The 'SADCASE Story' has kindly been documented by founding member Chris Mason.
Chris has seen the Club originally established by Martin Pester and a small group of friends grow to its current day format.
It is a nationally known award winning club with over 1700 active members.
He writes-"After the first meeting at the end of 2009, the first Tuesday night in the month continued as SADCASE club night in the Crown at Cootham. The original club motto was “If you love it, so do we”. A windscreen badge was made for members and a simple system of membership cards was introduced. Word started to get around about the free wheeling car club whose members delighted in calling themselves SADCASES and more people started turning up. Flyers saying who we were produced and placed under windscreen wipers at every opportunity and a website was set up.
To cope with the increasing membership that was by now coming from a widening catchment area, the move was made to two separate locations (large car parks being the main qualification) on the second and fourth Tuesdays in the month. In the summer of 2010, we were asked to take part in what was then the Storrington Village Summer Show, which was run jointly by the local Rotary and Lions Clubs. In the space we were allocated we were able to accommodate about 130 classic and sports cars. They proved to be a huge attraction. As a result SADCASE became increasingly involved in the village show. In 2016, the Rotary/Lions announced that they no longer had the resources to do the show. By then we had done a couple of ‘Spring Gatherings’ In the Storrington Library car park, in association with Horsham District and Storrington Parish Councils, that had proved to be very popular with the locals. So the Storrington Parish Council came to us and asked us to put on a summer show on the recreation ground, they undertook to deal with event licences, risk assessments and pay the insurance. As well as providing the cars, we had to take care of catering, entertainment, promotion, toilets and crowd control. We estimated that we would get maybe 200 cars, but in the event we got 400! The number took us completely by surprise and it was a tight squeeze. It has since become an annual event. All profits have traditionally been given to local charities.
For a few years we held the "Not the Christmas Party" at the end of January at a number of local venues. Essentially, a dinner and dance, sometimes with a theme, or sometimes with a guest speaker. These petered out because it became increasingly difficult to cater for all tastes although a good number of members have asked for this fun mid winter event to return. Over the years, our increasing number and types of activities have attracted the attention of local media and the National Motoring Press giving a healthy boost to the already rapid increase in membership numbers.
As I think everyone knows, circumstances saw us at Ford airfield in 2018 with 600 cars attending. 2019 saw a smaller more relaxed Storrington Show exclusively for SADCASE members and then on to Ford again, where this time, some 2000 cars turned up! It was a busy day. This however might have been the straw that broke the camels back for some who were on the organising Gearbox group at the time. A new committee at first led by Jamie Brown then by Robert and Jessica Carter was formed to maintain the club motto and find room for expansion. Mike Toynbee who was largely responsible for us meeting at the Amberley Museum, Simon Hoy our treasurer and of course Martin Pester our honorary President are the other members of the present committee. A large number of smaller but no less enjoyable meetings have punctuated the SADCASE years.
The present gearbox committee have sought to include at least one additional show or meeting from February to October every year. The Spring and autumn breakfast gatherings at the Pagham Beach Cafe have been particularly popular, as has a gathering with the members of the Southdown Gliding Club at their Parham airfield; there have been other one off events. The introduction of National Drive it Day has resulted in some very pleasant and well organised SADCASE tours around the Sussex countryside. Recently we have enjoyed two all day special events at the Amberley Museum being the Queens Jubilee event in 2022 and the Coronation event in 2023. All ticketed events in 2022 and 2023 were "sold out" .
The acknowledged highlight of course is our highly successful annual shows at Amberley Museum in May and Hurston Lane Recreational Ground in July /August each year. The Amberley Museum event is being held on Bank Holiday Whitsun Monday 27th May. The Storrington show however has been shelved this year and a members only event at Kestrals Farm is being trialed a couple of miles north of Thakeham. Many thanks to Harry and Lorraine Sherrard. Just turn up on the day bringing with food and drink with you. We will supply the Toilets, Bins and an ice cream van. The field stretches over a few acres so space should not be a problem.
The Goodwood Motor Racing Circuit invited our club to their GRRC track day events in June, August. September and October in 2023. These were well supported with many cars meeting at the Storrington Library car park ready for the drive out and some 20 cars joining us directly at the circuit. These days were most enjoyable despite the rain in August. Other events are planned in 2024.
We meet at the Amberley Museum(second wednesday) and the Fountain in Ashurst(fourth wednesday) for the summer months( April to September) and at the Spur in Slindon(second saturday lunchtime) and the Fountain(fourth wednesday) in the colder winter months.
