Kirkwood To Host Inaugural Kirkwood Route 66 Festival Featuring the 2015 Great Race on Saturday June 20, 2015

     Kirkwood, Mo., will host the inaugural Kirkwood Route 66 Festival featuring the 2015 Hemmings Motor News Great Race presented by Hagerty Saturday, June 20, race organizers have announced.

     This family friendly event will showcase the Great Race, the world’s premiere old car rally, will bring 120 of the world’s finest antique automobiles to the Kirkwood Train Depot downtown for the $150,000 event.

     The race will finish June 28 at the Santa Monica Pier in California traveling along historic Route 66. Along the 2,400-mile route, competitors will travel parts of The Mother Road in all eight states it originally ran through – Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California.

      Saturday, June 20 will be filled with activities to entertain and delight kids of all ages.  In addition to the Great Race, there will be a Kid’s Corner with bounce houses and face painting sponsored by the Magic House, A Hero’s Impact Foundation and Once Upon an Occasion.  Disney characters will arrive to perform.  Get there early to get pictures with Anna, Elsa and Spongebob.  Anna and Elsa will perform hits from the movie Frozen by the train station at 9:45am.  Belle and Cinderella will join the festival in the afternoon for pictures and will perform on the steps of City Hall at 1:00pm. 

     Raffle tickets will be sold for opportunities to win unique prizes.  Win a ride in the Batmobile as the last vehicle that crosses the starting line of the race.  Other prizes are available including a romantic getaway for 2 to Hermann, MO.  For ticket sale information, contact Donna Poe, Executive Director of the Downtown Kirkwood Business District at 314-822-0084

 The Great Race, which began 32 years ago, is not a speed race, but a time/speed/distance rally. The vehicles, each with a driver and navigator, are given precise instructions each day that detail every move down to the second. They are scored at secret check points along the way and are penalized one second for each second either early or late. As in golf, the lowest score wins.

     Cars start – and hopefully finish – one minute apart if all goes according to plan. The biggest part of the challenge other than staying on time and following the instructions is getting an old car to the finish line each day, organizers say.

     The cars will arrive in downtown Kirkwood at 8 a.m. in preparation for the 10 a.m. start. Cars will leave at one-minute intervals for two hours. Each stop on the Great Race is free to the public and spectators will be able to visit with the participants and to look at the cars for several hours. It is common for kids to climb in the cars for a first-hand look.

     Cars built in 1972 and earlier are eligible, with most entries having been manufactured before World War II. In the 2014 Great Race from Maine to Florida, a 1915 Hudson racer, a 1916 Hudson Hillclimber and a 1917 Peerless were the three oldest vehicles. All of those vehicles are participating again in 2015.

     Last year’s winners, Barry and Irene Jason of Keller, Texas, drove a 1966 Mustang and won $50,000. It was the first time a post-war automobile won the Great Race.

     The 2015 winners will again receive $50,000 of the $150,000 total purse.

     Over the decades, the Great Race has stopped in hundreds of cities big and small, from tiny Austin, Nev., to New York City.

      “When the Great Race pulls into a city it becomes an instant festival,” race director Jeff Stumb said. “Last year we had three overnight stops with more than 10,000 spectators on our way to having 250,000 people see the Great Race during the event.”

     The overnight stops, in order, are Springfield, Mo.; Oklahoma City, Okla.; Amarillo, Texas; Santa Fe, N.M.; Gallup, N.M.; Flagstaff, Ariz.; Lake Havasu, Ariz.; and San Bernardino, Calif.; before finishing in Santa Monica.

     Lunch stops, in order, are Rolla, Mo.; Claremore, Okla.; Elk City, Okla.; Tucumcari, N.M.; Albuquerque, N.M.; Winslow, Ariz.; Kingman, Ariz.; and Twentynine Palms, Calif.

     The event was started in 1983 by Tom McRae and it takes its name from the 1965 movie, The Great Race, which starred Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon, Natalie Wood and Peter Falk. The movie is a comedy based on the real life 1908 automobile race from New York to Paris. In 2004, Tony Curtis was the guest of the Great Race and rode in his car from the movie, the Leslie Special.

     The Great Race gained a huge following from late night showings on ESPN when the network was just starting out in the early 1980s. The first entrant, Curtis Graf of Irving, Texas, is still a participant today.

     The event’s main sponsors are Hemmings Motor News, Hagerty, Coker Tire, Reliable Carriers and Best Western.  Other premium sponsors are Carr Lane, Adam Place and an Anonymous Kirkwood Resident in Honor of Kirk  Hutchison

Updates are posted each week on Facebook at:

https://www.facebook.com/KirkwoodMORoute66Festival

For more information, call Beth von Behren, Public Information Officer, City of Kirkwood at 314-822-5894 or visit  www.kirkwoodmo.org/