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All of the ingredients are ready to make this year's festival the biggest and best so far. All that' needed now is fine weather. David Wilcox reports
• .fruckfest's organisers and its sponsor — Commercial Motor — have made at least one wise decision; they have moved the event from Easter to this weekend's May Bank Holiday. True to form, Easter was wet. The organisers (and intending visitors) are keeping their fingers crossed for sunshine this coming break.
Despite the rain last year more than 70,000 people descended on the East of England Showground to see the very best trucks in Britain and from Europe and Scandinavia too.
This year, for the fourth Truckfest, the successful recipe is repeated, but in larger measure and with extra ingredients to make an even better blend of road haulage trade show and relaxed truckers' festival.
• CONCOUILS D'ELEGANCE
The heart of Truckfest is the concours d'elegance competitions. In 1985 more than 200 trucks had been entered in advance. The same number turned up to be entered on the day. This year 500 trucks are already entered and so the organisers reluctantly have had to close the entries to keep the judging to a manageable task; entries on the day cannot be accepted.
The competition is divided into several classes and the prize money has been increased well above the rate of the inflation. Commercial Motor is once again sponsoring the all-important class for the Best Kept Working Truck. Last year's winner, Anderson's Bulk Haulage of Upwell, is back with its superb Y-registered Volvo F10, backed up by two A-registered units, so the standard is sure to be high.
All the effort in preparing the truck is worthwhile for the winner, who will need to make space on his mantelpiece for a handsome trophy and will receive £750 to fill a space in his bank account.
The Best Custom Truck class is sponsored by Eminox, the makers of stainless steel exhausts for trucks. Last year, Volvo and Scania units between
them scooped up the prizes in this class. If a British truck is to win this weekend — there is a hotly-tipped Foden, for one — it will have to beat The Beast, Mark Goddard's F'12 Globetrotter that will be defending its title.
Entries from Scandinavia, Holland and Denmark take on the pride of the UK in the International Supertruck Challenge sponsored by Shell. With their separate enclosure, these were the stars of Truckfest 85. The all-conquering Swede Svempa Bergandahl is bringing his brand-new creation, the Black Widow.
There will be an intriguing battle in the Best Kept Fleet class sponsored by Bandag. Ken Thomas from the village of Guyhim near Wisbech won last year and is
back with two teams of five vehicles; one is made up of five Mercedes-Benz 1625s, the other is mixed. Among his competitors are five Volvo units entered by Bretts . . of Guyhirn near Wisbech!
One class where Volvo and Scania are definitely not going to sweep the board is the Vintage Truck section. There are plenty of entries and they are nearly all British.
Local Ford dealer PM Trucks is sponsoring the competition for the Best Custom Van. There is a huge entry lined up for this one and the National Street Van Association will be staging a parade on both days.
• TRADE DISPLAY
Aside from the sight of 500 of the country's smartest trucks there will be much also to see at Truckfest. The trade show is larger than last year, both in terms of the stand space taken and the number of manufacturers who will be represented; Foden and Seddon Atkinson are welcomed to the fold.
The truck manufacturers will show then current ranges but many are bringing something different too. For example, Daf will have its 1986 Paris-Dakar rally contender, the TurboTwin that sports no fewer that four turbochargers — two on each of its two engines.
• SPECIAL AlTRACrIONS
Steve Murty's jet-powered Projet Ford Cargo is always an attention grabber and he will be putting on a display on both days of Truckfest. Also dropping in on both days will be the Whoopee Hollow Sky Divers.
Mercedes-Benz is at Truckfest in a big way. On the Sunday it will be hosting its popular truck-pulling contest with Geoff Capes and his similarly-sized pals. On Bank Holiday Monday Capes will be found playing It's a Truckout, Mercedes' adaptation of television's It's a Knockout.
B1', Commercial Motor and Sealink are jointly sponsoring the first UK appearance of Super Monster, an American Ford pickup that drives over cars, rather than round them. It was built in America and is
)vv owned by a Swiss. It will be demonrating its non-too-gentle art, but when aper Monster is resting you will find it on re Commercial Motor stand.
Operating with much more finesse will the Royal Artillery's motor cycle disay team, the Flying Gunners. They rform the classic pyramid formation plus any other stunts that motor cycles were at designed to do.
These are just a selection of the ients lined up for Truckfest this year; tere are more. Celebrities will be out in Tee, including Noel Edmonds, Suzanne ando, Jim Bowen, Stuart Hall, Keith hegwin and Roy Castle. To keep ieryone entertained there will be Couny and Western bands, parades of the !hicles, hot-air balloons, helicopter rides id a funfair.