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BJR star Nick Percat reveals he won’t be Jamie Whincup’s replacement at Triple Eight. He explains why to BRUCE NEWTON.

NICK OFF!

ANOTHER POTENTIAL candidate to fill Jamie Whincup’s prized seat at Triple Eight Race Engineering is out of contention.

Nick Percat has revealed he made contact with the owners of the championship heavyweight team to press his claims, but was rebuffed.

“I definitely put the feelers out, you’d be silly not to,” Percat told Auto Action.

Percat remains part of the wider Supercars driver market speculation, as a return to Brad Jones Racing in 2022 is yet to be confirmed.

Other teams he has been mentioned in connection with include Walkinshaw Andretti United, where second-year driver Bryce Fullwood is highly regarded but needs to improve his results.

Percat had been a constant on speculative lists of who might be in the frame to replace seven-time Supercars champion and four-times Bathurst 1000 winner Whincup, who retires from full-time Supercars racing at the end of 2021 to step into Roland Dane’s role as team principal.

But reality has intervened in that theory.

“It is flattering to see fans commenting about Jamie retiring and me replacing him,” Percat said.

“I would be lying if I said I hadn’t reached out and put the feelers out to see what they were up to.

“But Roland and the whole team there – I guess they have a whole

board of people there now – play their cards pretty close to their chest.

“At the moment I am loyal to Brad [Jones Racing], but I put the feelers out to see if there was an opportunity there.

“I’m sure there isn’t otherwise I would have heard more by now.”

Percat said he posed the question to T8 late in 2020.

“I was pretty early with asking the question,” he admitted.

“Roland said I was too old,” he halfjoked, admitting that was the crux of the message he had got back.

Whincup, who will also take over from Dane as T8’s managing director in 2022, told AA Percat was definitely on the list of about six drivers drawn up as his potential replacement.

“Nick was certainly on the list,” he said. “We haven’t made a decision yet, but last I knew Nick was on the list.

“It’s still six on the list, just some are still getting more favourable than others.”

Percat joined BJR in 2017 and has finished 17th, 10th, ninth and seventh in successive campaigns. He lies ninth in 2021 despite a difficult start to the year at Bathurst.

In 2015-16 he raced at Lucas Dumbrell Motorsport and Walkinshaw Racing in 2014, when he made his full-time championship debut.

Percat was a development driver within the old Walkinshaw factory

Holden set-up, partnering Garth Tander to that famous Bathurst win.

He says that history is part of the reason a return for him to Clayton comes up in speculation frequently.

While unsurprisingly unwilling to say if he has had more recent talks, Percat did reveal negotiations with WAU two years ago at the same time Mostert and Fullwood were signed.

“I had a few meetings with them but they went in a different direction,” he said.

Percat heads to Hidden Valley this weekend on the back of some stellar form at The Bend, where he drove from the back of the grid to finish fifth in race one. He also scored sixth place in race three.

He has an enormous mix of results in Darwin from podiums and DNFs. The super-soft tyre makes its debut this weekend and that should open up strategic options through the three 110km races, something BJR traditionally excels at.

Percat won two of six races at Sydney Motorsport Park last year when Supercars converted to the three sprints format and started experimenting with tyre allocations and compounds.

“It should be pretty exciting this weekend and I enjoy that sort of racing,” Percat said.

“There is a bit of strategy in it and opening it up to everyone to get a good result if it works out that way, is good for the sport.”.

FEENEY FIRMS

WITH NICK Percat ruled out, Chaz Mostert now expected to renew with Walkinshaw Andretti United and Tickford Racing’s Cam Waters also set to stay where he is, the way is clearing for youngster Broc Feeney to claim Jamie Whincup’s seat at Triple Eight.

And Whincup says we won’t have to wait that long to find out who has the drive.

“We want to be on the front foot, so we will make a call sooner rather than later, as soon as we can.

“It’s probably weeks.”

Andre Heimgartner is theoretically a rival for Feeney as the Kiwi’s negotiations with Kelly Grove Racing have been put on-hold (see separate story).

Of course, T8 might still opt for an out-of-the-box international choice.

But with Feeney already part of the Triple Eight structure in its Super2 program and sharing a T8 wildcard with Russell Ingall at Bathurst, he is clearly favourably looked upon.

Feeney would also get plenty of opportunities for testing to bring him up to speed, considering he would have rookie and team test days as well as the Gen3 testing that teams will be allowed to commence from around April next year (see separate story).

