Show Finnish pride during Great Race
News | Published on June 23, 2022 at 7:34pm GMT+0000 | Author: Chad Koenen
0Event to drive through NYM, Bluffton
Tucker Henderson
Reporter
Vintage car enthisiasts and precision racers will be driving up Highway 10 past Bluffton and New York Mills on Friday, June 25 as The Great Race continues.
The Great Race is an annual event with over 100 vehicles entering the challenge each year. The race includes vehicles spanning over 60 years of automotive history. Since a 1973 Jensen Interceptor can speed along quite a bit faster than a 1916 Hudson Hill Climber, the race is not a speed-driven race, it is an endurance and technical race.
Drivers and their navigators must follow intricate directions in order to travel the correct speed, make the correct turns, and complete their daily length of road in a certain amount of time to come close to the correct timing, which will ultimately win them the grand prize of $50,000.
This year, the racers will be starting off in Warwick, R.I. on June 18 and will finish on June 26 in Fargo, N.D. at the Historic Fargo Theater.
Finnish flags requested
For those of a Finnish background, a group called the Wandering Troubadours of Finland will be competing in the race and will be driving past NY Mills on Friday, June 25. The Troubadours get their name from the founders’ Finnish heritage and member John Reinan explained their slogan.
“The Great Race motto is: ‘To finish is to win.’ Our motto is: ‘To be Finnish is to win,’” wrote Reinan in an article for the Star Tribune. “We, too, are fan favorites, meeting our car at the finish line every day and jogging the last hundred yards with it, waving Finnish battle flags as the crowd goes wild.”
With the completion of this year’s Great Race, the Troubadours will be driving through their final state in the lower 48 when they finish the race in Fargo. This is a special event for the group and with the knowledge that the NY Mills area community is rich with residents of Finnish heritage, a special showing of Finnish flags has been respectfully requested.
Those who would like to show their support can line Highway 10 with their Finnish flags to wave as the Wandering Troubadours make their way past the city.