Well can you believe it’s that time again!! How time flies when you are busy scootering around the country, drinking too much, behaving like teenagers and generally enjoying ourselves. Another year has past since my last account of what happened in 2005 and what a great year that was. Could it be bettered, I ask myself? The year 2006 has probably been more eventful than 2004 and 2005 put together. Where shall I start? Well…. let’s start with some facts and figures and blow our own trumpet, to show how good our club really is. With a casual and fairly fluid membership of about seventy five members, we now have over forty two riding scooterists who ride with us. This year, as a club, we have been to seven National Rallies and six YSA events including the Whitby day event. Countless events have been attended by our members including Rallies in Issoire France, the Lands End to John O Groats Ride, the Coast to Coast Run and the London Rally. We should also feel very proud as a club that we have achieved a position of tenth best supporting club for 2006 in the Lambretta Club of Great Britain and this being our first year as an affiliated lcgb club. Our two biggest events this year, the YSA Moorends to Selby Rideout and the IOW Weekend Rally also helped to secure the smtsc reputation as one of Yorkshire’s best organized Scooter Clubs. With our own club website organized by Scooter Stu and regular pictures of members appearing in Scootering mags, local newspapers, Scootering dvds, other club websites, there can’t be many people who haven’t heard of the Moving Targets.

I also think the fact that we have two icons in the club also helps to enhance our club’s name. I wont embarrass them by naming them, but to give you a clue who I am talking about, one has a nickname that starts with a well known Supermarket and the other is from north of the border and who does not like paying to go in vfm and lcgb venues.

I think it’s also true to say that a certain other chappie with a mean competitive streak and who isn’t short of a bob or two has certainly made his mark on the club. Without him a lot of things within the club this year would not have happened.

This year we say a sad farewell to some of our members, who have moved on for various reasons. So to Martin and Lisa, Preston Sharman, Sandra Vollans and others, we wish you all the best for the future. I refuse to include Tony Vollans in this category, because I sincerely hope that we will see him again in the near future.

We also have several new members in the club and we welcome them and hope they can participate in the forthcoming events that we are now organizing for 2007.

January will be remembered for a very successful second Anniversary Do at Drax Club. Despite the state of the women’s toilets, we made a decent amount of money for Charity, thanks to a raffle overseen by Sandra and the Auction of two fantastic pictures painted by

Shaun and Tony. Who can forget our club auctioneer? Unforgettable Ingy!!

This month we also had a few local rides to York and a run on a very cold day to Leeds Parts Fair.

February was fairly quiet, but we did pick up a little trophy at the Doncaster A1 SC Annual Do for the second best turned out club. Even if we did lie about our numbers.

March was the real start of the riding season for the smtsc. We had a ride over to Helmsley to meet up with other East Yorkshire Clubs, followed by a weekend trip at Llandudno for the pre season National Rally. If I remember rightly, we got lost more than once, going there and coming back home. Unfortunately this would not be the first or last time this would happen in 2006.

Those that could not go to Llandudno, went to Castleford for an event hosted by the Midnight Runners Scooter Club.

Things really got going in April. Local clubs met up at a Taddy Stax SC pub, were Scooter Stu walked away with a raffle prize from Chiselspeed. A few of us went to see Tony 1Shirt at Kath Shapcotts party which was followed the next day by the first of the YSA Rideouts. As usual the first rideout is always at Knaresboro and along with other clubs, we had a good turnout, with nineteen scooters setting off from the market place.

The following week we had the second National Rally at Morecambe. It was a good rally with decent weather, but a few breakdowns, Barry’s rear shocker, Andy M’s Clutch cable and Andy Fb’s dodgy petrol tap. Oh yes, I can’t forget Kelvin’s snoring, the big gap in the middle of mine and Fb’s double bed, my daughter Debbie and we lost Ingy and Mivi on the way home. We finished the month with a ride to Shamus’s Parts Fair at Scunthorpe and on the way home we had a drink at Cargrave with some of the Goolies.

May was one of the most important months for the club. This was the month that we hosted an YSA Rideout with our good friends from Moorends. It was a team effort and every one pulled together to make this a really successful and memorable event. Selby had definitely not seen anything like it and it was a credit to every individual in the smtsc for making it an event that I and everyone else will never forget.

Whilst we were reveling in our Rideout success, a certain Scotsman was on an adventure of his own on the Land send to John O Grouts Ride. We have got to give the lad a lot of credit, because this event sorts the men from the boys and I certainly would struggle to do it with my back. Well done Scooter Stu.

Stu also was active again this month when he rode east without us to take part in the Mod Rally in Scarborough.

Along with lots of mid week runs we finished the month with the weekend National Rally in Skegness. I still have visions of flying beer mats and Sheila’s excellent waitress skills. Oh… and of Andy Mitch’s escapades with his lammy on the way home.

Late May and early June saw our Tesco Pete make the long arduous journey to Issiore in France. 1208 miles were covered on this journey and although the Rally was abit of a disaster, it sounds like Pete, along with Tom Petch and company had a good laugh.

June started with Scooter Stu at it again. This time he rode south with a partner to take part in the London to Southend Rally. How does the bloke do it?

