“With the event held bi-annually and growing in local as well as international popularity, we surveyed the events past competitors, and they responded with the majority sending us a strong message indicating a need for a fresh look, and to make this a truly New Zealand event” said rally chairman, Hamilton’s Gary Smith.
“Yes the North Island will bring a whole load of new challenges, but nothing our small but dedicated organising team feel can’t be overcome. We started from nothing in 2006 down south, and have built up a great team of can-do people who want the event to succeed” Smith said.
Organisers will now begin the process of planning the rally route and overnight stops. This will entail meeting with, and working closely with, Car Clubs, Local Councils, land owners and community groups.
“We can’t emphasise enough that without the support of all these people an event of this size could never happen. However our preliminary discussions suggest a positive attitude with everyone working together to make another successful event” Smith added.
Previous rally manager, Timaru’s Carl Rabbidge commented, “I have every confidence that our South Island based event management team members will enjoy the challenge that the North Island environment will bring”.
Rabbidge added “the whole team have done a fantastic job in establishing the NZ Silver Fern Rally as the world’s premier marathon car rally and the intention is to return south in 2014, and then maybe alternate islands if this idea works.”
The 2012 NZ Silver Fern Rally has been calendared by MotorSport New Zealand, for the week of November 10th – 18th 2012.
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