Big prizes up for grabs at Waikaraka Park

3 February, 2016

There’s set to be plenty of action in late February at Waikaraka Family Speedway, with around $16K in prize and appearance money up for grabs. February 20 will see the Modified Grand Prix in action, in which drivers will not only get the chance to settle old rivalries but also be in with a chance to take home their share of $4K. Almost 30 cars are already entered and will provide a great spectacle for the crowd as they race for victory. While hometown hero Jamie ‘Foxy’ Fox is known as the man to beat at Waikaraka, he’ll have his work cut out for him to stay at the head of the pack with that much cash for the taking.

The Modified Dirt Cup a week later, on February 27, will see the prize pool boost up to almost $12K, the largest on offer in the sport.

Then the ever-popular Teams Nationals will hit the Waikaraka clay on March 4 and 5. The event will see eight top teams from around the country, including the Palmerston Panthers, the Nelson Tigers, the Gisborne Giants, and the Baypark Busters, face off for national bragging rights. 

For more info and tickets, visit waikarakafamilyspeedway.co.nz.

Design accord

You can’t get much more of an art deco car than a Cord — so much so that new owners, Paul McCarthy and his wife, Sarah Selwood, went ahead and took their Beverly 812 to Napier’s Art Deco Festival this year, even though the festival itself had been cancelled.
“We took delivery of the vehicle 12 days before heading off to Napier. We still drove it all around at the festival,” says Paul.
The utterly distinctive chrome grille wrapping around the Cord’s famous coffin-shaped nose, and the pure, clean lines of the front wing wheel arches, thanks to its retractable headlamps, are the essence of deco. This model, the Beverly, has the finishing touch of the bustle boot that is missing from the Westchester saloon.

Motorman: When New Zealand built the Model T Ford

History has a way of surrounding us, hidden in plain sight. I was one of a group who had been working for years in an editorial office in Augustus Terrace in the Auckland city fringe suburb of Parnell who had no idea that motoring history had been made right around the corner. Our premises actually backed onto a century-old brick building in adjacent Fox Street that had seen the wonder of the age, brand-new Model T Fords, rolling out the front door seven decades earlier.
Today, the building is an award-winning two-level office building, comprehensively refurbished in 2012. Happily, 6 Fox Street honours its one time claim to motoring fame. Next door are eight upmarket loft apartments, also on the site where the Fords were completed. Elsewhere, at 89 Courtenay Place, Wellington, and Sophia Street, Timaru, semi-knocked-down Model Ts were also being put together, completing a motor vehicle that would later become known as the Car of the Century.