In addition, it would be a shock if Feeney were not part of the driving roster for the Supercars prototype testing that is scheduled to start in late August. T8 is building the Chev Camaro prototype for that program.

Supercars has a history of involving young drivers in development testing. A young fella by the name if Scott McLaughlin was among the first to test the Car of the Future.

Feeney is a protégé of former Supercars team owner and driver Paul Morris and the son of renowned 1980s and 1990s motorcycle racer Paul Feeney.

Whincup played down the prospects of Feeney now being favourite: “Dunno about that. There are no favourites at this stage.”

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MIXED TEAM RESPONSE TO GEN3 TIMING

Mid-season changeover accepted by some, questioned by others

By BRUCE NEWTON THE SUPERCARS paddock has reacted with a mixture of acceptance, resignation, scepticism and hostility to the proposed introduction of the new Gen3 technical ruleset mid-season in 2022.

The move to entirely replace the grid with a new generation of racing cars midchampionship is virtually unprecedented in world motorsport.

Gen3 was scheduled for introduction for the start of the 2022 season, but has now been shifted back because of the impact of the COVID pandemic on design, testing and build timelines.

News of this possibility broke about a month ago and was confirmed by Supercars in a short statement issued on Friday afternoon, June 4.

The debut of the Chevrolet Camaro and new Ford Mustang – not officially announced but confirmed to media by Supercars – is now set down for the Sydney SuperNight event in August 2022.

The debut is being turned into a “a gala event” according to one Auto Action source.

Commercial considerations are understood to have played a key role in the mid-season introduction, rather than rolling all the way back to 2023.

Supercars has confirmed Destination NSW has a contractual right to host the launch of the new cars, but other commercial pressures such as agreements with broadcasters FOX and Seven have also been hinted at.

The views within teams is that the August introduction now eases any issues about completing and testing cars and building up spares inventories in time for their debut.

The debate now centres on whether the

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his emailed reply was to the point.

“It [Gen3 introduction] hasn’t happened yet … There will be a lot [of challenges] but as I said above I’ll start to look at it once it looks certain and the cars are built.”

AA made contact with every Supercars team via phone, email or both about the Gen3 introduction timeline. These are some of the responses we received: Tim Blanchard – owner Blanchard Racing Team “That definitely mixes it up a bit doesn’t it!

It creates quite a few challenges and I think it’s going to reward the guys that work the hardest.

“Changing mid-season is not ideal but the person who wins it is going to have to be competitive in two completely different cars, which means the complexity of winning it is going to be harder.”

Digital images: Supercars

change-over should happen because of the potential influence it could have on the championship outcome.

If the technical parity between the Camaro and Mustang is not right when they debut that would hand any advantage to drivers of the faster car. You only have to look to 2019 and the introduction of the Gen2 Mustang to understand there is precedent for such an occurrence.

Alternatively, individual teams may not get a handle on the new car in terms of reliability or speed as quickly as others, again affecting the championship position of drivers.

Tickford Racing team principal Tim Edwards acknowledged the potential impact of Gen3’s introduction on the 2022 championship’s course.

“You might find there is a runaway leader in

the 2022 championship,” he said. “But there is a fair chance when we go to Gen3 it will disrupt what I would call the normal pecking order and potentially spice up the championship.

“From a teams’ point of view it could be frustrating because you might be that runaway leader, but we all have to take a step back and not be selfish and think about ourselves.

“You can’t shy away from the fact it [a midseason introduction] is a bit unorthodox but all of the teams have bought into this, all of the teams are onboard with doing it then.”

But Supercars team owner, commission member and board member Brad Jones wasn’t sounding like he had ‘bought in’ when contacted by AA. Asked his view of the mid-season introduction and what opportunities or challenges it presented to Brad Jones Racing,

Barry Ryan – CEO Erebus Motorsport “Erebus Motorsport wholly supports Supercars’ timeline for the Gen3 introduction.

“We will continue to work closely with Supercars to ensure our new Camaro’s are aligned to the fastest and most efficient timeline for testing prior to their racing introduction next August.

“Camaro is our future and we look forward to showing our partners and fans our cars in 2022.”

Stephen Grove – co-owner Kelly Grove Racing “To do it as the Sydney night race I am pretty comfortable with that. It’s the launch, it’s a night race, it’s the whole process, it’s a few rounds before Bathurst.

