Banger Rallies
Discussion
I've done two. One in 2006 and the other in 2012.
They were run by StreetSafari but they won't be doing any more European ones.
They are great fun but also expensive and tiring. Those ones were calais to Naples over four days.
I'm not sure what else is out there but don't expect it to be a package holiday.
Viterbo 2006...
I gave that one away to another Scottish based team in return for bringing my tools home. It did a 10:38 round the Nordschlieffe on the way bcak, they used it for a year then took it to Prague where it died.
Video...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wFmR6_EcaIY
2012's car...
Giving it away to a Russian ex-pat who I found at a scrap yard in Rome. As you do...
After the 2300 miles or so, it was really starting to fall apart, but it got us there and rescued another three people who's car packed up on the last day in 45* heat. I did smell a bit after.
They were run by StreetSafari but they won't be doing any more European ones.
They are great fun but also expensive and tiring. Those ones were calais to Naples over four days.
I'm not sure what else is out there but don't expect it to be a package holiday.
Viterbo 2006...
I gave that one away to another Scottish based team in return for bringing my tools home. It did a 10:38 round the Nordschlieffe on the way bcak, they used it for a year then took it to Prague where it died.
Video...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wFmR6_EcaIY
2012's car...
Giving it away to a Russian ex-pat who I found at a scrap yard in Rome. As you do...
After the 2300 miles or so, it was really starting to fall apart, but it got us there and rescued another three people who's car packed up on the last day in 45* heat. I did smell a bit after.
Edited by Big Rod on Tuesday 7th January 12:42
Yeah, the founder of StreetSafari may have handed the running of it over to someone else as I'm pretty sure the one I was on was the last ever Euro one under the old management.
Even if you don't do that one, get some mates, buy some cheap cars then draw up a list of places you want to visit. To be honest, other than setting the meeting places, keeping track of the scores for the challenges and pointing you roughly in the right direction, the rest is entirely up to you anyway
Even if you don't do that one, get some mates, buy some cheap cars then draw up a list of places you want to visit. To be honest, other than setting the meeting places, keeping track of the scores for the challenges and pointing you roughly in the right direction, the rest is entirely up to you anyway
Big Rod said:
I've done two. One in 2006 and the other in 2012.
They were run by StreetSafari but they won't be doing any more European ones.
They are great fun but also expensive and tiring. Those ones were calais to Naples over four days.
I'm not sure what else is out there but don't expect it to be a package holiday.
Viterbo 2006...
I gave that one away to another Scottish based team in return for bringing my tools home. It did a 10:38 round the Nordschlieffe on the way bcak, they used it for a year then took it to Prague where it died.
Video...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wFmR6_EcaIY
2012's car...
Giving it away to a Russian ex-pat who I found at a scrap yard in Rome. As you do...
After the 2300 miles or so, it was really starting to fall apart, but it got us there and rescued another three people who's car packed up on the last day in 45* heat. I did smell a bit after.
i remember your batmobile senator dude, we were the dicks of hazzard! was one of you dressed as scooby doo?They were run by StreetSafari but they won't be doing any more European ones.
They are great fun but also expensive and tiring. Those ones were calais to Naples over four days.
I'm not sure what else is out there but don't expect it to be a package holiday.
Viterbo 2006...
I gave that one away to another Scottish based team in return for bringing my tools home. It did a 10:38 round the Nordschlieffe on the way bcak, they used it for a year then took it to Prague where it died.
Video...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wFmR6_EcaIY
2012's car...
Giving it away to a Russian ex-pat who I found at a scrap yard in Rome. As you do...
After the 2300 miles or so, it was really starting to fall apart, but it got us there and rescued another three people who's car packed up on the last day in 45* heat. I did smell a bit after.
Edited by Big Rod on Tuesday 7th January 12:42
to the OP - do it, however lots of this year's ones will get sold out soon so get booked up.
One I looked at entering a couple of years ago was the Ramshackle Rally. IIRC they ran several over the year to eastern Europe or the Stelvio pass. £500 car, an minimum sponsorship quota and the car got scrapped at the end.
