Club to introduce Pedal Car Racing in Penang

IN conjunction with Visit Malaysia 2007, the Penang Turf Club (PTC) will be introducing pedal car racing in Malaysia and the inaugural event is set to take place in Penang on August 19.

Themed ‘1st Malaysian Pedal Car Race’, the PTC hopes that the introduction of this environmental-friendly sport will instil in Malaysians, especially schoolchildren, love and concern for the environment.

“We hope that this event will encourage Malaysians from all walks of life learn to love our environment more. School- children can also take up this sport as a form of exercise.

“We also hope that this event will help promote tourism in Malaysia particularly Penang during VM2007,” said PTC committee member Alex Rodgers.

As its name suggests, a pedal car is powered by legs, thus, it is also sometimes referred to as a Human Powered Vehicle (HPV).

Environment-friendly:A driver trying out a typical pedal car.

HPVs are aerodynamic vehicles specially designed to be fast and sleek, yet safe for road use. It also comes complete with a sturdy metal chassis and hand brake.

These cars are not powered by engines that burn fuel, thus making them pollution-free.

For this inaugural event, the PTC has commissioned a local engineer to build 12 professional cars based on British specifications.

The PTC Penang Pedal Car Race 2007 is an eight-lap relay team competition with 10 cars on the grid and two cars acting as back-up in the event of an accident.

Each team will have four crew members and each member will have to pedal for two laps.

Each lap will cover about 1.1km and the route of the competition will see participants pass- ing by several landmarks in Pe- nang like St George’s Church, Fort Cornwallis and the Jubilee Clock Tower at the Downing Street/Light Street roundabout, the Esplanade, King Edward Place and Beach Street. The race will start and end at the state legislative assembly building in Light Street.

A pole position in the Penang Pedal Car Race 2007 is vital and in this case, each rider will have to do battle in the practice session before the main race to secure a good position.

“The club will sponsor 12 cars and we invite schools, universities, associations, clubs, financial institutions and government de-partments to come and participate in this one-day event. En-trance is free but it will be on a first-come-first-serve basis,” ex-plained Rodgers.

The PTC is the main sponsor of this inaugural event which has received endorsement from the Penang Tourism Action Council.

For more information, contact P.H Lim at 012-4109218.

Source : STAR
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