The South Eastern Automobile Club’s sister club, Limestone Coast Off Road Club Inc (LCORC) put together a Khanacross event for Round 3 of the SEAC 2024 series, held at the Mount Gambier Showgrounds car park.


Club stalwart, Paul (Keg) Height ably assisted by Alison doing the behind the scenes work and other club members to man the official positions for the day, put together some simple but very entertaining courses for the 22 entrants to attempt on the day’s outing.


At the driver’s briefing, Paul and Alison, together with Jim Coombe were awarded life membership for the effort these people had given to the small club over its 15 years of successful operation, a fitting tribute to each of these busy people in what they had done in assembling competition activities over the years, assisting with the organisation of club and state level off road events.


The term “easy tracks” has always caused some drivers to attack with a little too much effort, resulting in the course markers jumping into the path of the vehicle, costing the competitor five seconds for each one that an official has to go out and reposition.


This was very evident on each of the courses that had been provided, going by the added penalties against the offending drivers.


Course layout for the warm up, a simple short and enjoyable track, Sam Thomas set the quickest time (41.19) from Phil Wilson (43.20) Josh Munn 3rd (43.26) Geoff Wilson 4th (44.02) Paul Razum 5th (44.24) Bruno Vadori 6th (44.73) Henry Sims 7th (45.32) Brad Bliss 8th (45.61) Denvor Herbertson 9th (45.79) and Jason Sims 10th (46.12).


Same layout 2nd run, Sam Thomas a little quicker (40.67) and again fastest, Jason Sims next (42.70) Damien Wilson 3rd (43.13) Harry Bliss 4th (43.16) Paul Razum 5th (43.20) Phil Wilson 6th (43.43) Henry Sims 7th (43.86) Denvor Herbertson 8th (44.02) Justin Devlin 9th (44.33) Brad Bliss 10th (44.89).


Reverse direction of this “simple” track, Sam Thomas 1st (40.82) Henry Sims 2nd (42.60) Paul Razum 3rd (42.94) Phil Wilson 4th (43.58) Jason Sims 5th (43.66) Harry Bliss 6th (43.88) Justin Devlin 7th (44.42) Denvor Herbertson 8th (45.14) Bruce Hamilton 9th (45.18) Bruno Vadori 10th (45.35).


Second pass, Sam Thomas again 1st (40.77) from Henry Sims 2nd (43.04) Phil Wilson 3rd (44.21) Max Viitanen 4th with a clear run (44.48) Paul Razum 5th (44.53) Justin Devlin 6th (44.59) Jason Sims 7th (44.68) Damien Wilson 8th (45.12) Harry Bliss 9th (45.27) and Geoff Wilson 10th (45.31).


Some changes made and a drive around by all competitors, Jason Sims made the best of this track (39.70) with Paul Razum 2nd (40.03) Phil Wilson 3rd (40.11) Damien Wilson 4th (40.27) Henry Sims 5th (40.42) Geoff Wilson 6th (41.59) Josh Munn 7th (42.60) Bruno Vadori 8th (42.62) Max Viitanen 9th (42.81) Cohen Hamilton 10th (42.82).


Also runs for this saw 4 with a cone penalty and 3 who drove a different track and copped the dreaded WD penalty (not for well done!).


Same direction, second pass, Sam Thomas 1st (38.06) Jason Sims 2nd (40.16) Phil Wilson 3rd (40.41) Henry Sims (40.52) Paul Razum 5th (40.95) Denvor Herbertson 6th (41.14) Brad Bliss 7th (41.29) Justin Devlin 8th (41.44) Geoff Wilson 9th (41.74) Charlie Evans 10th (41.79).


Previous track, reverse direction and Sam Thomas 1st (35.09) Harry Bliss 2nd (37.44) Paul Razum 3rd (37.58) Phil Wilson 4th (38.04) Jason Sims 5th (38.05) Justin Devlin 6th (38.27) Geoff Wilson 7th (38.71) Bruno Vadori 8th (39.25) Charlie Evans 9th (39.36) and Blair Meek 10th (39.71).


Second run and Sam Thomas 1st (35.45) Phil Wilson 2nd (37.84) Jason Sims 3rd (38.02) Harry Bliss 4th (38.09) Justin Devlin 5th (38.18) Henry Sims 6th (38.79) Charlie Evans 7th (39.37) Brad Bliss 8th (39.40) Denvor Herbertson 9th (40.06) equal with Bruce Hamilton 9th (40.06).


Another course change and a “look around” drive by all drivers, Jason Sims made good use of the direction changes and set quickest time (40.52) from Geoff Wilson 2nd (40.68) Harry Bliss 3rd (41.32) Phil Wilson 4th (41.36) Paul Razum 5th (41.38) Justin Devlin 6th (41.39) Henry Sims 7th (41.43) Max Viitanen 8th (42.13) Damien Wilson 9th (42.34) and Denvor Herbertson 10th (42.37).


Note the times for 3rd to 7th were a little over one tenth of a second apart, 41.32 to 41.43 seconds covering 5 competitors.


Last run, same direction, Sam Thomas quickest (38.14), Henry Sims 2nd with another good drive (40.08) beating dad, Jason 3rd (40.64) Paul Razum 4th (41.32) Geoff Wilson 5th (41.40) Justin Devlin 6th (41.73) Denvor Herbertson 7th (41.91) Phil Wilson 8th (41.93) Damien Wilson 9th (42.19) and Josh Munn 10th (43.04).


Again less than a second spread over 5 drivers, 41.32 to 41.93 seconds.


Next event on the SEAC calendar is a Touring Road Event (TRE) on August 3, followed by a Motorkhana on August 11 and an Autocross on August 25.


Volunteers will be needed for each of these events, so, if you can spare a little of your time to help run these events, make contact with the club – any of the members – and also on Thursday afternoons at the club office, corner Wireless Road East and Attamurra Road.