Happy New Year to everyone. This year has started off with a flurry of events on the calendar; the Australian Factory Performance Car Nationals at Bathurst, the Sydney Car Festival, our own Darling Harbour Charity Display Day and the Drag Day at WSID on consecutive weekends. 

            Early January and another Summernats passed with some controversy in the media after a stunt car accident but there was some good news with a Hemi 6 powered Centura making over 350 rear wheel horse power in the Horse Power Heroes competition.

            Back in mid-January we had our first club run of the year. It was one of the best attended runs for quite some time with some guests in attendance including Mick from Victoria and even Murray drove up from Goulburn. The twilight cruise proved to be quite popular and we’ll be sure to add more of that style of runs in the future. Unfortunately the weather didn’t hold up and it was a little wet by the time we reached Wollongong but most people stayed around and enjoyed some fish and chips by the water. The drive home was a little stressful through the pea-soup fog but everyone made it home safely.

            Over the Australia day weekend the inaugural Australian Factory Performance Car Nationals were held in Bathurst at the Mt Panorama circuit. Hugh and I entered the event (although Hugh was waving the flag for the Monaro club). There were only a handful of Mopars in attendance at the show and shine on the Saturday but there were around 300 high quality cars to check out on the day. Those who attended last years winter escape weekend will remember the chilly temperatures, well that certainly wasn’t an issue this time. It was so hot over the weekend that the tar was melting in the pit area of the show and shine. The atmosphere was fantastic over the whole weekend at the show and back at the motel with the members from the GT Falcon Owners club and Monaro club members. 

            The shown and shine on Saturday was followed by a presentation dinner that evening with a large amount of money raised for a children’s charity. There were several motorsport identities present including Harry Firth and John Goss. Unfortunately Leo Geoghegan was taken ill and was unable to attend. We all hope Leo recovers quickly.

            Sunday morning arrived which had about 80 cars at the mountain nice and early for the Conrod Sprint driving event. After scrutineering and a drivers briefing it was time to hit the mountain. I had never participated in any sort of circuit driving event before and I am now a convert. It was a fantastic experience and words fail to express the exhilaration of driving into the chase at close to 200kph and then the approach to Murray’s before turning onto the start/finish straight. The old Pacer held it’s own and to my surprise I ended up taking out a class win in the 3 to 4.5L category against some experienced competition from a couple of XU-1 Toranas. With the combination of driving events and show and shine it was one of the best car shows I have attended. The organisers deserve a huge congratulations and I for one will be back next year.

            Coming up the weekend after the Darling Harbour Charity Display Day is the Drag Day the Falcon GT Owners are organising in conjunction with us. This again promises to be another top day not to be missed. A date has been set for this years Dyno Day, Sunday 7^th May, once again at Mick’s Motorsport in Milperra. Mick has supported us for a couple of years now and offers excellent advice for getting our cars running at there best. Thanks to Mick’s generosity the price remains the same at $35 for pre-entrants which also includes a BBQ lunch and drinks for entrants. Entry forms will be available soon from the web site and will be distributed with a future Pentasheet.

For those with access to the internet, a video clip is available from our website of one of my runs down the mountain in the Pacer.  It is available from http://www.cavoa.com/images/Pacer_at_Bathurst5.wmv (the file is about 4.1mb in size).

Regards,

Nik