Way back in the early 1960s the Pioneer Motor Club as it then was named, held a weekend of events to commemorate its fifty years of existence.
Festivities started with a social gathering on the Friday evening and culminated with a NZ Championship race meeting at the old New Brighton horse racecourse a couple of days later.
Why are we telling you this old boring stuff?
Well, dear Pioneer member, your committee has embarked on the gigantic undertaking to do something similar early next year to mark our 100th year of existence. Not an achievement to be sneezed at particularly in Christchurch where motorcycle clubs have come and gone quicker than promises of rate reductions from the City Council. Preliminary thoughts include the following:
A get-together for current and past members on a Friday evening followed over the next two days by a fun hillclimb, sidecar activities, gymkhana, possibly a Greybeards trial on the same day as the aforementioned, and a trial similar to that held when Mick Andrews was last here to complete the programme. The trial would have sections for modern bikes and also some laid out as in the trials of fifty years ago – somewhat akin to today’s Classic trials.
On the Saturday evening there would be a feed and a speech by a keynote speaker very well known in the motorcycle world. At this function it is hoped to run a continuous display of movies and slides from the Club’s events in the past. Also every effort is being made to get together a display of bikes that have a distinct connection with the club’s history. Does anyone know the present whereabouts of “The Chuffer”?
A date early in February looks likely at this stage so keep it in mind when planning holidays etc. As soon as possible everyone will be advised of the date to put in your diaries.
In the meantime this is what we want from you NOW
1 Advise anyone you know who is a former club member and urge them to come along and meet some of the people he/she used to compete against
2 Have a good think about the above listed programme and let us know of anything you think could be included to widen appeal
3 Let us know of the location of any old bikes which would fit in with the display proposals
4 Similarly, let us know if you have any slides or films which could be available to show at the function or if you know someone who has some that we could approach
Please please give these requests full consideration and help make the jubilee a very memorable event at least as good as the 1963 one was. After all we don’t want the old buggars who ran that show (many of them are still around) crowing that things were done much better in the good old days.