Iola motorists were treated to a pleasant surprise Thursday as 120 vintage automobiles rolled through town.
Turns out the owners of those classic cars were equally surprised to be going through Iola.
The occasion was the Hemmings Motor News Great Race 2023, which takes competitors from St. Augustine, Fla., to Colorado Springs.
While the competitors know their destination cities — Thursday took them from Joplin to Wichita, by way of Emporia — their route is a mystery, even while they’re driving.
You see, unlike practically every other motor race, The Great Race doesn’t care whose car goes fastest, but rather which driver-navigator team can best follow rudimentary (yet amazingly precise) instructions.
The instructions themselves are a sight to behold, listing such things as road signs and other markers to identify every turn, speed change, stop, and start that the team must make throughout the day. Each day features more than 200 such instructions.
Additionally, drivers must pass anywhere between four to seven checkpoints daily to record the exact time that the team passes that point.
The objective is to arrive at each checkpoint at the correct time, down to the tenth of a second.
Pass the checkpoint too late, or too early, and your score is docked, noted Gerno Reinard, who joined Erin Roberts of San Antonio in a gleaming 1969 Camaro. Reinard and Roberts were among the owners who stopped at Pump N Pete’s in Iola for gas along their route.
“The judges know what time we’re supposed to be at each checkpoint,” Roberts added. “We do not.”
BUT THE true stars of the Great Race are the cars themselves.
Rules stipulate no automobile newer than 1974 is allowed. Simply keeping the vehicles running is one of the key factors. Older cars also receive bonus points if daily challenges are met.
The routes tend to follow scenic, lesser traveled road. In fact, when leaving Iola, cars traveled north on Old 169, on their way to Emporia.
Lawrence Bettencourt of Newcastle, Calif., took advantage of his Iola stop to refill his 1935 Chevy Master Coupe with antifreeze in preparation for triple-digit temperatures.
“The car’s running well,” Bettencourt said, “but we’ll find out today how it goes.”
THE GREAT RACE, formerly known as the Great American Race, dates back to 1983, when Tom McRae and Norman Miller organized an event to take drivers from Los Angeles to Indianapolis, all using pre-World War II vehicles.