“Whether you start it at the start of the year

TEAMS MAY NOT TEST GEN3 UNTIL APRIL

By BRUCE NEWTON

or mid-year from a fans concept I am okay with, but the workload is a separate issue.

“Waiting till the end of 2022 and rolling out in 2023; there are a lot of commercial issues there. Things have been sold to sponsors; there’s things that have been sold to other stakeholders about the new car; the Holden Commodore is not sold in this country any more.

“There are a whole lot of reasons why the start of 2022 is no good and the start of 2023 is no good, so the mid-season I support.”

Charlie Schwerkolt – owner Team 18 “Not ideal at all, I am not exactly a fan of it but I understand why it has to happen this way.

“It makes it difficult for sponsors, it makes it difficult for on-track, it makes it difficult for drivers, it makes it difficult everywhere really.

“But we just have to work through it and somehow make it work.

“These are the cards we are dealt with and we just have to look at the best situation we possibly can.

“I want Gen3 as early as we can for our sponsors especially, but it’s also for our networks, our fans and everyone involved in the sport.

“I am still getting my head around whether it’s better mid-season or wait a whole year.”

Ryan Walkinshaw – co-owner Walkinshaw Andretti United “I’m an optimist, so I look at things as potential opportunities more so than negatives wherever I can. I know it’s a bit bizarre, but we’re in bizarre times at the moment, so at the end of the day I’d much rather have to deal with the challenge of introducing a new car mid-season than trying to deal with the challenge of rushing to get cars done for the beginning of next season

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during some pretty difficult times currently.

“It’s not just about making sure the design is all done for next year. It’s also about making sure that we get parts made locally so we don’t have to airfreight parts in.

“We’re in one of the biggest supply chain challenges ever and I’m seeing that firsthand in my automotive business, my caravan business and our other operations.

“The supply chain is just a nightmare at the moment. So there’s more to it than just Gen3.

It’s how the teams end up being able to get all the parts they need in a cost-effective manner and that wouldn’t have happened if we’d stuck with the start of next year.

“It’s not ideal but it’s an unusual world at the moment and I think this is a decent solution to a challenge.”

Jamie Whincup – co-owner Triple Eight Race Engineering “I am an advocate of starting 2022 with Gen3 and we as a team pushed very, very hard to make that happen. We still stand by that as being ideal, but for many reasons that can’t happen and we respect Supercars’ call to move it to the first race after August 1 2022.

“There’s plenty of debate on why its shouldn’t happen mid-season and I understand that … but sport is one big drama, it’s full of curve balls and unpredictability. I just think changing to a different car just adds to the drama and adds to the challenge of motor sport and the 2022 championship.

“So I say we do it. Everyone is going to be juggling trying to maximise their cars until August and then running a new car until the end of the year. That’s the challenge and that’s racing.”

Teams that did not respond to requests for comment: DJR, Team Sydney, Matt Stone Racing.

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A LIMITED supply of spares such as wheels and brakes means teams may not to be testing their new Gen3 Supercars until March or April 2022.

The racing debut of the new Ford Mustang and Chevrolet Camaro Supercars is currently planned for August 2022 at the annual Sydney Motorsport Park night race.

Supercars intends to have its own prototypes build by homologation teams Triple Eight Race Engineering (Chevrolet Camaro) DJR (Ford Mustang) out and testing by the end of August this year.

Gen3 had been scheduled for the start of 2022 but was pushed back to mid-season because of delays to the program caused by the COVID pandemic.

Commercial requirements appear to be the driving force behind the unprecedented wholesale changeover of the entire grid midchampionship.

Some teams have already started on the Gen3 construction process, while others are yet to act. Tickford Racing plans to have four Mustang chassis in its workshop by October while Kelly Grove racing has ordered two complete Mustang chassis from Pace Innovations (see separate story).

Some teams such as Matt Stone Racing and the Blanchard Racing Team have yet to decide which brand of car they will race.

Publicly committed to the Chev Camaro are Triple Eight, Erebus Motorsport, Team 18 and WAU. DJR, Tickford and KGR are publicly committed to the Mustang.

Supercars head of motorsport Adrian Burgess confirmed the Gen3 steering group had a proposal on team testing in front of it, but made it clear there was a long way to go before the process was finalised.

“We are unlikely to start testing with teams’ cars until March or April next year,” Burgess confirmed. “That’s partly because we have a quantity of wheels and brakes coming to run the prototypes on, but it’s different story to have enough wheels and brakes and some of those consumable items ready to run a whole series.

