The Art of the Convoy: How HRR Keeps it Flowing and Fun
A group of sensible drivers c.2012
If you have been as lucky as me, by your mid 30’s you will have experienced a few convoys to varying degrees of success, satisfaction, danger, chaos and utter farce. The convoy is a special time on the road. Special because it is not part of the day to day, it is an abnormal thing to happen. You wouldn’t convoy to the shops, or to the Bank (which is now a 90 minute round journey, thank you, Mr Barclays). For me, at least, the enjoyment of a convoy starts when you realise that you have ended up in a convoy situation, planned or otherwise. Why do we like convoys so much? It is tricky to put your finger on it; does it link back through a multitude of generations to evoke some kind of tribal cave man group hunting journey? Or is that too academic? And we just find it quite fun dicking about in multiple cars. I suspect the latter. Whatever it is, I love it. Don’t get me wrong, a solo drive when you need the headspace is an essential tool. If a Solo drive is our everyday hammer in the toolbox of life, the convoy is the specialist tool that sits there patiently waiting to be used, and when it is, it absolutely hits the nail on the head from start to finish. That’s enough woodworking analogies.
Now, my first convoy I can remember vividly. It was to a friend’s 18th Birthday. It comprised more second hand VW products than many dealerships had in stock across the Southwest of England at the time. A friend was in his mum’s Peugeot 206, and I was in a 2007 Fiesta Zetec. We had made a few essential modifications to our cars; I had bought a cigarette lighter socket to 3 pin plug converter, which meant I could have my desktop speakers with a massive subwoofer rattling around in the car with us. This was one of my less practical upgrades as the speaker system took up the entirety of the rear seats, clattered around and unplugged themselves whilst I was trying to get the back out, on a front wheel drive Fiesta, and caused an issue lighting our very poorly rolled cigarettes. At the time, it was simultaneously the coolest and most dangerous thing I had ever done and culminated in a member of the convoy upsetting the Special Boat Service.
Thinking back on why it was so fun has got me thinking; it is not easy to pinpoint what it is that makes the experience of a convoy so exciting. I think that first convoy, even though subsequently I have done much longer, bigger and (supposed) better convoys, captures the essence of the convoy. Through the haze of adolescence, Golden Virginia, Deadmau5, there is a form shaping of what the convoy delivers, its freedom, it’s the ability to showcase freedom as a group as well as an individual in a group. It is pretending you are on Top Gear, it is a competition on who can get from 30-60 the quickest, whose car sounds the nicest and all conducted in a friendly and community felt sphere.
In my eyes, these are the few essentials that I try to instil in all of the HRR Road Rallies: camaraderie, competition, freedom, adventure, buzzwords, and confidence. This last point is the most important for me. Everyone on every HRR designed trip has different levels of ability and confidence. The road rallies on the HRR are designed to provide engagement at whatever standard. We will have some people who have owned their car for 20 years and know it like the back of their hand, or people who have saved up and bought their first love and joy and are still unsure what to do with it. We won’t teach you how to drive it, but we will show you how to enjoy your car.
Now, I’m not saying every convoy should involve the upper echellons of the millitary. I’d recommend avoiding it if you can, but moments like that are what make a convoy so much more than ‘driving somewhere in a group’. It is driving next to each other, rolling down the window because that feels cool and then realising that you can’t hear each other shouting to one another and winding the window back up. It is about genuine appreciation for a friend’s car as it comes screaming past and realising you’ve known them for 27 years and 10 year old us would think this was the coolest thing in the world.
There is no such thing as a replicable convoy, I have learnt that over the years. It’s like media bias, the same words of a story can be read by two different people with entirely different outcomes. Convoys come on a scale; Some trips can be precise, even surgical, with pre-planned fuel stops and designated lead cars and irate planners when things go off course. Others are absolute chaos, where the only rule is “try not to lose sight of the guy in front” which I like and works well, until you lose the guy in front. HRR rallies tend to land somewhere in the middle of this scale. Enough structure to keep everyone flowing, but enough freedom to be able to experience the dichotomy of solo and group adventure.
And that’s really the art of it. Not enough chaos, and it’s boring, you reduce the chance of random events occurring, and when they do (which they will), your meticulous plan is buggered. Too much chaos, and you will have missing cars, missed lunch spots, hungry and thirsty drivers. It is not an easy tempo to achieve, but something we feel we are pretty good at.
It’s the reason why we do what we do at HRR. The routes are designed to bring out the best in the cars, the drivers, and the group dynamic. I started this literally so I could pull together convoys for my job. It doesn’t matter what car you have, it is how you fit into a group and experience the road together.
