This year, everyone who enters a pre-war car is receiving a very special raffle ticket. We are assembling a list of mouthwatering prizes, including a Tiger Moth flight, dinner for two at a Michelin-starred restaurant and today we have added a climb up the hill in this stunning and very swift 1927 Type 37A Bugatti, courtesy of its owner and BOC President Charles Trevelyan. Additional tickets will be on sale in the morning at the Vintage Minor Register marquee and from any of the Air Cadets in the Paddock. The draw will take place in the lunch break, directly after the auction of donated spares and automobilia. All of the funds raised by the raffle and the auction will be donated to the RAF Charitable Trust, our designated charity. So please sort through your motor home and bring along any unwanted quality items for the auction and drop them off at the VMR Marquee in the morning.
The work level at PWP HQ USA is reaching fever pitch right now as entries continue to arrive and a zillion things and incoming e-mails and phone calls need to be sorted before we fly to London on the 16th (I had a call at 1-30 this morning from a chap in Swindon asking for tickets! Poor chap didn’t realise he was calling Seatte!). The latest entry today was an Alvis Speed 20, making a record entry of 20 pre-war Alvises so far. We are currently at 248 entries and we’re receiving many spectator entries every day right now. I will be posting the last tickets from Seattle tomorrow (I can’t today – its Independence day here!) and then all further ticketing will be handled by John Hicks in Gotherington who is holding plenty of spare tickets. And as we count down to the day, we can STILL arrange last-minute advance tickets which will be enveloped nad waiting for you at the gate on Saturday morning. Of course you can turn up on the day in your pre-war car and enter at the gate, but you won’t receive your free climb, your free Commemorative Programme (which I approved the print proof of this morning) or your free five pound raffle ticket. The same is true for spectators. You can enter online in advance for ten pounds per person or pay fifteen pounds on the gate.
I just ticketed Peter McFadyen, photographer for The Automobile and a friend of Pre-War Prescott, who will be penning a write-up about the day for the Magazine.
Climbs next. Right now we have allocated 471 climbs which is slightly less than last year. From experience we know that not everyone who enters uses their climb ticket or tickets – for a variety of reasons, so filling the hill with climbs is much more of an art than a science. It also all depends on any delays due to stoppages, and last year we had no less than three stoppages caused by drivers’ GoPro cameras falling off their cars on the way up the hill, thereby wasting valuable climb slots. Can I therefore ask anyone who is planning to bring along a camera to please avail themselves of a motorsport-grade mount. We will be making checks at the start line.
And a reminder that everyone who intends to climb the hill – be they drivers or passengers – MUST attend a safety briefing where they will receive a wrist band. These wrist bands will be checked by the start line marshals. The first briefing will take place at 9-30 a.m. at the BOC office and further briefings will take place periodically throughout the day as required by demand. The hill will open at 10 a.m. and we need to keep the start line marshals busy right from the start.
And the other really good news is that the weather forecast for the weekend is looking warm and dry!
Finally for this time, an important announcement about PWP 2020. The date for the Isle of Man Manx TT has been changed for 2020 and this has had a knock-on effect down the motorsport calendar. Long story short – we have had the date for PWP 2020 brought forward to Saturday 13th JUNE by the Bugatti Owners’ Club. As a result, there will be five weeks less to plan and so entries will officially open at PWP 2019 where entry forms will be available at the Vintage Minor Register marquee. Obviously the online entry form cannot be updated before this year’s event – I’ll do this when we return in early August, but if anyone would like an entry form now, just e-mail me at vintageminor@gmail.com and I will return a form to you as an attachment.
I’ll try to post news updates daily from here on in, so do stop by here regularly as they days count down.