“The production lead times are fairly long on those components so we don’t anticipate

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probably running team cars until maybe April.”

Supercars will allocate teams additional Gen3-specific test days in the months leading up to the racing debut, but the formats of those days is yet to be decided.

“There’s two ways of doing it,” explained Burgess. “You either give them a quantity of test days and a quantity of tyres and you let them go and do what they choose. Or we go the other route and organise some sort of category test days and have everyone there together.

“It just saves on economies of scale and having the right people at the right place at the right time.

“We haven’t delved down into the details yet but it will be something along those lines.”

The good news for teams is they will still have some on-track experience of Gen3 ahead of their own testing programs. They will be invited to attend prototype testing, have access to data and their drivers will be able to get behind the wheel.

“When we are into more detailed and specific testing when we want driver feedback from current drivers, then we will sweep the paddock and we will use a variety of drivers.

“It is not going to be left to drivers from the homologation teams, we will use drivers from across the paddock to get a broad spectrum of feedback.”

Burgess played down the possibility of dedicated Gen3 team test time at rounds in the first half of the 2022 season, an idea that has been circulating in the Supercars paddock.

“Don’t underestimate the resource required to run an extra car at a race event is something the teams aren’t geared up for at the moment,” he said. “It’s probably an unnecessary strain.”

However, Supercars fans will still get to see the Gen3 cars at events, Burgess said.

“I’m sure we’ll be taking the prototypes to a majority if not all the events next year as a bit of a road show, but equally as a mechanism for Supercars to continue the testing, data gathering and validation of the cars.

“We also plan on running the cars at events in the tail-end of this year.”

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HEIMGARTNER TALKS TO GET SERIOUS AFTER DARWIN

By BRUCE NEWTON NEGOTIATIONS FOR a new deal between in-demand driver Andrew Heimgartner and his current team, Kelly Grove Racing, are expected to resume after the Darwin Supercars event, having been put on-hold in April.

At the same time, his management has confirmed the 26-year old Kiwi has also been the subject of multiple other enquiries from the Supercars paddock.

Regarded as one of the primary up-andcomers in Supercars racing, Heimgartner won for the first time in the category at the Tailem Bend championship event last time out.

But KGR co-owner Stephen Grove told Auto Action negotiations for a new deal with Heimgartner had been halted after the Tasmanian round in April, where both driver and team struggled for pace.

“Around Tassie time his management spoke to us and we just wanted to get some more rounds under our belt,” Grove explained.

“We were making a lot of changes at the time as a team and it was just important everyone knew where everyone was heading, what our direction was.

“We said to put it on-hold till mid-June and that just gave people time … discussions will start again in earnest very, very soon, probably straight after Darwin.”

Grove made clear the team remained determined to retain Heimgartner’s services.

“He is a very talented kid, he’s a good kid, he fits in the team well. He is very good at what he does. It’s not just him trying to sell the story to us, it’s us trying to sell the story to him as well.

“We need to talk to Andre and his manager and lay out our game plan; what we want to do and how we want to develop the team and where we want to take him.”

Heimgartner is one of a number of drivers thought to be on Triple Eight’s list as potential replacements for the retiring Jamie Whincup, although Broc Feeney and

Chaz Mostert remain the tipsters’ focus.

Heimgartner’s manager John Ruggiero confirmed expressions of interest from other teams.

“We still haven’t got a deal done and I am fielding enquiries about him,” said Ruggiero. “That is the reality. There was certainly more interest at The Bend. It’s

open-season until we secure a deal.”

Heimgartner is eighth in 2021 Supercars championship. He debuted for Super Black in 2015 and moved to Lucas Dumbrell Motorsport in 2016.

He rejoined the championship at Kelly Racing in 2018, where he has stayed ever since.

BLANCHARD CONSIDERS CAMARO SWAP

By BRUCE NEWTON THE BLANCHARD Racing Team is waiting on engine specifications for the new Gen3 Supercars formula before deciding whether it will stick with the Ford Mustang or make the mid-season swap to the Chevrolet Camaro next year.

The team has campaigned two Ford Mustangs leased from former Supercars team owner Phil Munday in its rookie season, but the 2022 transition to Gen3 will require it to purchase a car.

BRT has raced two Mustangs this year because driver Tim Slade crashed heavily in the opening Supercars round at Bathurst, forcing the team into Munday’s spare.

Slade has had some struggles since then, but showed strong form at The Bend with a third place in qualifying and seventh place race finish.

