RallySport Magazine April 2017

RETRO: THE BP RALLY
DEVIOUS DONALD ....
Story:
JEFF WHITTEN
Donald Kingsley Thomson (aka
DKT) was the man responsible
for the formation of CAMS in
the 1950s.
Thomson quickly gained a reputation
for being single-minded and a man who
enjoyed setting challenges, particularly
where car trials were concerned. Being
a keen navigator and event organiser,
he obtained sponsorship from oil giant
BP and began directing the legendary
BP Rally, a fearsome navigational event
that was unequalled anywhere else in
the world.
Each event was more challenging and
devious than the last, but competitors
kept coming back for more.
At the conclusion of the 1961 BP
Rally, the 50-odd competitors who
had been exhausted, confused,
disheartened, totally broken in spirit
and generally lead up the garden path
by way of the route instructions devised
by the director, fronted Thomson
and demanded that he never use
unmapped roads in the event again.
Now Donald Thomson, better known
then as the National Secretary of CAMS,
was a devious fellow, but he agreed to
the demands of the competitors.
“If you want mapped roads and
mapped roads only, then you shall have
them,” he told the relieved crews.
As a result, the 1962 BP Rally, directed
by Thomson of course, was run entirely
on mapped roads except where it was
absolutely necessary to use unmapped
roads, using instructions so simple that
even a child could follow them.
Thomson scoured Victoria for
mapped roads which, although shown
clearly on the Broadbent’s maps, had
fallen into such disuse in many cases
that forests had grown over them, or
which were surrounded by a maze of
unmapped tracks.
Indeed in some cases these
unmapped “roads” were in better
condition than the mapped ones, so
that it was impossible to distinguish
right from wrong.
These, together with a couple of
other tricks Thomson had up his sleeve,
ensured that the 1962 BP Rally of South
Eastern Australia was a nightmare
event that many competitors would not
forget in a hurry.
The July 1962 issue of Australian
“The 50-odd
crews had been
exhausted, confused,
disheartened, totally
broken in spirit and
generally lead up the
garden path.”
Motor Sports and Automobiles
contained a post-event report on the
event, which described the event in
graphic
detail, showing that Thomson’s level
of navigational debauchery knew no
bounds.
Twenty four cars left Melbourne’s
Light Car Club on Wednesday May 2 nd
for the epic 2000 mile (3200km) four
day journey through some of the state’s
most picturesque country.
Two more cars started from
Goulburn NSW, three from Adelaide,
four from Mt Gambier and three from
Tasmania. The following Sunday, 23
out of the original 35 starters, some
much the worse for wear, limped into
the finish at Melbourne’s Chadstone
shopping centre.
All competitors had linked up at
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