REPORT BACK: DRIVING TEST/BRAAI - by Tim Cruise.

Saturday 26 February dawned beautifully sunny and warm, with a light breeze - in short, a perfect day for a driving test!



Everything was set up ready to go at 1pm, in time for the first arrivals. In fact, Gerhard "V8" Vorster even had time to do the honours of giving the course it's first (unofficial) test drive before our first competitor arrived - Brian "Speedy" Maggs, with his lovely wife Sheila. Unfortunately, this was to be the quickest that Brian was able to manage all day...



By 1.30pm (official drivers briefing time) yours truly was getting a little nervous, as only two competitors had arrived so far! But then, this is Cape Town, so we reverted to Cape Town time, and by 2pm had 13 drivers signed up (12 actually, but Peter du Sautoy, after arriving in a plastic (TR5 woes unfortunately), scored himself not one, but TWO drives, so he became twins for the day!), including a couple of 'dark horses' in the form of members John "Hotrod" Markland and Mike "Vasco" Jakubowski.



The first test drive course, as advertised previously in this August publication, was a fun course. It was very twisty, with a couple of 360 degree turns to catch the unwary, so Tim "Conductor" Cruise walked everyone around the course a couple of times, which proved to be fun (certainly funny to watch!) in itself. Judging by the bemused looks on the drivers' faces, doing it in their cars was going to be very interesting indeed...



At great personal risk, "Conductor" decided the best thing to do was to mix it with the cars and their drivers, and marshalled each competitor around the more difficult parts of the course as they drove it. In reality, not as dangerous as it sounds, as the cars could not get up any great speed due to the twisty nature of the course. Nevertheless, the course proved to be most challenging, especially for the older cars (or was it drivers?). "Speedy" was a picture to watch, manhandling his TR3A with plenty of reversing (and expletives) thrown in! "Vasco" managed to create his own course, as his TR6 did not appear to like doing 360's at all, no matter how slowly they were negotiated!



After a couple of untimed runs on this course, the petrol heads decided to have a timed run before changing to the competitive course, such was the fun they were having! A surprise contender here was Gian "Stallion" Mani in his 1958 TR3A, which proved that even an old-timer (the car, the car!) could mix it with the likes of "V8" and other dark horses...



Onto the second course. This was a much faster course, designed for the petrol heads, but still sufficiently civilized enough to motivate even the most conservative drivers to compete. In fact, fully 80% of the drivers elected to run the second test, which was most surprising (and encouraging)! The main reason for this enthusiasm was the secret device imported by the organisers from the U.K.- a 'smoothness monitor' - which placed the accent on smoothness of driving as opposed to out-and-out speed. This secret device proved to be extremely popular, and also proved to be a great leveller, as both "V8" and "Conductor" managed to lose their balls!



Once again, "Stallion" proved that even oldies can pull a few surprises, and still keep their balls intact! The other dark horse, "Hotrod", managed to keep his too, but trampled over a few bollards which lost him vital seconds in penalties. "Vasco" managed to re-create his own course again; his explanation afterwards was that he was "not used to following beacons", and in fact it was his "first time doing this kind of thing"!

Not to be outdone, we had one female driver, Eileen "Buttercup" Cruise, who bravely mixed it with the boys on both courses. Balls were not a problem for her, but unfortunately the 'parking garage' was, as her pretty yellow GT6 complained bitterly whenever she tried to reverse it, and just wouldn't behave itself...! Well, that was her explanation, anyway! On the very last run, the car decided to co-operate, and a near-perfect reverse-thrust (parking) manoeuvre was performed!

Almost everyone stayed for the braai, and it was great to see Chris, Marion, Ken and Liz coming along as well to swell the ranks of the spectators and join in the festivities afterwards! All in all it was a great, fun-filled day; we missed all the members that didn't come, but judging by the requests it looks like we'll be having another one sometime soon, so watch this space!

By the way, if you think that I'm being rude with my references to round objects - well you had to be there to understand! But I'm sure if you ask any of the guys (and girls) who were there, they will enlighten you as to what really went on...

Triumphantly Yours, Conductor (aka Shadow)

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