If you are into bikes and having a damn good time with your mates then you were certainly in the right place at this years Thunderbolt Rally in Dungog, whether you were participating in the events or just kicking back and watching you knew one thing for sure, and that simply was, that all the stops had been pulled out to give the folk who attended a day of full on entertainment.

This year’s line up of Demolition Derby and Uni-motorcycle Drags, Burnout Comp, Adult Entertainment and a well stocked bar provided the four essential food groups for a healthy biker lifestyle, those of course being, dust, burnt rubber, eye candy and a copious amount of liquid refreshment to wash it all down, and, judging from all the smiling faces plus the stamina shown to see it all out into the wee small hours of the morning that’s obviously a bloody sight healthier for you than the other options of tofu, political correctness, dandy lion tea and going to bed early.

The Show and Shine and Tattoo Show judges had a daunting task as they tried to decide the winners from a classy line up of cars bikes and ink, and the rally goers had an equally hard task trying to decide what they wanted to get from the traders stalls that were selling everything biker related that you could poke a stick at. Music was in no short supply either with the “Marinated Blues Band” on Friday night for the early arrivals and “Dyvercty”, “Zebyah” and “Damaged Goods” playing all day Saturday, and, just in case there may have been a couple of locals who by then didn’t know we were in town, quite a few kilos of gunpowder made a bit more noise up in the night sky with a fireworks display.

An arm wrestling competition on Friday night had demonstrated some credible brute strength from the bikers in attendance, whilst an exhibition on Saturday of Martial Arts routines from a group who had traveled up from Wollongong showed some of the finer points of their discipline, and, as a finale from the martial arts participants they treated an appreciative crowd to a couple of full on Cage Fighting bouts between two pairs of their fighters, I have to say that it was a pretty full on effort from all four of the young fella’s with some very heavy hitting getting through their defences at times, and, there’s absolutely no doubt in my mind that they did themselves and their group proud on the night.