The Eastern Southland Car Club celebrated its 70th anniversary at the Croydon Lodge Hotel in Gore recently with a dinner, annual prizegiving and a Q&A panel discussion with some of the country’s best rally stars.
Four tireless workers for the club were made life members — David Kirk and Brigg Henderson, plus husband and wife Glenn and Ismay Howden, all responding to the accolade by underlining how much they enjoy the club.
A special cake to mark the anniversary was cut by Life Members Stewart Quertier and Ismay Howden while the club’s annual prizegiving recognised success in the many events over the 2025/26 season.
Ryan Howden was crowned club champion for the season, the 16-year-old the youngest competitor to have achieved the feat.
He scored 162 points to head off his father Glenn on 133 points with Neville Krammer third just two points further back.
Ryan also won Class B in the Club Championship while other class winners were Travis Belt in Class A, Ricky Ward (Class C) and Krammer (Class D).
Ryan’s very successful season also saw him collect both the Laird Family Challenge Trophy as the junior (under 25) champion and the Harry Ross Challenge Trophy as the junior (under 18 champion) ahead of Robbie Batt and Rielly Fieten.
He also won the under 18 Autocross Championship and the overall ClubSport Championship with 143 points ahead of Craig Jessop on 122 points and his father Glenn Howden with 112 points.
He was also the recipient of the BCM Memorial Trophy for the club’s most consistent competitor.
It was a spectacular haul of trophies in just his fourth year in the sport.
Carter Strang of Wallacetown won the Hillclimb Cup from Glenn Howden and club president Nigel King.
He also won the Gravel Sprint Cup, the Kelly Cup for the Slopedown Hillclimb, the Rally Challenge Trophy and the Gravel Events Trophy from Josh Cooper and Brendon Mitchell.
Glenn Howden took the Wright Stephenson Trophy which dates back to 1955 for the Motorkhana Championship, winning it from Josh Cooper and Damian Vincent, while Neville Krammer took the McManus Cup for the Autocross Championship from Glenn Howden and Roger Laird.
Karen Ward of Dunedin won the Ladies Challenge Trophy, and Reilly Fieten the New Competitor Award while Craig Jessop won the South Otago Challenge Cup after finishing fourth overall in the club championship.
Club member of the year was Neville Peters while Brendon Mitchell won the Hard Luck Award for the season.
The evening concluded with a panel of rally stars — Jeff Judd, Derek Ayson, Andrew Graves, Emma Gilmour, Kevin Laird, Jared Hudson, Carter Strang, Caleb Macdonald and Hayden Paddon — facing questions covering topics as diverse as to who in the team should check the tyre pressures, their preference for older or more modern machinery, other sports and hobbies they enjoyed, advice for newcomers to motorsport, favourite cars, favourite rally stages and stories of when some of their events went pear shaped. The answers were both informative and at times amusing.
The first meeting of the Eastern Southland Car Club took place in the Charlton Hall on June 11, 1956.