Media Release: 23 January

Pre-1919 Motors Rally for the Great Southern Ride

Dunedin (Thursday 23 January) - The quiet roar of veteran car engines across Dunedin's Octagon on Saturday, 25 January will mark the beginning of the 2014 summer.

The rally has been running continuously for 60 years and is the oldest veteran car rally in the Southern Hemisphere. Veteran cars must have been built before 1919 to be eligible for entry in the rally.

Seven motorcycles and sixty three veteran vehicles are registered to start in this year’s Dunedin to Brighton Veteran Car Rally, organised by the Otago Branch of the Vintage Car Club. Many of the vehicles have remained in the same families for generations.

Spokesperson Tony Devereux said the 60th Jubilee of this splendid event has been He said the furthest a vehicle is travelling for the rally is Palmerston North, a 1915 Cadillac owned by former All Black John Callesen. Another of note is a 1904 Fordmobile, the oldest Ford in New Zealand owned by the Colonial Motor Company, coming from Masterton.

The first rally in 1954 had 18 entries, eight of which are returning to Dunedin this weekend - including the vehicle which won the very first rally, a 1914 Humber. One vehicle, a 1900 Wolseley, has attended all of the rallies and is the oldest entry.

The cars will arrive in the Octagon immediately after the New Zealand Shop Timebuster race where Dunedin’s premiere athletes compete against the Municipal Chambers clock’s 10 o’clock chimes. The clock, affectionately named ‘Tick’, has not been beaten in several years so the runners have their work cut out for them on the 243m track.

The vehicles will warm up in the Octagon from 10am on Saturday and will be waved off by Mayor Dave Cull and under commentary by well-known local Dougal Stevenson.

ENDS

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