The following plea comes from Helen Elstrop who some of you might know from her days hillclimbing her Triumph Spitfire at Forrestburn. She has been carrying out training on behalf of the MSA in Palestine, Morocco, Oman, Jordan, Burundi, Jamaica and Indonesia. Her experience in Burundi and the ability to provide youngsters with their first proper motorsport experience was something she thought should not end once the MSA left.
As you may be aware, Colin and myself occasionally do some training for Young Drivers through the MSA. This initiative has been funded by the FIA and we have been very lucky to take part and meet some of these fantastic young drivers from many countries. Our most recent, was probably one of the most moving we have done. We went out to Burundi, and if like us when it was mentioned, you’re saying, “Where?” It was Central Africa, next to Tanzania and Rwanda. Up until November last year, they had not held a motorsport event in the country for 17 years. There is a whole generation of youngsters who think motorsport happens elsewhere in the world.
In essence we had participants from Burundi and neighbouring Rwanda. One or two older participants had done a little competition, but the majority were young, enthusiastic, and had never done anything like this before. The determination and willingness to learn, together with the appreciation to even be allowed near a competition car was inspiring.
These youngsters have left such an impression that we put our thinking caps on, to ask ourselves what we could do on a practical level to help. With the help of the MSA we are going to get some competition ideas together, but what they really need is a start to encourage new members. Although you do not need overalls and helmets for autotest, having access to them would make the participants feel more involved. Therefore what we are asking for is equipment that the club can hold, so they can invite people to have a go and get new members involved. If anyone has any out of date equipment that they would be willing to donate, we know a very good home that it could go to, and do some real good. Anything like fireproofs, helmets that you know have not been in an incident, seat belts, overalls.
If you do have anything you can contribute then please get in touch with Roslyn Cooper, club treasurer, ros@mscc.org.uk to arrange pick up. Of course she would be happy to collect anything available at any of the MSCC events early next year !