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Model S rally

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I recently found this online:
http://www.teslamotors.com/en_HK/blog/circling-hong-kong-one-charge

Sounds like a very fun trip! I wonder if we could do the same or something similar? We might want to make some adjustments e.g. stopping by a SuperCharger or the Tesla showroom.

Anyway, who’s in? And shall we set a date? I’m thinking of either a Saturday or a Sunday, and to accommodate some of the November deliveries, probably early-mid December? That means December 6, 7, 13, or 14.

I’m envisioning a convoy of Model Ss and that already makes me smile. :biggrin:

AppleFan
 
Interesting article, I wonder who wrote it? Sounds like a very intelligent sort of chap :wink:

The roadster rally was fun. But, just driving 200km in 4 1/2 hours would have been boring as hell. What made it was the organisation and the stops we made along the way (with the opportunity to socialise and eat good food). The other issue is to not make it _too_ large, unless we want to make this an enormous event. From my understanding, there are no restrictions on the use of public roads so long as we have a limited (less than 50, I think?) number of people. It also needs to be a rally not a race. For the roadster rally, we numbered the cars with adhesive stickers and the rule was you had to stay in order - that avoided 99% of issues with people getting too excited!

The other option is to try to make this an EV driving event (not just Tesla) and involve the other types of EVs. The issue with that is that I believe most EVs are in corporate/government ownership, and relatively few are in private ownership. But, this might just be the start of a plug-in-HongKong movement.

I'm very willing to help organise this. Early to mid December sounds perfect - stay away from the end of the month due to holidays.
 
As long as it's after this coming Tuesday and I'm not working, I'm also in.

Just signed with Fiona at TM then straight to Hitachi Capital to sign a revised deal - even lower interest rate than the original offer.

Hitachi Capital / Mr Mark Ma, really a pleasure to work with.
 
Thanks for the enthusiastic responses! In particular, I'm really happy that Mark has offered his assistance -- I'm sure his experience in organizing the Roadster rally would be invaluable!

Sorry to sound a bit snobbish -- but I would prefer to keep it Tesla only. :biggrin:

I see three main tasks going forward (Mark, please feel free to chip in based on your experience):
1. Set a date
2. Set a route and start time
3. Make reservations for lunch/tea at the stops
4. Tell Tesla (for some media exposure?)

So proceeding with task 1, shall we mark Sunday, December 7th? Please post whether you can or cannot make the 7th, and I'll keep a running tally in the first post. If too many people can't make the 7th, we'll make it the 14th.

And as for task 2, shall we follow the same route as the Roadster Rally? I like that a lot, with the possible exception of an additional/replacement stop by a "Tesla landmark", i.e. a a Supercharger or the showroom. What do people think?
 
Thanks for the enthusiastic responses! In particular, I'm really happy that Mark has offered his assistance -- I'm sure his experience in organizing the Roadster rally would be invaluable!

Sorry to sound a bit snobbish -- but I would prefer to keep it Tesla only. :biggrin:

I see three main tasks going forward (Mark, please feel free to chip in based on your experience):
1. Set a date
2. Set a route and start time
3. Make reservations for lunch/tea at the stops
4. Tell Tesla (for some media exposure?)

So proceeding with task 1, shall we mark Sunday, December 7th? Please post whether you can or cannot make the 7th, and I'll keep a running tally in the first post. If too many people can't make the 7th, we'll make it the 14th.

And as for task 2, shall we follow the same route as the Roadster Rally? I like that a lot, with the possible exception of an additional/replacement stop by a "Tesla landmark", i.e. a a Supercharger or the showroom. What do people think?

Regarding the date, I think sunday is safest, and Dec 7th is fine for me.

Regarding the route, yes it was pretty good, and repeating the same route has some benefits. But, let's not make the same wrong turn in Wong Chuk Hang (see it live, 15 seconds into this video):


I would suggest we change the start place slightly to that central meeting area on the harbour side of the post office (in sight of the Apple store). Early on Sunday morning, it should be easy to meet up there, and it is great for photo opportunities.

The stops we made were (a) Cyberport for a meet-and-greet, (b) Airport Marriott for a buffet lunch, (c) Science Park for a meet-and-greet, and ending at (d) ICC Ritz Carlton in TST for high tea at the 100+ floor.

Last time, we had a great drive-by of the airport departures terminal, which would be good to repeat, and I would also suggest this time that perhaps the Tesla service centre would be fun to circle. If people want to include a supercharger visit, I think Kai Tak makes the most sense (it is on the route).

Last time, we asked for HK$500 donation per car, and the money went to charity. But, the food was sponsored, making it overall an amazing day out. Doing it that way also gives an incentive for people not to cancel at the last minute (we had almost 100% attendance), and I really recommend that we do something similar.

I will talk to Tesla (I have the contacts there) to see if they would be interested in sponsorship / assistance. In particular, we have only a small group here and there is a much bigger Tesla community out there in HK.

Regards, Mark.
 
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Thanks for the very valuable suggestions, Mark. I like all of them, particularly the donation to charity as a commitment to joining. However, I'm just concerned some may be a bit difficult to implement? For example, how did you arrange the sponsorship of food?
And though I don't want to set too high expectations, I do think we would probably get more than 12 cars this time around -- should we give each of the stops some heads-up to expect so many cars stopping by at once?
 
Possible route mapped here: http://goo.gl/maps/QBvjQ

I've based 90% of it on the Roadster Rally route, with the following changes:
1. Changed the start point to behind the General Post Office (harbor side)
2. Added the Tesla Service Center stop between Cyberport stop and the Airport stop
3. Changed the end point to Kai Tak Cruise Terminal

It's less than the 202km the Mark mentioned in his article -- I wonder if there were any detours I couldn't figure out.

For fun but not necessary, it would be great to have the final distance just over 190km -- 190km being the range of the BMW i3. Haha...
 
The route you posted looks good, but a few differences.

1] You missed the wrong turning, and having to U-turn 12 roadsters in a convoy, above Happy Valley ;-)
2] The ClearWater Bay bit went down to Silverstrand roundabout, down to Hang Hau, and then back. Not much change in distance, but a nicer road.
3] The original roadster route ended up back in TST (which I guess adds 20km - 30km to it).
4] If we really want the distance, changing to go round Tai Tam reservoir would increase the HK Island length, but terrify us all.

Assuming we can't get much sponsorship, given time and organisational capabilities, it might be simpler to drop a few formal stops. Perhaps don't stop at CyberPort or SciencePark. The first part of the drive could then be central, through south island, via Tesla Service Centre, to the airport (lunch at the Marriott, assuming we can get their co-operation). Then, the afternoon drive would be from the airport through the new territories, past Kai Tak, and ending up somewhere nice to end and have tea (ICC Ritz would be nice, and would repeat what we did in 2011).
 
Mark -- any news with Tesla (or other parties)?

I'm fine with dropping some stops, but I think it would be good to space out the stops such that there's no more than an hour's driving between each. As you said, the fun isn't in the drive in and of itself, but the socializing at stops and meals. Perhaps we can think of places where we might be able to get good shots of our cars together?

As for the route, would it be better (or worse?) to go through Tuen Mun instead of Tai Lam Tunnel. Traffic can be bad on Tuen Mun Highway, but it might be more scenic. Also adds some kms. Stanley might also be fun, but I agree not to go through Chai Wan reservoir given the width of the Model S!