However, what holds more attraction to my mates and I is to do a top gear cheap car challenge style event, visit where we want to visit and do tasks on the way
However, what holds more attraction to my mates and I is to do a top gear cheap car challenge style event, visit where we want to visit and do tasks on the way
Hairbrakes said:
One I looked at entering a couple of years ago was the Ramshackle Rally. IIRC they ran several over the year to eastern Europe or the Stelvio pass. £500 car, an minimum sponsorship quota and the car got scrapped at the end.
However, what holds more attraction to my mates and I is to do a top gear cheap car challenge style event, visit where we want to visit and do tasks on the way
i've talked with the lads i went on S2N with in 2006 and we've all agreed the same. The organised one was fun but i think if we were to do it again it would be a couple of cars and we sort our own route etc.However, what holds more attraction to my mates and I is to do a top gear cheap car challenge style event, visit where we want to visit and do tasks on the way
Blown2CV said:
i remember your batmobile senator dude, we were the dicks of hazzard! was one of you dressed as scooby doo?
to the OP - do it, however lots of this year's ones will get sold out soon so get booked up.
Haha! Aye, that was us! (Was an Omega though! to the OP - do it, however lots of this year's ones will get sold out soon so get booked up.
)You're gonna have to jog my memory about you though! Were you in the Volvo 480?
A bloke in the next village was driving the 'Puke's a Hazard' Montego. I only found out he lived about 250 yds away while drinking beer alfresco in Sarnen.
Whatever! Pleased to make your acquaintance again!!
Edited by Big Rod on Saturday 11th January 11:08
a lad in work did one last summer - crumball rally I think its called nd had a great time. They chose an old Renault espace and skoda fabia and had no end of problems over the stelvio pass! Im tempted to do one for my stag doo next year but think the costs could still mount up. General idea is to scrap the car before you come home.
Watching thread with interest.
Watching thread with interest.
Big Rod said:
Blown2CV said:
i remember your batmobile senator dude, we were the dicks of hazzard! was one of you dressed as scooby doo?
to the OP - do it, however lots of this year's ones will get sold out soon so get booked up.
Haha! Aye, that was us! (Was an Omega though! to the OP - do it, however lots of this year's ones will get sold out soon so get booked up.
)You're gonna have to jog my memory about you though! Were you in the Volvo 480?
A bloke in the next village was driving the 'Puke's a Hazard' Montego. I only found out he lived about 250 yds away while drinking beer alfresco in Sarnen.
Whatever! Pleased to make your acquaintance again!!
Edited by Big Rod on Saturday 11th January 11:08
s" spray painted on the windscreen backwards courtesy of me.and your acquaintance too!!
I have run bangers on 5 StreetSafari events to Prague, Rome and John O'Groats and helped the organisers on 2 events to Prague. The problem I saw, more than anything else was that the costs spiralled. Not the costs from the organisers the costs of fuel, tolls, hotels, insurance and so on. Last event I did was Home2Rome in 2011 and the three of us paid the best part of £1000 each, over double what we paid in 2006. That covered the car, ferry, hotels, tolls to Rome and back (the Italians are taking the mick charging tolls for those autostradas) and a hideous bar bill in Rome. OK, a lot of it was the bar bill.
StreetSafari ran their last Euro event in 2012 IIRC and, as I said above, H2R 2013 didn't run in the end. Their last US event (BABE) ran last year and I know that one will not return.
Will there be more Euro events? Who knows but not in the near future.
StreetSafari ran their last Euro event in 2012 IIRC and, as I said above, H2R 2013 didn't run in the end. Their last US event (BABE) ran last year and I know that one will not return.
Will there be more Euro events? Who knows but not in the near future.
We stopped doing banger rallies for a number of reasons.
The main problem was that the banger rally had moved too far from it’s original concept, which was an antidote to the Gumballs and Cannonballs. It was about normal people in crap cars doing stupid things that didn’t cost much money.
