Increased entry fee for LDoY
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• The entry fee for the 1973 Lorry Driver of the Year competition has been increased from £2.25 to £4. Eliminating centres will retain half of the fee; the other half will be used to defray national administration costs.
Mr D. E. A. Pettit, chairman of the National Freight Corporation, was elected president of the competition in succession to Lord Chesham and the sponsors intimated the appointment of Maj P. M. Ede as the new assistant organizing secretary.
The 1973 event is assured of 39 eliminating centres following the approval of new centres at Cumnock in Ayrshire and Guernsey in the Channel Islands. The three centres which dropped out of the 1972 competition will return next year with events at Londonderry, Belfast and Manchester.
Next year's final will again be held at the Junior Leaders' Training Regiment, Gamecock Barracks, Bramcote, near Nuneaton.
Tests for the eliminating rounds are to follow much the same pattern as those used at the 1972 final. Test 1 is width-judging through a funnel-type alley finishing with the wheels of the vehicle placed on an offset target. Test 2 requires the driver to pass an obstruction on his offside and park his vehicle alongside the nearside kerb and close to another obstruction across the front of the vehicle. He must then drive his vehicle between two cones which are placed at a width which he has set from his cab before moving off. In Test 3 the driver will judge distances of road signs and then park his vehicle alongside the nearside kerb.
The road route has been left at a minimum of 10 miles and there are to be 20 Highway Code questions and 10 legal responsibility questions with a 15-minute time limit and maximum penalty points of 300 in this section.
Fixtures which have been submitted for the 1973 competition and approved by the executive committee are:
Aberdeen, June 3: Birmingham, May 6; Bristol, May 20; Dunfermline, May 20; Essex, June 17; Guernsey, July 8; Kent, June 3: Liverpool, May 13; London, June 10; Londonderry, May 26; ManChester, July 8; Newcastle-under-Lyme, May 20; Newcastle-upon-Tyne, June 3; Nottinghamshire (Newark) May 20; Oxford, June 3; Portstewart, June 16; Ruislip, May 20; South Wales, June 10; Sussex, June 17; Torbay, May 20; Glasgow, May 13; Weymouth, May 13; Wolverhampton, May 6; York, July 29. The date of the final is September 9.