29-1-79 Wi gram rac e In jeo oar ay The future of the Lady Wigram Trophy motor race is very much in the balance after poor public support for yesterday's international event on the airforce base circuit. Less than 6000 people attended the thirtieth Wigram race, according to offcials of the Motor Racing Club, which organises it. And support : of that sort puts the prestigious international race's future in jeopardy. The club had less than rdles title The former Christchurch greyhound, Latest Craze, sold recently for so, won $250 New Zealand Invitation Hurdles Championship at Hawera on Satúrday night. Latest Craze, formerly owned and raced by Mr Bill Kingston, of Christchurch, beat Hit It by eight lengths with Killarney Boy third. An accomplished fat performer as well as a dashing hurdler, Latest Craze is by the local stud dog. Chief Zero. out of Mr Kingston's brood bitch. hip top, walch won a South Island title. Latest Craze will contest the Auckland hurdles championship on Friday night and may be sent to Australia at a later date. .. $1000 in the bank when it undertook to run the $27,000 race and had to borrow. to take it on this year. "It was a disappointing said the race organiser sai george Bese today. "We feel that if Canterbury had wanted to keep international racing here people would have got behind it. "The crowd was less than 6000, which is perhaps 500 more than we got last jear." He confirmed that the poor gate puts the race's future "in jeopardy." In the past the event, one of the traditional highlight's of the Christchurch sporting year, drew more than 20,000 people. HANDICAP The Motor Racing Club was handicapped this year by the fact there was no series sponsorship. Although the exact sum devoted to each race on the New Zealand circuit last vear, was not disclosed, it certainly made things easier for race organisers. Because it is a temporary circuit. the Wigram race incurs big costs in setting up the course that do not occur elsewhere. "We have got to put in everything after 4.30pm on Friday to be ready by the time things start at 10am on Saturday, said one official today. "Then we have to have the airforce base like it was again by midday today. Its quite a task." Wigram is one of the last circuits of this sort licensed by FIA, the sport's world body, for international rac- It's a splendid circult, and always subject of favourable comment from people racing nere the first time," he said In spite of its merits as a course, it appears likely the fans who saw vesterday's event may have enjoyed the last Wigram race. Sybil, 66, laps up fast cars Mrs Sybil Archer arrived at the Wigram airfield motor racing circuit in a rented Mini, wearing orange trouser suit, sun glasses and picture hat. She chatted with several grey-haired men surrounding cars of yesteryear and later donned a pair of overalis. She pulled on a close-utting motor-driver's skallcap and clambered into an MIG IF. And then she drove five laps around Wigram in the special parade of nostalgia yestertay. Mrs Archer still uses ner former name of Sybil Lapp.. Thirty gears ago, ill ine first Wigram Trophy race, she raced ander that same. Sue was in an NG then and took fifth place. Subi was the only Foman in the race and she received a special mention in the ners. paper for her fine style. Sybil was 36 when she took part in the first Wigram race. She got the bug from her father. Not that he raced. He was a farmer in the Wairau Valley, near Blenheim, and was mad on fast cars ('He drove like a lunatic"). He owned Bentleys, Sunbeams and Talbots. Sybil was driving the farm tractor at 11 and didn't get a chance • to • handie ber father's cars. These were not kept near the homestead but across a rirer. The only way to the home was across the river by horse wagon. Her mother ensured she received a good education by correspondence ap to universily level but, in her 205, she decided she santeri to join the outside world. So she Tan array from home. Her mother knew her intentions but it was a shock for her father. She arrived in Nelson with few plans and really not knowing ansone very Fell. Sybil wanted to be one thing: A motor mechanic. A friend of her father's owned a garage and she told him of her ambition. "I'll take you on stail sar 'yes'," the garage owner told her. She mas paraded at morning tea. "I was fairly talkative and loved cars. I dia a corres pondence course car maintenance and so I coald talk to them in their own language. Anyway, they said they Fould give me a go." She never finished her apprenticeship for two reasons: The approach of war and her marriage to Jone Lupp. She moved to Dunedin, had son and a daughter, began work in a small way tuning cars, and started racing cars abont 1947. Her first major race was the Wigram race of 1949, in Sybil Lupp... drives an E-Type Jaguar. which she came fifth. Se remembers the race being a rouble. The he year te was back again and t00k second place. In 1951 she came seventh in tue race but this time she stopped to change the carburettor. Mostly she raced in MGs in the Neison beach races or in the Dunedin hill climbs and sprints. Later she ased an XK120 Jaguar. By 1953 she stopped racing. Her husband had died from war injuries she stopped to be able to afford to finance her children's education. She had her own Jaguar servicing business in Dunedin but found more work in the North Island and moved to Wellington. There she married Jack Archer and they combined their business interests but she stll used the name Sybil Lipp. Sybil has been mechanic fer racing drivers and was co-driver in the 1956 Grand Pris. She is now 66 and still Forks in the Fellington garage. Her son Danie looks as though he wil continue the racing bug which started with : a Blenheim farmer's passion for fast cars. Sybil Lapp's calling card deesn't let anyone forget her passion, either. It is it the shape of an E-type Jaguar.