But as each season came and went the banger rally scene moved away from those cores values.
Cars were no longer crap. Normal people started becoming whiny bhes expecting a 5 star holiday and expecting us to supply lots of women and pick up the entire bar bill each night. And the cost of them (for teams) was going up horrendously (fuel, car, insurance, hotels, food, tolls etc).
I have some great memories from the events, I met some fantastic people, I saw attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion, ah crap no that’s Bladerunner. It was a great time but not one I’m looking to repeat anytime soon.
S2N2012 and BABE2013 were our last events. We may do a reunion event for S2N in a few years (and I’ll be in contact with the veterans one day about that) but I doubt we’ll do any sort of reunion for BABE Rally.
By all means go on a banger rally, but choose one of the more established companies doing it. Pick a company that looks like they know what they are doing and don’t be seduced by the “doing it for charity” BS.
The main problem was that the banger rally had moved too far from it’s original concept, which was an antidote to the Gumballs and Cannonballs. It was about normal people in crap cars doing stupid things that didn’t cost much money.
But as each season came and went the banger rally scene moved away from those cores values.
Cars were no longer crap. Normal people started becoming whiny b
hes expecting a 5 star holiday and expecting us to supply lots of women and pick up the entire bar bill each night. And the cost of them (for teams) was going up horrendously (fuel, car, insurance, hotels, food, tolls etc).I have some great memories from the events, I met some fantastic people, I saw attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion, ah crap no that’s Bladerunner. It was a great time but not one I’m looking to repeat anytime soon.
S2N2012 and BABE2013 were our last events. We may do a reunion event for S2N in a few years (and I’ll be in contact with the veterans one day about that) but I doubt we’ll do any sort of reunion for BABE Rally.
By all means go on a banger rally, but choose one of the more established companies doing it. Pick a company that looks like they know what they are doing and don’t be seduced by the “doing it for charity” BS.
ssaf said:
We stopped doing banger rallies for a number of reasons.
The main problem was that the banger rally had moved too far from it’s original concept, which was an antidote to the Gumballs and Cannonballs. It was about normal people in crap cars doing stupid things that didn’t cost much money.
But as each season came and went the banger rally scene moved away from those cores values.
Cars were no longer crap. Normal people started becoming whiny bhes expecting a 5 star holiday and expecting us to supply lots of women and pick up the entire bar bill each night. And the cost of them (for teams) was going up horrendously (fuel, car, insurance, hotels, food, tolls etc).
I have some great memories from the events, I met some fantastic people, I saw attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion, ah crap no that’s Bladerunner. It was a great time but not one I’m looking to repeat anytime soon.
S2N2012 and BABE2013 were our last events. We may do a reunion event for S2N in a few years (and I’ll be in contact with the veterans one day about that) but I doubt we’ll do any sort of reunion for BABE Rally.
By all means go on a banger rally, but choose one of the more established companies doing it. Pick a company that looks like they know what they are doing and don’t be seduced by the “doing it for charity” BS.
thanks for joining to set the record straight. That's actually really sad to hear. I had such a great time in 06 and at that time it really was the antithesis of the 'show off' rallies, and was a great event. There were even then some guys that had turned up with a car they'd supposedly bought for £100 but must have been worth a couple of grand really, and then they'd used sponsorship money to go and then spend thousands making it 'cool'. This wasn't common and there were maybe only 2 or 3 cars where they'd done this, but i can see this might have become more common. It really wasn't meant to be about money and showing off. It's sad that the clientele or expectations changed and it became something else, but you can feel proud you ran it in it's heyday. The main problem was that the banger rally had moved too far from it’s original concept, which was an antidote to the Gumballs and Cannonballs. It was about normal people in crap cars doing stupid things that didn’t cost much money.
But as each season came and went the banger rally scene moved away from those cores values.
