Rallying

MUCC Rakers take on the Red Centre to Gold Coast Trial.

Six crews in the up-coming Red Centre to Gold Coast Trial owe their Motorsport origins to the Melbourne University Car Club.

While Current members Kate and Dinta Officer and Steve Ashton /Ro Nixon will form the Lovells Spring team with ex-member, now Sydney based, Simon Crane in a team of Mitubishi Galants, a second three vehicle team will also take part.

Established in 2006, the MUCC Rakers team has had two runs in the 6 Hour regularity Relay at Phillip Island. Now half of the original team will take on the challenge of the outback.

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Graham Pate and Glen McAliece will use a Datsun 180B sedan, seen above at the Alpine, while Peter Otzen and Paul Franklin will be in a Datsun 180B SSS, seen below at the Bonnie Doon Sprint.

Both cars are currently being prepared in period livery and will get their final paint scheme just before, or shortly after, their shake-down at the Rich River. Joining the Datsun duo will be David McKenzie and Will Pryor in a Volvo 244 from the 1979 Repco Round Australia event.

To get 5 cars from a club with a membership of just over 50 must be some sort of record. We will try to re-sign Simon to get the percentage of members even higher.

The Pate & Otzen Datsuns will have a support crew consisting of 3 more MUCC members – so 25% of the club membership will be roaming the outback of Australia. Attendance would be even higher if we didn’t have to leave a full timing team back in Melbourne to cover the V8 Supercar “Bathurst warm-up” at Phillip Island held in the middle of the RCGC event.

Not surprisingly, most of these crew members are now also members of the Historic Rally Association, where events more suited to the age of both personnel and machinery abound.

Roll on September.

Peter Otzen