The annual Gore Truck Show was held on the Saturday of King’s Birthday weekend as a part of the Tussock Country Gore Gold Guitars country music festival. Thousands of visitors flocked to the Eastern Southland town, lining the main street to watch the parade. Earlier, attendees enjoyed a public static display where the entrants were judged for a lengthy line-up of awards.

Transport Repairs kindly allowed the use of its yard and workshop facilities for the display and judging of the trucks, and as a host centre for trophy returns and the collation and aggregation of the judges’ points to decide the various honours. Within the Transport Repairs workshop were several trade stalls, including model vendors.

A children’s colouring competition was displayed, which had been used as a promotion tool in the local newspaper. Something new and quirky was a ‘Kids, build your own truck competition’, which allowed them to make a model truck from any type of material, which had to fit onto a piece of A4 paper. It drew a dozen or so entrants.

The event was organised by Rhonda Wilson and a small local committee who gathered prizes, prepared the venue, invited judges and ordered compliance requirements, such as street access and logbook waivers. McDonough Contracting was again the main sponsor and covered off the traffic management obligations.

The parade commenced at 2pm in brilliant sunshine but was marred by faithfully predicted rain. There were 95 trucks in the parade, this number a little down on previous years, but the standard of presentation was overall higher making for some very tight decisions in the judging process. There was a good turnout of classic trucks, which turned heads in the parade.

The prizegiving was held at the Croydon Lodge with refreshments and a buffet meal afterwards. At the ceremony, Rhonda welcomed everyone and acknowledged the sponsors who donated a huge number of prizes and trophies to accompany the bragging rights associated with the various awards. Bruce Robertson compered the prizegiving after acknowledging the recent passing of Alex McLellan, who had been a regular supporter of Gore Truck Show for many years and whose family had just donated a memorial trophy in his honour for the best Kenworth. Bruce also recognised the hard work done by all entrants – especially the stock trucks – to prepare for the show at a difficult time of year for availability due to it being very busy with herd shifts to winter grazing.

The King Rig title was awarded to Daryl Shand, operations manager from Freight Haulage. This was the second time FHL No.29 has won this trophy; it also claimed the same prize in 2016 with Lindsay Stuck as the entrant. Coincidentally, Lindsay also won the King Rig title last year with a Scania R620, so the trophy is no stranger to the Freight Haulage office. Daryl has worked at Freight Haulage for 22 years in various roles and his son Ryan works at Truck Stops and successfully showed a FHL Mack, taking away the Best Mack and Best Tractor Unit awards.

Results Gore Truck Show 2024