Cars were no longer crap. Normal people started becoming whiny b
hes expecting a 5 star holiday and expecting us to supply lots of women and pick up the entire bar bill each night. And the cost of them (for teams) was going up horrendously (fuel, car, insurance, hotels, food, tolls etc).I have some great memories from the events, I met some fantastic people, I saw attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion, ah crap no that’s Bladerunner. It was a great time but not one I’m looking to repeat anytime soon.
S2N2012 and BABE2013 were our last events. We may do a reunion event for S2N in a few years (and I’ll be in contact with the veterans one day about that) but I doubt we’ll do any sort of reunion for BABE Rally.
By all means go on a banger rally, but choose one of the more established companies doing it. Pick a company that looks like they know what they are doing and don’t be seduced by the “doing it for charity” BS.
Blown2CV said:
There were even then some guys that had turned up with a car they'd supposedly bought for £100 but must have been worth a couple of grand really, and then they'd used sponsorship money to go and then spend thousands making it 'cool'.
Not me 
This was our CRX '06 chariot
With high-tech mid-Alpine leaky diff fix:
Blown2CV said:
thanks for joining to set the record straight. That's actually really sad to hear. I had such a great time in 06 and at that time it really was the antithesis of the 'show off' rallies, and was a great event. There were even then some guys that had turned up with a car they'd supposedly bought for £100 but must have been worth a couple of grand really, and then they'd used sponsorship money to go and then spend thousands making it 'cool'. This wasn't common and there were maybe only 2 or 3 cars where they'd done this, but i can see this might have become more common. It really wasn't meant to be about money and showing off. It's sad that the clientele or expectations changed and it became something else, but you can feel proud you ran it in it's heyday.
I rarely had a good thing to say about the 'charity' side of the events. Some teams treated the charity side as a way of financing the team's particpation in the event which I utterly resented, some teams flat out lied to sponsors, and some banger rally organisers were using charity to get their knighthood (seriously, one springs to mind who had his own PR guy!).Having said that, I was very proud when one of the S2Ns (or H2Rs) managed to raise something in the order of £75,000 for various charities. One team managed to bank over £15k (with help from Sun Microsystems who matched £ for £ everything that was raised).
Nothing compares to the $200k that one BABE Rally team raised one year.
If you never heard about these things, it was because we never pretended that these were successes of StreetSafari. These were the successes of the teams concerned. If we had released PR for such stuff it would have been fake.
We worked with one very small charity exclusively one year and raised £15k. They couldn't even be bothered to come out to Calais to thank the teams. It was 50% of their fundraising that year. It was the first and last time we worked with a charity. When they called and asked "are you going to sponsor us next year?", I can assure you it was an amusing conversation. Amusing for me.
We had some good times, I remember doing DV8s stickers more than a few times (I do remember something about you!)
The value of the cars always annoyed me, but I can tell you now that no one who entered a car that was overvalued or simply took the piss won any of our events. Turn up in your £1k BMW, turn in your points and I can assure you that whichever marshal marked your scores marked them hard - "call that a photo of a cow, looks more like a goat". Only one team ever (in 37 events) got through our "vetting" - I was not pleased. And on one event we changed the bonus points halfway through because someone was competing for the win in a 2003 Ford Taurus. I think it went along the lines of "anyone not fielding a 2003 Taurus gets 10,000 points". f
k em.StreetSafari will be back in the future, but it'll be something different. The banger rally scene has played out in my opinion. It was a fun fad but it's over. I would like to do something in the future that is as ludicrous, but probably not banger cars.
I believe there is a future in adults with waterpistols and motorsport and fancy dress costume.
very good That's an enlightening account, must have been tough to co-ordinate with all that going on. I think we raised about £1k, but wouldn't have dreamed of using any of that on the car!!
we certainly were a budget outfit
one of those lads i found!
agree on the fancy dress
the car certainly wasn't preciously guarded
That's an enlightening account, must have been tough to co-ordinate with all that going on. I think we raised about £1k, but wouldn't have dreamed of using any of that on the car!!we certainly were a budget outfit
one of those lads i found!
agree on the fancy dress
the car certainly wasn't preciously guarded
Gassing Station | Events & Meetings | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff