SCI Team Targa Tasmania 2006 started out about six months ago when member Alan Stevenson gave us a call and told us about his idea of entering a team in the Targa Tasmania.

Alan wanted to put his mechanical and racing skill knowledge and experience to good use after suffering a spinal injury 6 years ago.

The Targa Tasmania is an exciting International Classic Car Race / Rally Drive held annually in and around the picturesque roads and landscape of Tasmania . It is a tarmac rally with competitive stages on closed roads for the best touring, sports and GT cars in the world.

Targa Tasmania is conducted over six days (including a Prologue) on over 2,000 kilometres of tarmac roads during April of each year. This year Targa Tasmania celebrated its 15th Anniversary and there was a record entry field with over 250 teams, from Lamborghini’s to Porsche’s to Holden’s and more.

Our aim was to show the greater community that people with disabilities, in particular the Spinal Cord Injured, could achieve just about anything they set out to achieve. We also wanted to create awareness and motivate other disabled people to follow their dreams.

I arrived in Launceston, Tasmania about a week before the event started. I needed to familiarise myself with the car and have a chat with the sponsors. Before I took a seat behind the wheel for the first time, I was a bit worried that I wasn’t familiar with Alan’s car but I didn’t have to worry at all because I felt comfortable in the car nearly as soon as I jumped into it. I drove around the city for an hour and noticed the appeal of the car from the looks we received.

Alan also initiated a ‘Disabled Kids Drive’ with the support of the Launceston Casino, the local police and other Targa entrants with their cars as part of the overall Targa event. The day was a huge success, not only was the weather great (lots of sunshine), we had heaps of volunteers wanting to be involved. The Launceston Casino allowed us to use their main entrance for our event which was ideal. They have asked us if we would do it again in 2007.

Over 30 kids registered for the drive and what a great time they had. They not only went for a drive in a Targa competition car, they also received a couple of showbags which were provided by our sponsors including t-shirts, backpacks, chocolates, drinks etc. Seeing these kids’ faces before, during and after the drive was priceless. They had smiles from ear to ear and we could see that we helped “make their day”. It was also great to see that the media was behind the event. Two television networks reported the story on their 6 o’clock news, followed by newspaper reports. We also received numerous thank you letters.

I was soon to realise that it wasn’t all going to be fun and games. Many late nights and early mornings were to follow. I sometimes thought, “What have I got myself into?”

Alan did a fantastic job in preparing the car and chasing sponsors. The car looked the part (as can be seen in the photos) as well as sounding the part.

All this could not have been done without the help of Alan’s close friends, in particular Helen, Jason, Shane, Bruce and Craig. Helen and Jason were not only our support crew (transporting our wheelchairs and getting our lunches, etc.) but also official followers (following and assisting broken down entrants).

One thing that we never thought of, and something that could have stopped us from competing, was the fact that Alan’s and my spinner knobs for steering weren’t interchangeable, which we assumed were. “Easy fixed”, Alan said, “I’ll give Shane a call to knock one up”. One phone call and a few hours later we had interchangeable spinner knobs. Being mechanically minded and having friends in the field was very handy indeed.

Getting the car ‘looking the part’ took a lot of work. Alan purchased a vinyl cutter and made many of the decals on his own. It was ‘learn as you go’ for Alan but he has become somewhat of an expert at sign making now. We had a few sleepless nights finalising the decals for the car and were still sticking signs onto the car the day after we started the tour.

Because the car would be on display to the public at the end of each day’s touring, we thought it would be a great way to promote ourselves even further by making a display with a banner which promoted all our sponsors including AQA. Our whole display turned out to be fantastic and a success with our car getting lots of attention from the public as well as other entrants. We looked like a very professional team with our display and our SCI Team Targa uniform. We were there for barely 5 minutes before we were approached for an interview.

People were genuinely interested in hearing about what we wanted to achieve and wished us the best of luck.

We have been approached by many of our current sponsors saying that they would like to continue with their help, and will sponsor us again next year.

Anyway, after six days of touring around Tasmania covering over 2,000 kilometres I learnt that it wasn’t the holiday I was expecting. It was hard work and we were on the go constantly. Most mornings we had to be ready to go by 6 am , no time for room service or breakfast, and we wouldn’t get back to our rooms until late afternoon – that’s hard for anyone let alone someone with a spinal injury.

Our lunchtime break during the event was the only time we had to change from driver to navigator and vice versa. This was a time consuming task as we had to wait for our wheelchairs to be dropped off. After changing positions we could only manage a few quick bites from our fresh salad rolls before the starting horn was blown and we were off again.

I found being a navigator and a co-driver was pretty intense. We drove right around and through Tasmania including the rugged west coast. The west-coast is an amazing place with rugged mountains and dense forests in every direction you look. At one point, I thought the down-hill run was never going to end – the road just kept on descending.

We were feeling more and more confident that we would achieve our goal of being the first ever disabled team to complete the Tasmanian Targa as we neared the final 4 stages. Until now, we had beautiful weather with no rain in sight. But things started to change with rain slowly approaching.

The last stage was a ‘street circuit’ in New Norfolk and the roads became wet with the changing weather. The unthinkable nearly happened as we navigated through the last turn (only 50 metres from the finish line) on the wet and very slippery circuit. We lost control of the car, spinning it around 180 degrees and crashing the rear driver’s side wheel into the curb causing it to snap. Fortunately the official in the “sweep vehicle” asked us if the vehicle was still drivable and if we could cross the finish line only 50 metres away. We said “yes”, and we very, very slowly limped across the finish line to achieve our goal – we were so relieved. We did feel better afterwards once we found out we were not the only ones that came unstuck on that corner, there were about 8 others who had the same problem.

At the presentation dinner the following day, we were given special mention which confirmed we had achieved something special.

I’d also like to mention that Alan and myself weren’t the only ones with SCI in the event. AQA member Derek Vanderbom has been navigating in a Mitsubishi Evolution Lancer VI RS2 for a few years as has Chris Alp in a Porsche 911 GT3. Unfortunately Derek did not finish after an accident on day 4 and Chris finished in 19 th position.

Written by Nazim Erderm