Cross Country Cars.  There were also five classes based on engine capacity.

To be eligible for points, both crew members had to be a member of one of the clubs participating in the series although that list includes most car club active in rallying in Victoria . The clubs were BLCC, CCRMIT, CerbCC, FFCC, HRA, KCC, MUCC, MMSC, NECC, NCCA, PAC and WDDC. Awards were made for outright champions, 2WD, Junior Cup, Senior Cup, Novice and for each class. In addition, an overall “Champion Club” award was made to the most successful club in the series.

For the individual awards, points allocated were 20-15-12-10-8-6-4-3-2-1 for first to tenth.  Unlike 2015, crews didn’t have to register for points in the first event they competed in that year but could “opt out”.  However, new registrations weren’t accepted after 50% of the year’s events had been run. With six rounds for the year, one event was dropped in determining series results.

For the Champion Club award, 1st outright was allocated 70 points, 2nd 69 points, 3rd 68 points, etc down to one point for 70th if there were sufficient finishers. Each club then scored the points allocated to the top 3 drivers and top 3 navigators who were members of and had nominated that club.

Events

There were 6 VCRS events in 2016. The Cooper Memorial Sprint Rally was calendared as Round 5 but was cancelled. The Spring 200 was to be Round 6 but was cancelled. And the Goldfields Rally was to be the final round but was cancelled. Subsequently the Moonlight Meander, postponed from May to November, was added as the final round. Click on the event to see more details.

  1. Eildon Stages (NCCA; also a VRC round)
  2. Gil Davis Memorial Rally (HRA)
  3. Daryl Tunbridge Trial (BLCC)
  4. Nissan Nightmoves (NCCA)
  5. Blue Rock Stages (PAC)
  6. Moonlight Meander (MMSC)

Points Tables

Class and Other Awards

Junior Cup: Driver – not awarded, Navigator – Troy Hutchins

Senior Cup: Driver – Justin Lange, Navigator – Ross Batson

Class A: Driver – Michael Trucano, Navigator – Heli Thaw

Class B: Driver – Geoff Hale, Navigator – Jenny Pollock

Class C: Driver – Jason Lennane, Navigator – Amanda Ramia