Supercars will abandon the current 5.0-litre V8 pushrod racing engines for the newGen3 formula, instead moving to production-based units paritised for equal performance.

The Ford engine will be based on the 5.4-litre Coyote V8, while the Camaro’s engine is still yet to be finalised, but is expected to come from the legendary Chev small block family.

“We have no links with anyone at the moment, so we will see where the engine parity ends up and we’ll make a

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Image: Motorsport Images

decision from there,” Blanchard told Auto Action when asked about his Gen3 brand preference.

“We are working closely with Ford at the moment, but we have no formal arrangement in place at the moment. If that changes that would lock us into Ford.

“From our perspective we will make that

call as late possible to make sure we are making the best decision for the long term to make sure we are competitive over the next few seasons.”

Blanchard’s consideration of a Ford-Chevy swap comes at the same time as Matt Stone Racing weighs up a shift to Ford for Gen3, rather than staying with General

Motors and swapping from the Holden Commodore to the Camaro.

While a decision is still thought to be weeks away, a blue oval swap appears to be the favoured option.

Blanchard said the teams’ planning for the new car – which he has already dubbed BRT001 - had only started being discussed recently as information about Gen3 started to be released.

“We haven’t worked that bit out yet,” Blanchard admitted. “We haven’t got much more than top-level information about how much it is going to cost.

“So lacking that information it has been very hard to go to any of the partners of the team to see if they are interested in supporting us with a new-car build.

“Now we have a little bit more information we can start on that, but to date we haven’t had any of those conversations.”

Blanchard admitted the August 2022 debut planned for Gen3 was giving him some concerns, “It creates quite a few challenges,” he said. “It is going to reward the guys who work the hardest.

“Changing [from Gen2 to Gen3] at mid-season is probably not ideal, but the person who wins it is going to have to be competitive in two completely different cars, so I think the complexity of winning it is probably going to be harder.

“It is a big change mid-season.”

STRUGGLING WAU DRIVER & STAR ENGINEER UNITE IN DARWIN

By BRUCE NEWTON SUPERCARS STAR engineer Grant ‘Shippy’ McPherson will get an instant understanding of the challenges facing Walkinshaw Andretti United’s struggling second-year driver Bryce Fullwood, when he attends a Supercars event with the team for the first time this weekend.

McPherson signed with WAU from Triple Eight Race Engineering at the end of 2020 as its head of performance, a new position created for him to slot into between the race engineers and team technical director Carl Faux.

McPherson has had to spend six months on ‘gardening leave’ ahead of his debut with WAU at Hidden Valley.

Because Fullwood’s regular engineer Terry Kerr had to stay at home in Victoria for COVID lockdown, McPherson will add those duties to his own this weekend.

Pressure is mounting on Fullwood, who had a promising debut season in the Middy’s Holden Commodore ZB in 2020, highlighted by a third place finish at The Bend.

Ahead of racing on his home rack this weekend, the 23-year old is 15th in the championship with one top 10 qualifying and two top 10 finishes from 11 starts.

The 2019 Super2 champion’s struggles have been in contrast to superstar teammate Chaz Mostert, who is third in the championship, 246 points behind Shane van Gisbergen, the T8 driver McPherson engineered for five years.

“This weekend I will be on the radio to Bryce and we will run the car with assistance from Terry back home,” confirmed McPherson.

“It will be a one-off and to work even closer with Bryce and try and see what’s going on and what we have to do to get him up the front.

“We know he is capable of achieving that.

“Bryce hasn’t been getting the results we know he is capable of, so there is a lot of time and energy to be devoted to getting him into

the 10 and deep into the 10.

“He has got a promising future.”

But McPherson also stressed his time would be equally devoted to Mostert, who still has a pace upside.

“For Chaz and the championship battle, that is a lead that is not insurmountable.

“There are still a lot of rounds to go and if we can get Chaz winning more often and start to turn the blowtorch on Triple Eight, then absolutely there’s a lot to be achieved on that side the garage.”

McPherson said his arrival at WAU will allow Faux to focus more on the development of the Gen3 program leading toward its slated introduction in August 2022.

“I will oversee more the going racing side of

the engineering,” he explained.

McPherson started his Supercars racing career at Ford Performance Racing, where he engineered both Will Davison and Mark Winterbottom to third in the championship during an eight-year stint. He also worked with Mostert and his long-time engineer Adam De Borre.

