Alpine Legend Frank Kilfoyle - What are my most poignant memories of the Alpine?

As editor of the November 2005 edition of the Historic Rally Association Journal 

I did an interview with Australian Rally Hall of Fame member &  

Alpine Rally legend Frank Kilfoyle as a 6 6-time winner & 4-time Director. 

I have reproduced the words here with some extra recently researched 

information & pictures to add some more colour as we prepare for the 

2025 Lovells Suspension Alpine Rally of East Gippsland.

Man on Road

Alpine Legend  Frank  Kilfoyle

What are my most poignant memories of the Alpine?

I’ve competed in some 12 Alpines.  

I think I finished in 11 of them, won 6 or maybe 5.5,
depending on how you count the one as co-driver. 

ed note - an Alpine Rally win as a Navigator certainly counts!

The first was 1959, which we rather won be accident. 

George Reynolds in the 1985 Olde BP Rally with Frank's long-time Navigator Mike Osborne

Bruce Ford, with Harry Firth driving, led by an hour 2 sections from the finish and somehow managed to conveniently lose himself for just long enough to let George Reynolds and myself to take the cup.

The next year, Geoff Russell directed the wettest Alpine ever. 

We were scheduled to travel via Deptford, and after fighting our way through countless bogs, we were confronted at the ford with a four-foot deep raging torrent.  

We turned back.  

Hoineville and Firth took a punt that was informed by a good deal of local knowledge. They bypassed Deptford & ended up with such a lead in doing so that no one could get near them.

64 was the first Alpine that I won from the driver’s seat.  

The late Roger Abraham called the corners; 65 was a repeat, but with Mike Flanagan.  
Mike had the extraordinary and somewhat scary talent of being able to fall into 

genuine sleep between calls.  

But somehow, we managed to keep Bob Watson at bay, even so.

Frank Kilfoyle & Roger Abraham 1964 Alpine Rally

66,67 & 68 were Robert’s years.  

The second of them yielded an extraordinary statistic.

  

The first seven place getters each lost the same number of minutes as their placing! 

Doug Rutherford and I scored 2 minutes, unfortunately.  One of them was on the way up to Falls Creek.  We couldn’t bridge the gap between first and second gears in our “special” close-ratio gearbox, and we screamed up the mountain for the most in first at some 7500 rpm!  Very frustrating – and not too good mechanically either!

68 left a nasty taste in our mouth!  

Frank Kilfoyle & Doug Rutherford 1968 Alpine Rallye

We ran out of petrol in the main tank a few miles short of the Omeo Highway control point, and we couldn’t get supply from the spare tank.  It turned out that we had tightened the spare wheel down on the fuel line and squashed it.  We made it to the control by virtue of sucking petrol out of the spare tank into my mouth and spitting it into the main tank!  

But we lost a few critical minutes doing it, and I didn’t appreciate fine wine for a full 6 months afterwards.  It cost us the Australian Championship, too, just to make matters worse!

Doug and I made up for that with a victory and title in 69.

Frank Kilfoyle & Doug Rutherford  Winner 1969 Alpine Rallye

I retired for a couple of years after that, but came back 

to climb the winners’ podium again in 72 and 73.  

Frank Kilfoyle & George Shepheard  Winner 1972 Alpine Rally  Rod Steffanoni pic

Frank Kilfoyle & Mike Osborne  Winner 1973 The Golden Alpine Rally  Chris Brown Pic

Late in the 73 event, 

I learnt how it's folly to drive too much sideways!  

But that’s not really an Alpine story.

Frank Kilfoyle & Mike Osborne Winner 1973 The Golden Alpine Rally   Rod Steffanoni pic

Frank Kilfoyle & Mike Osborne in their Nissan "Happy Coats" at the finish at the Bright Sportsground 

But, you know, none of these counts as “most poignant”.

That’s reserved for the next four years

 when I took over the Director's job.

And later on shared 

that role with 

Ian Richards.

We had a caravan permanently parked in the camping ground at Bright and we

spent weekend after weekend with the “Directors mob” living in that caravan.

 

Surveying and interviewing by day and reducing the store of Baileys Vintage Port by night produced the occasions, complete with campfires, which will always remain uppermost in my memories of the Alpine!

Hey, I forgot the 68 Blizzard!  

We stopped at the Mt Hotham control in a gale so strong that with both windows down the snow went straight in the navigator’s window and out the other side!  

Within two minutes, it was still travelling horizontal to the ground but in the opposite direction!

Frank Kilfoyle

Credits

Pictures

Chris Brown

Rod Steffanoni

Simon Brown

Auto Action

Research

Simon Brown

Brent Fletcher

Maps

Geo R Broadbent

Additional Material

rallypedia.com.au

Tom Snooks - Australian Rally History

Racing Car News

National Library of Australia https://trove.nla.gov.au/