MG Car Club 50 year Concours Report.

19 March 2006

    The weather was absolutely perfect for this rather special opening to the year 2006 activities, this being the 50 th year since the first group of interested MG owners gathered at Brown Street, now Morphett Street, intent on fostering the MG Marque.

A day of positives!

From those early days to today I know that the interest and affection for MG’s has not wavered.

The intention was to keep this event as a ‘family’ type event we were given some very good publicity through both 5AA and the ABC 891. This coverage plus some additional advertising in the Advertiser created a considerable amount of local interest from both old members and from the general public.

We were also favoured with some wonderful sponsorship, without this these events would not be possible to present..

They were:

MG ADELAIDE WORKSHOPS & A.A. AUTOMOTIVE (ADRIAN AKHURST)

14 NIGHTINGALE AVENUE , MAGIL 5072 PH 8364 4988

MG SALES AND SERVICE (BOB AND MICHELLE BAZZICA)

197 TORRENS ROAD , RIDLEYTON 5008 PH 8346 0692

MG & OCTAGON AUTO( ROD O’MALLEY)

872 SOUTH ROAD , EDWARDSTOWN PH 8297 2322.

PRESTIGE CAR SALES (FORMALLY MG ROVER) (VERONICA GRANT)

134 NORTH EAST ROAD , WALKERVILLE PH 8269 2922

SHANNONS INSURANCE (ROD PROUSE- MANAGER)

6/212 BRIGHTON ROAD SOMERTON PARK PH 1300 139 006

The first three sponsors jointly sponsored all the Class trophies, the Peoples Choice trophy was sponsored by Prestige Walkerville and the three Outright Trophies were sponsored by Shannons Insurance.

Also a special thank you must go to Bill Schapel and to his daughter Haley, who’s company KRAFT FOODS donated the huge Toblerone Chocolate for the raffle. The chocolate came in a similar triangular shape but was a massive sized and weighed in at over 5 kilos. The lucky winner was Neville Daniel, our Birthday boy as well! Congratulations Neville.

While there were not official head-counts I am sure that there would have been in excess of 300 people on Wigley Reserve at Glenelg throughout the afternoon at any one time. Even as we packed up after 3.30 pm there were a lot of people who did not want the event to finish. What a colourful display of gleaming paintwork and chrome. Set against a background with sea glimpses!

JUDGING

There were a total of over 100 MG’s in all being judges in one of the 32 classes and each receives a beautiful 50 th anniversary poster designed and printed by Neville Daniel, each is a numbered poster starting from # 251 onward with only 200 printed.

There were also a considerable number of members who drove down and parked their cars in the respective classes, but did not wish to have their cars entered for judging.

There were quite a number of quality MG’s in the “T” Types which gave the judges a very hard task and a challenge to establish the order of merit on the day.

This challenge was also the case with class U: MGY Saloons and Tourers. First and second place were separated by only one single point!

The successful Trophy recipients in the various classes were:-

There was one additional Class added for the day and it was wonderful to see the huge grin on Willem Daniels face when he was awarded his trophy for his beautifully presented Pedal Car replica of his Dad’s TC.

Each trophy had as a centre-piece a specially designed 50 th Anniversary Logo (designed by Maurice Linehan) Well worth winning, they will not be offered again!

I can however report on the three Outright Trophy winners;-

They were:-

1. Pre MGA from Class F - MG TF Mick Mitolo in his loverly red TF 1500

2. Post TF from Class L -.MGB Mk 11 Alan Turner and Penny Moore’s superbly presented Blue MGB Mk 11

3. Post 2000 from ClassZD All models from 2000 (not MGF) Trevor and Helen Praite’s stunning iridescent Black ZR Saloon.

All worthy winners. Well Done!!

I know that the judging of these MG’s required a special amount of encouragement and thanks for it is not easy to judge so many different types of cars within the criteria of the time frames. A special thank you to these judges

The Peoples Choice Award, sponsored by Prestige Walkerville was awarded to TWO winners:

A number voted for Mick Mitolo’s Red TF plus the votes cast showed that people were more than happy to have had Andrew Murray’s beautifully presented BRG MGC Roadster sitting in their Garage! Again Well Done to these winners!!

There were small entries in quite a number of the MGB Classes.

Possibly a lot of people are hesitant to enter their cars thinking that theirs is not up to standard, I can assure them that if they had entered any of the MGB GT Classes they would possibly have walked away with a trophy. The old saying is true; you have to be in it to win it!!

A number of members also made the point to me that they had learned quite a bit just by attending today, whether it was to do with Concours presentation or to do with improvements to their cars, what ever, they went away better for the experience! All members are happy to share their knowledge and experience. This is another positive for the day.

I know that the day was a resounding success! purely from a social perspective. So many members came down even for an hour or two just to catch up with friends made over a long period of time, mates who though you don’t see them too often, still can pick up where they last left off. It was that sort of a day!

We were also able to welcome some interstate visitor’s one couple driving through from West Australia members of their MG Owners Club on their way down to Launceston for these years National Meeting; another couple also attended from Darwin and also a third couple from Alice Springs. Unfortunately I did not keep a record of their names, sorry.

I noticed the large number of people who came up to the Administration desk wanting to join the MG Car Club of SA. It was quite a list for our Secretary to attend to during the next few days. Another positive from today’s event.

An event like this cannot happen without a lot of assistance and fortunately I was able to have wonderful help from so many very willing members who had all got up at some unearthly hour to make the event a success. Be they marshals directing traffic; be they administration type roles; be they Judges; there was without exception help where ever needed. Thanks everyone!

Members kept coming up to ask if there was any other help needed!

I am not going to name them individually but collectively I say thank you all for making the day the success that it became. A lot of work has to go into this type of event and to those who helped prior to the event, and they know who I mean, a special thank you for your untiring assistance

Mike Greenwood – Coordinator.

See you again in 2 years