I’m literally just home from Yorkshire and having had pretty poor internet in our hotel last night could do little more than read feedback and hit the like button now and again!
This is another thank you thread and but I’ll make no mention of organisers or volunteers this time. I simply want to thank the 1500plus drivers and lets guess at 1000 more passengers (2500 people at least) who all turned up on a cold, windy (potentially wet) day at an old airfield in Yorkshire on Sunday.
Thanks to every one of you. Thank you first for just being there of course but thank you especially for your supreme patience with some of the waiting around, the queues for the loos and the food. The simple explanation for all that of course is you folks smashed through every figure that had been anticipated in terms of a turn out! I stood and watched the line of cars parked up on the run way get longer and longer and longer, as more and more piled in simply in the anticipation of being in on something BIG.
More loos, more food and drink, more signs, more marshals, etc. etc. all possible in hind sight now but I don’t think in anyone’s wildest dreams did we imagine the sort of response to the call out to get to Elvington as we got on that cold, dull Sunday.
So thank you all again, we are well aware where we might have gone wrong, but we also know that we all did something very special on Sunday. We now have a long wait to see if Guinness will verify all our data and grant us the Guinness worlds records, but what ever happens for me I was in exactly the right place at the right time on Sunday (even when I was queuing for the loo!). That was a one huge vote of confidence in the MX-5 the MX-5 community and the Owners Club which I hope we are all proud to be a part of.
This photo is actually of cars on the move can you believe, look at those almost straight lines, and I reckon its less that a third or a quarter of all of us.!
Who’s still got “close the gap!” ringing in their ears?
I was surprised until I realised after the event that many drivers weren’t actually aware of the requirement for maximum of a two car lengths gap.
Some attended the drivers briefing and listened on 87.7 MHz. Some missed the briefing (we missed it because we weren’t made aware of it) but saw the boards asking drivers to listen on 87.7 MHz, which we did (after finally working out how the radio could be manually tuned rather than automatically bypassing it).
Some drivers for a number of possible reasons did neither and obviously took the parade to be just a jolly, free for all jaunt down a runway! One driver I spoke to afterwards said it was one of the most boring traffic jams he’d ever been in and considered dropping out when he realised we were going round for a second go, let alone a third…
Wow thank you Martin what fantastic picture. From most of us it was an honour to be part of such a special day. The MX5 club is friendly and so very well supported. I have only joined recently but so glad I did. All us true MX5 enthusiast’s wanted to be part of this exceptional day so despite some negatives please accept a big big thank you for making this happen and be very proud too. This goes to all the people involved in helping, giving up their time and effort to support us.
Massive thank you and well done from us to all involved with organizing the event, it must have been a huge task!
8 of us made it up in 4 cars, we promised to get a customer car ready and did it with one day to spare, they were blown away at the turn out and we all had a fantastic day!
As this was my 1st rally i really didnt know what to expect, but i can say i really enjoyed it,
Everyone was really friendly and i was amazed to see the turn out which i know caused problems with catering / toilets etc
But overall had a really good day and hope that the records are broken,
Lastly i would like to apologise if you were one of the half dozen or so following me of the last roundabout before elvington where i missed the turning and had to do a quick u turn !