McPherson won his first Bathurst 1000 with Craig Lowndes and Steven Richards in 2015, his first drivers’ championship with van Gisbergen in 2016, and another Bathurst with the Kiwi and Garth Tander in 2020.

He left Triple Eight after Jeromy ‘JJ’ Moore rejoined as its technical director in 2019.

“Once JJ returned that role had closed out for a period of time. If I had stayed I would have been immensely happy, we would have had a competitive package and winning races, and that would have been great.

“I couldn’t lose either way.”

Asked to compare and contrast WAU with Triple Eight, McPherson said it was too soon to make such calls.

“It’s really hard to comment when I haven’t done a race yet,” said McPherson. “Even when we go to Darwin it’s not going to be a typical race in that Terry was unable to travel this time.

“And with running the [Kurt Kostecki] wildcard, our personnel structure isn’t as we intend.

“I’ve also only done one week in the workshop and after two days everyone had masks on.”

McPherson also downplayed the differences between a WAU and Triple Eight Commodore.

“They are two Supercars, it’s not like the differences between a Supercar and a GT3 car,” he said.

“There are different front-ends in the cars and different philosophies across springs and bars and geometry, but at the end of the day it’s still a Supercar, so we’re still taking the strengths that we have got and trying to refine them.”

KGR ON THE PACE, ORDERS MUSTANGS

By BRUCE NEWTON WHILE SOME other Supercars teams continue to sit on the Gen3 fence, Kelly Grove Racing has already ordered two complete Ford Mustang chassis from supplier Pace Innovations.

The new Supercars formula is scheduled to debut in August 2022 at Sydney Motorsport Park, timing some teams are quietly unhappy with and some still doubt will happen.

But KGR co-owner Stephen Grove made it clear to Auto Action that the Braeside team had parked any concerns it might have and pressed on with its Gen3 plan.

As previously reported, KGR also continues to build a new Gen2 Mustang for driver Andre Heimgartner, which should debut at the Sydney or Perth SuperNight events in August or September.

Grove said delivery timing had yet to be confirmed, but that was less critical than actually placing the order. KGR also plans to order a third chassis to build up a spare car.

“I don’t know how many teams are going to go Ford and how many are going Chevrolet, but with all the teams wanting two or three chassis and some more, you don’t want to be getting number 25 or number 26,” explained Grove.

“It’s important for us to get in the queue as fast we can and we have done that.

“We have ordered two chassis and once

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we get those chassis we can start to build components and we will do as many kilometres of testing as we are allowed to do.”

Supercars has stated separately that team Gen3 testing is unlikely to happen before April 2022. Its own prototype testing is schedule to start in late August 2021.

Grove admitted KGR had limited information about delivery timing of the 5.4-litre Coyotebased engine that will power the Gen3 Mustang, but he is confident about how it will perform.

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“The Coyote engine for the Ford is an outstanding engine from the data we have got and I think that’s just about ready to go,” he said. “The parity issue I think they are working through versus the GM engine … I am very confident they will get that right.”

In co-operation with the fabrication side of the old Kelly Racing business that is still based alongside KGR at Braeside, the Mustangs could have been assembled on-site from flatpacks.

But Grove said taking two complete chassis was the efficient decision.

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“We do have the in-house resources to weld them and get them right, but we just feel at this stage they are a control chassis so it’s just better to get them to build them, then they come down and we fit them out,” Grove explained.

That fit-out will be completed by both KGR and Grove Motorsport personnel under the direction of KGR co-owner and technical chief Todd Kelly. Grove Motorsport is the Grove family racing business.

A similar model is being used to build Heimgartner’s new racer.

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SUPERCARS CHAMPIONSHIP leader Shane van Gisbergen revealed that his plans to travel to New Zealand and compete in a rally have been scraped. The Kiwi Triple Eight Racing driver can no longer contest the event as the rescheduled Supercars Championship round at Winton Motor Raceway is due to take place on the same weekend, on July 31-August 1. DM

BRAD JONES Racing’s Todd Hazelwood will deliver a new sponsor for the next two rounds of the Supercars championship. Fresh new backing from Pizza Hut will take over the naming rights on the #14 Holden Commodore for the upcoming Hidden Valley and Townsville rounds of the series. Pizza Hut is set to deliver free pizzas to fans during the event, all they have to do is post a picture of themselves with the #14 Pizza Hut Supercar and use the hashtag #PizzaHutSupercars. RV

THE SHELL V-Power Racing Team has taken the covers off a special Indigenous livery it will run at the upcoming Darwin Triple Crown.

