TOTAL Economy Run

Brief History of the TOTAL Economy Run

The TOTAL Economy Run is a unique motor sport event, which marries a highly competitive element with a strong social flavour.

"It's not for sissies," declares Jan Hettema, who was the Clerk of the Course until 2003.

The TOTAL Economy Run remains to this day the only credible test for the man in the street of the comparable fuel efficiency of all makes and models of cars competing against each other over the same route, distance and under the same set of regulations.

In the late 1970s, at the time of the fuel crisis, Gerhard Esterhuizen, then TOTAL's market development manager, attended an economy run sponsored by TOTAL Oil Great Britain. He suggested a similar event in South Africa and, when TOTAL management agreed, the Pretoria Motor Club was asked to organise the first TOTAL Economy Run in 1977. It is has been staged by the PMC ever since and is one of South Africa's most enduring motor sport events.

"The early runs were much tougher than recent events," Hettema, five times South African rally champion and four times a winner of the TOTAL International Rally. "They were three-day affairs covering some 1 700 km and 50 per cent of the route was on dirt roads. Today it's a two-day event over about 1 100 km and the dirt road component is only about 20 per cent."

Visit our Motorsport Website for more information on the Total Economy Run