To a dedicated band of tinkerers willing to devote a week or more to nursing old cars over a 1,000-mile rally route, the Great Race is catnip. This year’s race, which will route participants around the Great Lakes region in a four-state, one-province loop, begins in Traverse City, Mich. on June 23 and will conclude, at least for those whose old iron withstands the ordeal, in Dearborn, Mich., on July 1.
The rally shares its name with a 1965 slapstick comedy about an automobile race from New York to Paris, via the Bering Strait into Russia. (As Maggie DuBois, Natalie Wood stars in the film as a reporter for this news organization.)
“It’s no coincidence that the film and the race share the name,” said Jeff Stumb, the rally’s race director.
“Tom McRae and Norman Miller, who organized the first Great Race in 1983, were inspired by the movie. Tony Curtis, who starred in the film, was the grand marshal of that first event.”
Those early rallies were two-week coast-to-coast affairs that placed a heavy burden on participants and vehicles. After 25 years of marathon transcontinental sprints, interest ebbed and the Great Race was suspended. Last year, Coker Tire, a maker of reproduction tires for antique and classic cars, revived the event in a more palatable form that remained challenging but was not quite as grueling as the original.
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