Orange, Calif.--After logging about 9 million miles in its first 24 years of competition (if you count up all the miles driven by the event's individual teams), the Great Race will take on a hint of green when teams enter the starting gate in Concord, N.C., on June 30.
For the first time, the annual two-week transcontinental road rally for vintage, classic, and historic cars will include a class for modern alternative-technology cars, including electric vehicles, hybrids, flex-fuel power trains, and other such similar systems.
In adding a class for those vehicles, the goal is to showcase new technology, said Bill Ewing, CEO of Rally Partners, the organizers of the Great Race.
"The Great Race was founded to celebrate people's love affair with the automobile," he said. "The 25th anniversary Great Race celebrates that love affair by including the next generation of automobiles in a competition alongside classic automobiles."
For the first time also, the Great Race will extend its list of eligible vehicles to include hot rods and muscle cars through the 1969 model year.
"The Great Race is a blast in any car, so why not a '69 GTO," Ewing said. "The race is really about adventure on the open roads of America. With the popularity of muscle cars, we felt it necessary to open the competition to anyone with a classic car and a passion for adventure."
What won't change about the event is its reputation as a genuine 4,000-mile endurance test for teams and machines.
"There won't be many changes in the nature of the route," said Great Race Director of Competition John Classen. "It will be a southerly route this year. Then once we get to the desert, we will move a little north and a little higher, where it won't be quite as hot as the lower desert. We will visit Rio Rancho in New Mexico and Flagstaff in Arizona rather than Phoenix, for example."
Classen said Irving, Texas, will serve as the midpoint of the 2007 contest and host the rally's traditional day off on July 7.
The rally will finish July 14 in Anaheim, Calif., as part of the city's yearlong sesquicentennial festivities.
In addition to its own silver-anniversary celebration, the Great Race will also mark the diamond jubilee of Ford's landmark flathead V-8. The Great Race has named the '32 Ford Deuce as the event's featured marque.
"For 75 years, the Deuce has been a symbol of style, automotive expression, and American ingenuity," Ewing said. "When it was introduced, the '32 Ford brought style and V-8 performance to the mass market. Even today, it continues to influence automotive culture."
To enable Deuce owners to take part in the celebration--tagged already by some as the world's longest '32 Ford celebration--the Great Race will offer one-week Deuce East and Deuce West options that will run concurrently with the full transcontinental event. Deuce East will run from Concord to Irving, Deuce West from Irving to Anaheim.
Ewing said the goal of Deuce East and Deuce West is to encourage '32 Ford owners to help celebrate one of the most significant automobiles of all time.
The 2007 Great Race also marks the return of Interstate Batteries as a sponsor and the return of the word "American" as part of the event's official name.
The Great Race was co-founded by in 1983 by Texas entrepreneur Tom McRae and Interstate Batteries' Norm Miller. Known originally as the Great American Race, the word "American" was dropped from the title in 1996 at the request of Daytona 500 officials, who use the trademarked reference for their event. Now the rally has permission from the Florida Speedway to again use the title "Great American Race," said Mike Ewing, director of Marketing and Communications for Rally Partners.
In 2008, the Great American Race will enter the international arena when it honors its namesake, the around-the-world Great Race of 1908. As with the original event, the start and finish of the 21,000-mile contest will be New York City and Paris, France, respectively. The 2008 event will retrace much of the original 1908 route.
Regardless of the name, or the kind of vehicle you drive, the Great Race remains a genuine adventure, said Curtis Graf, who has run every modern Great Race since McRae and Miller hosted the inaugural cross-country rally in 1983. It is a new adventure every year, he said.
"You meet old friends and you make new ones," he said. "You see new places and new cities and new cars."
Graf has run the Great Race in everything from a 1916 Packard to a Roush-prepared flathead Ford. For a self-confessed car guy like himself, the Great Race is not to be missed, he said.
"You can have all kinds of fun on Sunday afternoon, sitting around and watching NASCAR go round and round, but there's still nothing like getting out on the road and competing yourself. It's the best. And I say that from the bottom of my heart."
2007 Great Race Schedule (Overnight Stops)
Sat., 6/30 Start, Concord, N.C.
Sat., 6/30 Spartanburg, S.C.
Sun., 07/01 Chattanooga, Tenn.
Mon., 7/2 Nashville, Tenn.
Tues., 7/3 Germantown, Tenn.
Wed., 7/4 Fort Smith, Ark.
Thur., 7/5 Norman, Okla.
Fri., 7/6 Irving, Texas
Sat., 7/7 Rest Day, Irving, Texas
Sun., 7/8 Abilene, Texas
Mon., 7/9 Clovis, N.M.
Tue., 7/10 Rio Rancho, N.M.
Wed., 7/11 Flagstaff, Ariz.
Thur., 7/12 Laughlin, Nev.
Fri., 7/13 Pomona/Fairplex, Calif.
Sat., 7/14 Finish, Anaheim, Calif.
Comment on this article
Send This Link To Friend