THE Swan Hill Sporting Car Club have unveiled their calendar for the upcoming season, with hopes high that they can return to some normality and get people back in the driver’s seat.
With the past two seasons being heavily impacted due to COVID regulations, President Chris Gibson is hoping for a better year in 2022, with all events to be held this year to be two-day events to give competitors as much time as possible in the driver’s seat.
“It has definitely been hit and miss over the past two years, we only had one event go ahead in 2020 in March and we were able to have a couple more last year but finished around June or July so we missed a fair few there as well,” he said.
The first event scheduled is in early March with Mr Gibson hoping that they are able to hold the event with no complications popping up in the meantime, but understands the uncertain times we are living in.
“We just have to roll with the punches, we can only hope that we are able to go ahead with no issues, but if that is not the case we continue on and try again a bit later on in the year at the next event,” he said.
As like a lot of sports locally, a lot of time behind the scenes goes into making sure sports can go ahead, with a decision to be made about 10 days before the first event as to whether it can go ahead.
“It takes a good four to five days to get the track ready to compete on, probably longer this time around as it hasn’t been used for so long, so we need to make a judgement call on whether it is viable for us to compete,” Mr Gibson said.
With such a big venue the opportunity is there for the Club to run events with quite a large attendance, but they are only committed to being able to run safe events aligning with the restrictions in place.
Offering the cheapest form of Motorsport in Swan Hill, the Club also focuses on training drivers of all abilities how to control their vehicle when they venture off road, which is especially important for learner drivers.
With the club having such a social presence the past couple of years have been extremely hard, with the social aspect of events effectively banned, however hopes are going forward this can be reintroduced.
“We are a social club, we allow the drivers to take around passengers around with them, and that is how we get a lot of new members, so we definitely want that social aspect to be reintroduced this year,” Mr Gibson said.
Anybody who is interested in further information regarding the Swan Hill Sporting Car Club is encouraged to visit their social media pages or website to find out more.
