It takes 7 hours (maybe more)for the Melbourne guys to get to Thredbo, so its not that driveable and we have all seen it plenty of times and since we go out of our way to drive, try some different roads (trust me they are better around Bright). Lets try something different for once.
I think it would only add 2 hours or so to the Syndey guys trip, since they have the Hume to get to Albury.
The way I see it is, we do these trips to drive and catch up also, we can do all of that in Bright too and it's a change of scenery and some kick arse roads.