Traditional rivalry at Bathurst
• 3-5 February – Bathurst, NSW
The Great Race was first held in 1993. It was between pre-1958 Indian and Harley-Davidson motorcycles from Brighton to Portsea with about 20 participants. The race is a team event with riders scoring points and the team with the most points declared the winner. This first year it was the Indian motorcycle riders who went home with the bragging rights.
Since then the event has grown in size with over 100 entrants partaking in the 2022 Great Race which was held in the Bathurst region of NSW. It comprised a meet and greet on Thursday evening where the actual course was provided to the entrants with the race starting on Friday morning. Perhaps race isn’t quite the right term as the event is held on public roads with a requirement that the road rules be adhered to. Failure to do so results in a deduction of points. The points are awarded in a number of ways. The most obvious is that for each of the riding stages a maximum of 20 points is allocated with a deduction 1 point for being ‘slow’ and a bigger deduction of 2 points for being ‘fast’. In addition there are timing checkpoints scattered throughout the route along with questions and/or roadworthy checks. Average speeds are used to calculate the times for each stage with riders provided with average speeds for various speed zones (40, 50, 100 km/h) with allowances made for steep hills and dirt roads. Most of the competitors were based at the Rydges Hotel which overlooks the Mt Panorama circuit. The hotel provided secure under cover parking for the bikes along with a function room for Friday and Saturday evening’s dinner and presentations. Friday’s dinner was preceded by a tour of the National Motor Racing Museum where both cars and bikes were on display. Well worth a visit for any racing enthusiast.
Both days of The Race started with a timed lap of Mt Panorama. Emphasis was placed on the circuit being a public road with a speed limit of 60 km/h even along Conrod Straight where the police have been known to set up speed radar. It was also mentioned that being a public road vehicles can go either clockwise or anti clockwise – so no racing lines. Considering the narrowness of the circuit, the concrete barriers along with the steepness of the descent from the top of the mountain, I’m not sure any riders were that interested in doing a fast lap especially considering the brakes or perhaps lack of brakes on the old bikes. After the lap of Mt Panorama the bikes set off on a tour of the local countryside with Friday’s tour encompassing Orange, Mandurama (fuel and coffee), Newbridge (for lunch) before returning to Bathurst. Saturday saw Portland being the first stop for fuel and coffee with the lunch stop being Kandos before returning to Bathurst. ‚
The ride could be considered ‘challenging’, primarily as the roads were littered with potholes which saw more than a few riders getting airborne with most bikes lacking any form of rear suspension. Then there was the rather detailed course notes with distances between turn points marked in miles to the nearest decimal point. Whilst the speedos on the bikes were marked in mph their accuracy was quite debatable.
For many participants this is an annual event that they pencil in the calendar partly for the race, partly to catch up with friends, and partly to ride with a bunch of like-minded riders. Oh yes, and Harley-Davidson were the victors.