FOC New Zealand 25th anniversary - AGM 2011

The 2011 AGM of the Ferrari Owners Club held at the Chateau from the 11th-13th March was a very special one as the Club celebrated its 25th anniversary. That makes it one of the oldest Ferrari Owner's Clubs in the world.

Already back in 1979, Maurice Paton and David Peters started to make a list of all existing Ferraris in New Zealand. At that time, around 48 Ferraris were known to be in New Zealand. Several meetings were organised by word of mouth, usually they were a get together at some of the race events around New Zealand's racetracks. Many of the Ferrari owners drove to the event, prepared their car for racing, did their laps and went home in the same car. In the mid-eighties more and more Ferraris came to New Zealand and discussions about forming a club started. After setting up the constitution for the club including 15 signatures, the certificate of Incorporation was issued on 27th February of 1986. Several meetings, fun runs and - of course the club's Annual General Meetings became a big part of the life of every club member.

This years AGM has been a reminisce to several past AGM's held at the Chateau, in the heart of the Tongariro National Park. But the AGM's do not start at the selected location - they start from Christchurch, Wellington and Auckland with a fun run. The chairmen of the different areas work out a road book, including nice winding and empty back roads and a lunch break.

After arriving and refreshing at the Chateau, surrounded by scenic Mount Ruapehu and the iconic Mount Ngauruhoe - nowadays better known as Mount Doom, the buffet dinner started at the Tussock bar, very close to the Chateau. Just after dinner, the different club awards were presented to the winners.
The club has many awards: the Tim Baily Trophy recognises passion and goodwill for Ferrari, the Formula One Steering Wheel goes to significant contributions made by club members, the Carpenter Cup is presented to members who wrote the best stories for the club magazine, the Bent Steering Wheel Award goes to members who crash their cars in some way - there usually is a funny story behind it, the Wooden Spoon Stirrer's Award is a fun-one, too. It is presented to people who have successfully drawn attention to themselves with funny activities. The Ferret goes to people who got in hot water simply by being themselves and finally the Bob's Big Buckle Award is presented to the "person who most brings Ferrari NZ into infamy". The audience spent some time laughing about the funny stories the awarded people had to tell.
After the pricegiving, the AGM committee had organised an auction, which entire proceeds will go to a cause selected by the Christchurch members to help the people in the destroyed city of Christchurch.

The Saturday started with beautiful weather - and around 60 cars ready to drive out for the fun run. After a short driver's briefing the silence around the Chateau got disrupted by the beautiful sound of V12's and V8's. The fun run navigation was easy - just around Mount Ruapehu - again with some great roads. Probably one of the best was the hill climb up to Turoa ski field on the slopes of Mount Ruapehu - 17km of fun on an empty and twisty mountain road! After that the lunch break in Ohakune was more than welcome!

Back at the Chateau there was some time left for a group photo before the official AGM started with a lot of interesting reports and discussions. After that - With only one hour left to dress up - everyone was in a hurry to get ready for the mask ball. It was great to see all the different kinds of masks - classic ones from Venice, phantoms of the opera, self made ones and some from the 2$-Shop. A great variety of masks and a night with lots of good chats about the most fascinating car makes - Ferrari.

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