2016 Great Race route announced

By Matt Litwin

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March 18, 2015 Race number 9


Team Hemmings’s 1932 Ford Speedster arrives in New Bern, North Carolina, during the 2014 Great Race. Photo by author.

There are still three months of planning and preparation ahead for the roughly 100 teams entered to compete in the 2015 Hemmings Motor News Great Race presented by Hagerty, which will start in Kirkwood, Missouri, and travel along Route 66 through Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico and Arizona, before finishing in Santa Monica, California. However, during the 2015 Amelia Island Concours d’Elegance, Great Race and Coker Tire Company owner Corky Coker announced that the 2016 edition of the legendary vintage car rally will travel along the historic Lincoln Highway.

Scheduled to begin on June 18, 2016, the Great Race will start on California’s Gold Coast, before heading east through Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, South Dakota and Iowa, and then finishing in Illinois on June 26. As has become a Great Race tradition, teams will be able to see many of the route’s historic natural and man-made monuments, such as the Golden Gate Bridge, Lake Tahoe, the Bonneville Salt Flats, the Rocky Mountains, of course, the Crazy Horse Monument, Mount Rushmore and other interesting sights.

First run in 1983, the Hemmings Motor News Great Race presented by Hagerty is arguably the quintessential time/distance/endurance rally open to all 1972 and older collectible cars, trucks and motorcycles (yes, a motorcycle competed once). Based on experience, team entries compete in five divisions: Grand Champion, Expert, Sportsman, Rookie and X-Cup divisions, the latter reserved for college and high school teams. Initially a cross-country adventure, in recent years it’s been massaged to a more manageable 2,400-mile, nine-day test of man and machine, and the 2016 Great Race looks to continue that practice.

Although the 2015 Great Race has been sold out, early registration is already open for 2016 for teams wishing to compete in this northern west-to-east adventure along the Lincoln Highway. For more information, or to register, visit GreatRace.com.

A quick note to those who would like to catch segments of either the 2015 or ’16 Great Race: As is always the case, the exact rally route is kept secret to prevent teams from practicing. Before the start of each day’s stage, teams are given course instructions just one hour before their start time. No GPS or maps are permitted in the rally vehicles, so drivers and navigators must rely on analog watches and course instructions to get from point A to B successfully and on time. The best locations to see the cars and meet the drivers/navigators are at the day’s lunch and dinner stops. Exact locations for each day’s stops will become available as details are finalized, or you can monitor the official Great Race website, where you can also learn more about the Great Race history, rules and award structure.

 

Race number 60