You may recall that a few months back some of my staff, my family and I participated in a 24 hour charity indoor bike ride at Paul Hillbrick cycle studio in Smeaton Grange. As a follow up Steve is currently in Africa and distributing firsthand the funds and equipment that the event raised money for. It’s been great to see Steve’s pictures on Facebook and see the obvious enthusiasm that his generosity is generating in the children. As a reminder the Charity was Ikhaya le Themba, which is a facility in Cape Town that provides support to children whose lives have been affected by HIV & AIDS. If you get a chance follow Steve Wisbey on Facebook and see some of his pictures, we’ll place a few on our site also. It’s great to see a local bloke who is willing to stick his neck out and do such a great thing for people who otherwise may not get a chance at an ordinary life, well done Wiz.

Over the last 26 years, the annual St Thomas More School Fete has raised a hell of a lot of money through the fabulous support of its P&F, its families and the general community. This year was no different.

The little school off St John's Road in Campbelltown still has what it takes to keep the kids amused, and the parents fed!! It’s fair to say that keeping such a strong fete going would take a lot, but each year the organisers, whether they are new to the event or not, roll up their sleeves and give it a crack.

Yesterday for the 25th time, Paul Wakeling Motor Group gave away a pre-loved car to a lucky winner. I’m amazed that each year we give away the car, the winner seems to be so deserving and charitable themselves.

Last year’s winner told me at the fete yesterday that she knew of someone who needed the car more than she did, so she helped them out with it.

This year’s winner, Mrs Cornett, was so happy that she would be able to give the pre-loved Holden Commodore to her daughter who had been saving frantically for her own car. It appears as though the man upstairs was smiling on this little school and its community once again.

A few months ago Wakelings were approached by Roger Chater on behalf of Narellan Rotary to help out an organisation that helps lots of families in Macarthur. This organisation was seeking to expand its foothold in providing much needed house bound services to families of young children.

Rotary’s goal, in talking with me, was to see if there was some way that Wakelings could lower the cost of a vehicle that would allow other funds raised to go towards a more direct provision of services.

Thinking that this would be a great opportunity for our Volkswagen partnership, I approached Volkswagen head office to see what help they could provide. I’m pleased to say that they agreed with me and today, (well last week actually), we officially handed over the keys to a brand new Volkswagen Jetta.

The organisation is Karitane and, for those of you who have used its services or know people who have would agree, it’s a fabulous organisation.

For those that haven’t, take some time to visit their website here as it’s full of useful information on the services they provide.

Karitane have also recently opened a space in the Camden Hospital where, with the help of some amazing staff and useful technology, they try to tackle behavioural issues in young children. I’m told to see this in action is quite special...

So if you see a great looking sign-written Jetta on its way around the Macarthur, give Angela & her team a wave and thank them for all their efforts.

The last two weeks for me have been relatively sleep deprived. I have shared with many other cycling and sports enthusiasts the highs and lows of watching the Tour De France. Along with spectacular scenery, viewers are treated to great displays of strategy, suffering, skills and sportsmanship.

Overnight Australian Cadel Evans, on the final climb of a long stage, suffered a punctured rear wheel. He was not alone, there were several other riders who suffered a similar fate.

In a great showing of sportsmanship however, after realising Cadel’s fate, the other major competitors teams decided to ease up in their race to the finish to allow Cadel to rejoin. It appeared as though there was an attempt to sabotage the race somewhat, a spectator had thrown tacks onto the road.

The effort to pull Cadel back to the bunch was made by Cadel’s other team mates. It was inspirational to see all of the BMC riders drop back to Cadel, form a pace line and suffer themselves to bring the gap back as quickly as they could, no one rider alone could ever win the Tour.

I look forward to the next week and the finale into Paris and I’m sure examples of sportsmanship and team work will abound over that time...

You may have recently noticed that Holden is starting to promote its all new entrant into the Australian market place, the Holden Volt. As one of 49 dealers to be awarded the ability to sell & service the Volt we are quite excited as the arrival time of the cars is rapidly approaching.

As mentioned in their advertising, Holden sees the Volt as a game changer in how motorists in Australia see both Holden & the new technology that vehicles like this bring.

An electric vehicle with extended range capability, the Volt takes less than 6 hours to charge on a domestic power supply. This is estimated to cost around $2.50 per charge.

Once on the road, the lithium-ion battery can give over 80km of tail pipe emissions free motoring. Once the battery is depleted the Volt switches to extended range mode where a petrol motor runs to charge the battery, which can extend the range to over 600km.

Volt has been internationally acknowledged by winning a vast amount of awards and is not just a science experiment. In fact, Holden espouse it to be more car than electric and an exhilarating drive.

With so much to learn about this car the best thing to do is jump on Holden's website for a look at all the information...we're excited and i'm sure you will be too.

Last Friday night, amidst the cool of a wintery Camden night, the who’s who of Camden gathered to celebrate the Mayoral Ball. As usual, it was a great Macarthur evening all aimed at helping Society 389 raise funds for a great cause.

