On the first Sunday of November every year more than 400 remarkable machines dating back to the dawn of motoring set out from Hyde Park in London on their annual pilgrimage to Brighton on the South coast. This is the London to Brighton Veteran Car Run, for pre-1905 cars, and the event can be traced back all the way to what is considered the starting point proper of UK road motoring; to November 14 1896 and the Emancipation Run.
This was organized to celebrate the Locomotives on the Highway Act on the very day that it came into force. The Act relieved the strict rules and speed limits from earlier Locomotive Acts which had greatly restricted the adoption of motorized vehicles in the UK, raising the speed limit for ‘light locomotives’ from 4 to 14 mph and abolishing the need for these vehicles to be preceded by a man on foot waving a red flag. The Emancipation Run even included the symbolic tearing in two of a red flag by Lord Winchilsea, an act which became a common part of future London to Brighton runs.
Commemorative runs took place in many forms over the following years, then in 1927 a re-enactment following the same route as the 1896 run took place, and with it the London to Brighton Veteran Car Run as an annual event was born. It has taken place every November since, apart from the war years and 1947 when petrol was rationed. The Royal Automobile Club has managed the Run with the support of the Veteran Car Club of Great Britain since 1930.
The Run, staged specifically as a non-profit making veneration, still goes strong today and boasts a unique atmosphere and camaraderie. And entries for the 2019 event, which takes place on Sunday November 3, have just opened, almost exactly six months in advance, meaning participants from across the globe can now sign up their machines. This year the Run has a new-look website and a new entry management system so entrants can sign up their veteran cars for the Run more easily than ever. And even with all the event’s tradition, changing habits mean that over 40 per cent of those using the website and registering to take part in the Run now do so via a mobile device, so focus has been made to make the new system fully device responsive.
“To this day, the Run remains the Club’s flagship event, drawing in a truly international following every year,” said Miles Wade, club secretary of the Royal Automobile Club. “We always seek to provide the best experience possible for our participants and followers, and our revamped website and entry system contributes to this. The Run has a phenomenal heritage and, as its custodians, it’s important that we work to ensure that the Run is easy to access for our participants and all those who choose to follow this extraordinary event.”
Images courtesy of London to Brighton Veteran Car Run
