Man on Road

The Gil Davis Rally Diaries Chapter One Gil Davis asked me in late 2000 if I wanted to fill the Navigators seat beside him in the then Burnt Orange 180B SSS, complete with auto trans, taking over from his long-term Navigator David Long. The first event was the 2000 Millennium Alpine Trial run by Gordon – Trout – Douglas for the Albury Wodonga and District Car Club. Strangely enough, nearly 25 years earlier, in the 1976 Kleber Alpine Rally Gil Davis /David Long and Chris Brown and myself finished equal 8 th . The Millennium Alpine Trial was a different Alpine thou, more like an Experts Trial rather than those Alpines between that Kleber Alpine Rally in 1976 and last one in 1994; being a night of difficult navigation, which was a big wakeup call for me as hadn’t competed in many similar event for about 15 years! What was obvious straight away was the Gil was a stubborn old rally professional who would never give up and we finished in 4 th place finishing around 4.00am.  Th...

  The Hawker Eleven Cricket Match, Good Friday April 2014 It was Good Friday afternoon and the Sydney to London Classic Marathon service crews were fobbing around waiting for our cars to arrive; once again, this time on the side of the Hawker to Wilpena Pound highway, when one of Pat Coles service crew found this lump of wood, then another crew dragged a tennis ball out of there “kit“ and a bucket was produced from someone’s Service Trailer. The Hawker 11 on a fast pitch And so it started – a Test Match series with the Aussies Services Crews v the Poms & Welsh Crews - and then travelled west across the Nullarbor to Perth over the next 7 days or so.  Even a few other European teams joined in here and there to assist the Tourists. The Test Series continued across the Nullabour, here a Welsh batsman  attempts to hit the ball all the way from Kimba to Cardiff.   Anyway, back to the first pic, this road was becoming rather busy the longer it went on as many Adelaide...

  On the road with Man on Road An except from my May 2014 travel blog “My travels as a Gypsy Rover from Sydney to London” as I followed the Sydney to London Classic Marathon – The Big One. Lunch on Maining Street Sitting at the Zest Bar on the approach to La Rascasse, having a rest from my second lap on foot of the Monaco Grand Prix track I notice just how many cars have done multiple laps of this construction site, as it is being prepared for the Monaco Grand Prix Historique in a few days. Is this an upmarket version of that famed Australian country town activity known as "Maining" I ask myself. For those unaware “Maining” is the Ozzie outback town evening activity of drivin’ up and down the main street being seen. Matt deVaus and myself had witnessed an example in Broken Hill just a few days back whilst walking back to our lodgings from dinner at “The Demo” (Broken Hill Barrier Social Democratic Club). There they were in their VL Commodores' and HiLux Ute's - ...

Man on Road I am asked many times. Where did the nondeplume Man on Road come from?   Whilst it may feel that my rally blog fans think Man on Road has been on the road for eons, the term only entered my Rally story world in September 2008 on a dark dusty night (very early morning) some 20 or so kms East of Tibooburra in far North West New South Wales, not far from the Border to Queensland via Warri Gate whilst competing in the Red Centre to Gold Coast Trial.   It is correct that I have been on the road in the rally world since I first wagged a day off school at St Bede’s College Mentone and went, along with older brother Chris to the start of the 1973 BP Rally of SE Australia at Chadstone Shopping Centre in early May.     Warwick Smith even has a picture of me (Man on Road) standing next to Colin Bond and himself in the -to be - well used HDT Kingswood at the start of the 1973 BP Rally  of South Eastern Australia. Chris and I then travelled to the Ba...