The Queensland based squad are the first Supercars team to reveal new colours for the Indigenous round in the Northern Territory. DJR has dedicated its Indigenous round program to Racing Together, a program designed to give 12-to-18-year-old Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders an opportunity to pursue a career in motor sport. RV

THE BOOST Mobile backed Bathurst wildcard entry of Greg Murphy and Richie Stanaway is now official. Both Kiwi drivers will come out of retirement to race an Erebus Motorsport prepared entry. It will be Stanaway’s fifth start after hanging up his helmet two years ago. “All of a sudden here’s a group of people who are wanting and willing to make this happen,” said Murphy. “I’m very fortunate and lucky to be presented with the opportunity to go back and race at a place that means so much to me.” The duo will run Murphy’s iconic #51, a number he carried full time between 2001 and 2012. RV

FORMER BATHURST 1000 winner Nick Percat is restoring the Mygale SJ07A in which he won the Australian Formula Ford Championship in 2009. The Brad Jones Racing driver has also announced he will offer an emerging young kart star a chance to climb the motorsport ladder, with a track-day in the car. Percat netted 12 wins and 20 podiums that season. DM

8 AutoAction

VICS RACE TO CATCH-UP IN DARWIN Easing COVID crisis reduces question marks over Townsville

VICTORIAN SUPERCARS teams were set to play catch-up when they arrived in Darwin ahead of this weekend’s championship round.

Forced to bail out of Victoria before June 2 to ensure they could race in Darwin, personnel from BRT, Erebus, KGR, Team 18, Tickford Racing and WAU spent two weeks in stay-athome quarantine in NSW. Almost all key personnel from these teams made the trip into quarantine.

The highest profile absentee is WAU engineer Terry Kerr, whose role engineering Bryce Fullwood is being taken by new team head of performance Grant McPherson (see separate story).

If the latest COVID wave continues to ease and restrictions along with it, the Victorian teams should be free to return home after Darwin, regroup and then make the trip to Townsville for the next championship round on July 9-11.

Supercars CEO Sean Seamer had told sports radio network SEN in early June a decision would be made on whether Townsville would go ahead within two weeks.

He stressed Victorian teams would not be asked to stay away from home indefinitely to keep the championship going, as they did in 2020, when they were on the road for more than 100 days.

This was an issue highlighted by Erebus Motorsport in particular, which required a lot of convincing to

leave Victoria and go into quarantine.

As Auto Action closed for press a Supercars spokesman indicated there were no changes to the current Townsville plans: “At this point in time everything is fine. We don’t have any plans to change, alter or move. Obviously we are watching what’s going on, but everything is green light, good to go.

“But as we have seen in the past things can change quickly.”

During their NSW stay-at-home quarantine almost all the Victorian teams were unable to work on their cars or continue the usual daily cycle of pit stop practice, putting them behind their Queensland and NSWbased rivals.

Team 18 was the sole exception in terms of swapping car setups for the postponed Winton championship event to Hidden Valley spec.

Its personnel could legally work on the Irwin and DeWalt Holden Commodores at the Sydney branch of Waverley Forklifts, the business of team owner Charlie Schwerkolt.

Other teams weren’t able to do the same thing, usually because they weren’t staying near their race cars.

Apart from suspension, changes that have to be made to all cars are swapping over the air spike for pit stops from the left to the right-hand side, as Winton is clockwise and Hidden Valley anti-clockwise.

Here’s a team-by-team guide to who went where:

Blanchard Racing Team

The single-car team moved from its Box Hill base to Newcastle north of Sydney for its say-at-home period, with all five full-time team personnel making the trip. Set-up work on the Cooldrive Ford Mustang will be completed in Darwin.

Erebus Motorsport

The Dandenong-based team moved to regional NSW for its 14-day stay-at-home quarantine. All key personnel made the trip ensuring driver-engineering partnerships will be unaffected. Hidden Valley set-ups changes will be completed in Darwin.

Kelly Grove Racing

As per the 2020 quarantine dash, the Braeside team moved to the Kelly family farm north of Mildura.

However, the team transporter was driven to northern NSW, to ensure the quickest access to the Northern Territory.

All senior personnel made the trip, ensuring driver-engineer partnerships are unaffected. Some pre-Darwin work was performed on the team’s two Mustangs before departing the site.

The crew this week drove from Mildura to Sydney for their Darwin flight.

