Johnny Fraser (right), winner of the Suzuki Swft GL, with Downer NZ Masters Games manager Rachel O'Connor and Suzuki NZ general manager of automobile marketing Gary Collins. Photo / Paul Brooks
Johnny Fraser (right), winner of the Suzuki Swft GL, with Downer NZ Masters Games manager Rachel O'Connor and Suzuki NZ general manager of automobile marketing Gary Collins. Photo / Paul Brooks
Johnny Fraser won the Suzuki Swift GL raffled at this year's Downer NZ Masters Games, and it couldn't have gone to a more deserving winner.
Johnny, 71, has been involved with the Games since the beginning, usually competing, up until four or five years ago. Now he manages a footballteam – Athletic Cosmos, just missing out on a bronze medal this year.
"I have been at every single Masters Games (in Whanganui). I was on the committee with the council at the first one, the original," he says. He still has a letter of thanks from mayor Chas Poynter.
"It was a real gamble, and there was no Dunedin in it then, it was only Whanganui." That was in 1989. "Everybody in our team – Trevor Strong, Bryan Stewart … we were all in it."
At the moment Johnny is involved in fundraising for a new stadium at Wembley Park.
Tickets for the Suzuki were $10 each and the draw was made on Saturday, February 13 at the Games hub. The Suzuki Swift GL automatic is valued at $22,990 plus on road costs. Johnny has picked out a red model which should be ready for pick-up this week, according to General Manager of Automobile Marketing for Suzuki NZ, Gary Collins.