If you grew up with a poster of a mud-caked Land Rover being winched through a Borneo jungle on your wall, this one's for you.
Defender has revived the spirit of the Camel Trophy – the iconic expedition competition that ran from 1980 to 1998 and built the Land Rover legend into something mythological – under a new banner: the Defender Trophy. And two Australians have just punched their tickets to the Global Finals in Africa.
Louise McNair from Victoria and Glen Wimberley from Queensland emerged from 23 competitors at the Australian Qualifier held at Glenworth Valley, NSW, this past weekend, surviving a day of physical, mechanical and mental challenges through genuinely unforgiving terrain.
They now represent Australia against the world, competing across the African wilderness in driving, physical, and ingenuity challenges, with Tusk's real conservation missions baked directly into the competition format. The winners may get a trophy for their LinkedIn post, but they also get deployed with Tusk's field teams on the ground – a Defender-supported conservation effort that spans more than two decades.
To mark the revival, Defender released the 110 Trophy Edition – priced from $118,900 before on-road costs, with drive-away landing between $132,115 and $144,000 depending on spec. 100 units have sold already locally, which tells you everything about how deep the Camel Trophy nostalgia runs.
Powered by a 3.0-litre twin-turbo diesel and available exclusively in Deep Sandglow Yellow (a modern riff on that iconic Trophy ochre) or Keswick Green, it arrives with gloss black 20-inch steelies on all-terrain tyres, an expedition roof rack, deployable roof ladder, side-mounted gear carrier, raised air intake and laser-etched Trophy branding on the exposed cross car beam. Ebony Windsor leather inside, because tough doesn't have to mean spartan.
It looks exactly like something you'd want to get properly muddy.
Defender Trophy’s global finals take place in sub-Saharan Africa later this year.