The rest of the club did not venture quite so far this month, with rides to events hosted by the Phoenix Scooter Club and Harrogate Incrowd.

In June we also had a successful camp at the Whitby National Rally with breathtaking views from the campsite looking back over the moors. I remember the BBQ, Debbie’s hat, the lovely weather, Kelvin’s snoring and Mivi having problems getting up Saltergate bank. Bless!

We finished the month with a certain person’s fiftieth party and a trip out on our scoots to see the Who at Harewood House. Unfortunately the latter saw Cookie and Micky Flint get tickets for overtaking on double white lines. Something they hopefully are pleading innocent too.

Busy July brought the Kippax Scooter Club Do, were Kelvin won best Lammy. Later on some went to the Spit Roast event hosted by Spen Valley Scooter Club.

We also had the annual YSA Invasion weekend at Lepton. A great but tiring weekend, where we took our turn at the gate letting scooterists in. Andy Tucker, Craig Tate, Andy Moughan and I nearly got into a fight, but fortunately Debbie and Angie came to the rescue, donned the jackets and took control. Good on ya girls! Dare I mention that a certain person was so Knackered after that event, he rode into the back of me on the way home. FB!!!

Somewhere in July we also found time for a rideout and BBQ at the Olympia, a couple of Hull Alliance meetings, a Bridlington Ride and a Cleethorpes Rally to cope with.

In August we had rides to the Cumby Arms, Rotherham and Crusaders Scooter Club Do’s and the Wigan Esp Do.

All these events were memorable, but not as much as the jewel in the crown event for the whole year. The Isle of Wight International Rally at Ryde.

Twenty one members of the smtsc journeyed south with some of our friends from Kippax.

Over ten hours to get there and twelve hours to get home, it is fair to say, that true to form we got lost several times going there and coming back. We had a lot of laughs and adventures during this weekend. The weather was good and it helped to make this an experience I for one will never forget. I have said it already, but if you really like Scootering, this is one event that you have got to do at least once in your life. The Scooters, the people, the island and the whole atmosphere has got to be sampled at least once in your life. Those red Tshirts on that rideout really put our club on the national scootering map.

The Kelvinator has to take all the credit for organizing this event and already plans are underway for next years ride to the IOW..

You can imagine that after the IOW weekend those that went there, were on a high and it took some time to come back down to earth.

September brought the tiring but enjoyable Coast to Coast run of which Kelvin, Scooter Stu and Pete Hewitt represented the club. We also had the South Yorkshire YSA Rideout to Elsecar and later in the month the Wakefield Wakey Wakey monsoon rain rideout. Credit here goes to Stu’s Annette for enduring atrocious weather whilst riding to this venue.

October saw the riding season draw to a close with the YSA Tadcaster to Wetherby Rideout. A fine day saw around twenty three scoots parked up in the market place for the last YSA Rideout of the year. We even had a picture of some of our guys around Andy Mitch’s Indeed I Do scoot in the December Scootering Mag.

The next event in October was the Ryhill Parts fair near Barnsley and we finished the month with the Bridlington National Rally. Well done to Kelvin for winning a trophy at the custom show. I still have visions of half the club sorting through Andrea’s Stall for cheap Harrington’s and Tshirts, like it was a village hall jumble sale.

November was fairly uneventful with Scooter Stu having a ride over to the Bradford Scooter Clubs, a Sunday jaunt to the Humber Bridge Country Park Inn to join up with the Hull Alliance and myself, Kelvin, Scooter Stu and Cookie attending an YSA Meeting in Leeds.

We finished the year in December with me and Andy Mitch getting into trouble with Sheila and Shamus, whilst attending Tony1Shirt’s Kaz’s party. I didn’t know we would end up stopping the night at Tony1Shirts house. Honest Sheila!! Joy and I popped over to the Beverley Scooter Clubs Xmas party on the eighth.

On the ninth of December, we had our Xmas Do at the Gypsy Moth. A good night was had by all, as we were entertained by the Detours from Harrogate. I am not sure whether it’s a worry that some of our members feel the need to take their clothes off as these kind of evenings warm up. Why does it always have to be the blokes that do the undressing though.

Anyway it was nice to see visitors from Bawtry, Hull and Sherburn and we excelled ourselves again with the Raffle prizes.

The very last scooter event was the day after the Xmas Do, when some of our chaps attended the Hillsboro Parts Fair.

In this review, I have briefly skirted over the main events of 2006. There was lots of other rideouts, meetups with other clubs and social get together’s that we also had throughout this year.

Maybe you will agree that on the strength of what we did this year, we probably did far more than in the previous years. So how about 2007?

How does Kelso, Woolacombe, IOW, Coast to Coast, Morecambe, Scarborough, Margate, Bridlington, Cleethorpes, or the Lake District grab ya??

What about a weekend rally at Brieghton Launch or the YSA Invasion at Lepton??

Well it’s all gonna happen. So if you want to go on everything that we are planning or just pick and choose what you fancy doing, just let us know.

All the very best to all in the SMTSC and to all our friends for 2007.

Ride safe. Take care.

Derek C.