Wearing a ‘Phantom’ mask, Mayor Warren welcomed guests to what also turned out to be a celebration of the 30th year of the Camden Civic Centre.

Macarthur’s favourite MC Steve ‘Wiz’ Wisbey showed off his precocious talents in both cycling and singing and the nights festivities took hold. In what promised to be a carbon neutral event, Terry Diomis used his cycling ability to help power the night.

Of course the night was aimed at raising funds for the family of local girl, Adriana Gatellari. This brave girl & her family have battled to overcome APERT syndrome, which has meant that Adriana has had dozens of cranio-facial surgeries aimed at providing her with a better quality of life.

The Mater Dei student showed what a true champion she is by using the night to raise awareness for a cause she believes in, which was to support the facility in Adelaide which has given her a new life. With such a strong family and caring community you can see that young children like Adriana will definitely go on in their lives to make a difference.

It was a great night and I was pleased to be among the crowd who could help. The night raised a question however.... Adriana’s Dad Joe, in his speech, spoke of he and his wife’s sadness at the thought of "What happens to these members of our society when they are left alone? When the carers in their lives pass on, who looks after their kids?".

It’s a vexing topic and one which certainly deserves more attention.

After having visited Hyundai’s Korean Headquarters a couple of weeks ago, it comes as no surprise to me to see that they have recently released two new vehicles.

The all new i30 is the next generation of the award winning model that earned Hyundai great accolades in the later parts of the noughties. The new i30 builds upon that success with newer styling incorporating Hyundai’s fluidic sculpture theme. This new i30 is larger in head, shoulder and leg room as well as having a new petrol & upgraded diesel engine. With standard features like stability control, 7 airbags, rear sensors, cruise control, all the USB & Bluetooth inputs you could want, the new i30 is definitely taking the i30 brand forward.

Over the weekend Hyundai also announced that the new i40 sedan is due to arrive any day soon. The new sedan's big sister, the stunning i40 wagon, has been a hit since launch and I’m sure the sedan variant will be the same.

Slightly smaller than the i45 sedan, the i40 is designed in Germany and has a far more European feel to how it drives with a stirring diesel motor and a more refined steering & suspension package. Both are available now from our showrooms, pop in and have a look!

I could fill three pages with the interesting things I saw last week when Greer & I were lucky enough to be guests of Hyundai on a trip to Korea & China.

From the outset we knew we were in for something special when we landed in Seoul and were whisked away to Hyundai International HQ. There we saw Hyundai’s automotive vision for the future, certainly something we should all look forward to.

We then flew down to Yeosu in southern Korea to visit the world expo site (similar to Brisbane in 1988). Amazing in scale and technology, we visited many pavilions including the Australian hall. Interestingly it was here that we were driven to the venue in a Hyundai Bus, which was powered by a hydrogen fuel cell. The only emissions this vehicle gives off is water... certainly something to look forward to.

A visit to the Asan plant and we were quickly on our way to see China and the view of a dealership in a city of some 24 Million people... once again the scale was mind blowing.

I came away from the trip in awe of the scale of development in both Korea & China. You hear lots of stories but it’s not until you can see the scale of the growth that you understand how important this region is for our future. There is of course a lot of history - Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden Temple were highlights, and the promise of a bright future when you could see both countries were attempting to push clean technological growth... as I said I could fill three pages.....

Wow what a night! As promised the annual Kids of Macarthur Ball held last Saturday at The Cube was indeed spectacular. A great cause, the who’s who of Macarthur were there to help raise funds for much needed equipment for the hospital, in particular the adolescent mental health facility, Gna Ka Lun.

Supporters on the evening were treated to a great spectacle with host and local boy made good, Tim Campbell setting a great pace for the night. Amongst lots of dancing and acknowledgments to what seemed like a thousand dignitaries, we learned of the great work and philosophies of the team at Gna Ka Lun.

It is not until you hear some of the statistics of the need for such facilities that you really can appreciate that we would be a great deal worse off, if it weren’t for people like the health services team at our local hospitals and indeed the people from Kids of Macarthur.

Literally meaning “healing of the mind” in aboriginal tongue, let’s hope this facility can continue to do its great work. If the level of support on Saturday is anything to go by, it certainly will.

We’re getting pretty excited at the dealership right now, on top of a range of new vehicles hitting the showrooms like the all new Hyundai i30, the super tough Holden Colorado, automatic diesel Great Wall and the new automatic transmissions available in the Volkswagen Amarok range, we’ve also completed our latest building project.

Our new stand alone Volkswagen Parts & Service facility is now ready to move into. The service team have been looking forward to this for a while now and I’m pleased to say it has lived up to our expectations. With a nine bay workshop, the facility certainly gives us opportunity to grow with the Macarthur market and with the expanded Volkswagen range, we are certainly well positioned.

The team will be moving in over the next few weeks and will then be ready to take care of all your Volkswagen Service & Parts needs.

On another note, I’m really looking forward to attending this weekends Kids of Macarthur Ball. One of the highlights of the Macarthur social scene, the night at The Cube is certain to once again stand out. Let’s hope this years function sets new heights in fundraising for this worthy cause.