Team 18

The two-car Holden Commodore squad has set up on the central

coast of NSW, ensuring it is not too far from Sydney airport, which will be its departure point for Darwin.

All race team staff made the trip out of Melbourne before lockdown, leaving driver-engineer pairings unaffected.

Under NSW stay-at-home rules for Victorians, the team was still able to make the set-up changes required for Darwin at the Waverley Forklifts NSW workshop.

Tickford Racing

The Campbellfield operation settled on the central coast north of Sydney in a group of rented houses. While some members of the regular travelling crew didn’t make the trip, all the regular driver-engineer pairings are intact.

The team’s three Ford Mustangs remained in the transporters set-up to race at Winton until they arrived in Darwin, when Hidden Valley set-ups were due to be installed.

WAU

Another team based on the central coast also faced with converting its Holden Commodore ZBs from Winton to Hidden Valley settings once they arrived in Darwin.

For family reasons, Bryce Fullwood’s engineer Terry Kerr has been unable to leave Victoria. New head of performance Grant ‘Shippy’ McPherson is taking up that role in his first outing for the team (see separate story). Bruce Newton

SUPER2 TO STAY COTF AFTER MONTHS of silence, Supercars has announced that its second tier Super2 Series will continue to run Car of the Future generation machines next season.

There has been speculation for months about what chassis the Super2 Series would run next season.

While Supercars was pushing for a change, competitors wanted to continue running the COTF cars.

As Supercars are now not moving from the Gen2 to the Gen3 machines until the middle of next year, it is impossible for Super2 to move into the Gen2 chassis’ currently run in the Supercars Championship.

Official confirmation came in the form of a small statement released by Supercars, which

reads as follows.

“Supercars has informed current Dunlop Super2 Series team owners that the current Model Eligibility and VSDs being run in the 2021 Dunlop Super2 Series, will continue to be run in the Category until the end of 2022,” it said.

Supercars’ plan was to introduce the Gen2 machines to Super2, however not to force them upon competitors.

The Gen2 Ford Mustang’s and ZB Holden Commodores would run alongside the current FGX Falcons, VF Commodores and Nissan Altimas, but paritised.

Many Super2 team owners felt that the cost to run and repair a Gen2 chassis was too great, as many Supercars teams have found since they were introduced in 2017.

Image: Insyde Media

The other issue of concern was an apparent lack of availability, as many collectors have already purchased the cars currently racing in the Supercars Championship.

It appeared as though only Tickford Racing and Brad Jones Racing were looking to sell machines, and so there would simply not be enough Gen2 cars to purchase.

The announcement of the Super2 stability comes much to the delight of many concerned Super2 team owners.

It is also understood that the Australian Racing Group owned Super3 Series will continue to run

Project Blueprint machines from 2012 and older.

However, one further complication as revealed in the last edition of AA is that Supercars is keen to slow down the second and third-tier category machines, in order to make the Gen3 cars the fastest Supercars package.

The Gen3 machines are expected to be several seconds a lap slower, meaning that unless alterations are made, the lower-tier machines, the Gen2 and COTF cars, will be faster.

AA understands that Supercars are considering adjusting the Super2 machines’ rear wings, undertrays and even diff ratios. DM

BEAT THE HEAT

Supercars confident Dunlop super-soft won’t melt under pressure

By BRUCE NEWTON SUPERCARS IS confident there will be no Bakustyle tyre failures in Darwin this weekend, as the Dunlop super-soft tyre races for the first time.

Supercars head of motorsport Adrian Burgess told Auto Action testing of the super-soft showed it would stand up to the top-end heat.

He played down the prospects of calamitous tyre failures like the ones that afflicted Lance Stroll and Max Verstappen in the recent Formula 1 Azerbaijan Grand Prix.

Supercars tested the super-soft tyre at Queensland Raceway last December, with Triple Eight’s Jamie Whincup and DJR’s Will Davison both doing laps.

“When you test a new tyre you fully evaluate it and you strip the tyre down afterwards and you inspect it, which is what we have done with Dunlop,” Burgess told Auto Action.

“The degradation level at Hidden Valley is ranked alongside QR in terms of degradation per kilometre and degradation per lap, so we are not expecting to see too many different results than what we have seen.

“We are keeping an eye on it but we are not concerned about it.”

Darwin is expected to produce extreme wear

Image: Motorsport Images

and performance drop-off in the super-soft, but more because of the 30-degree ambient heat and 50-degree plus track temperature rather than the track surface, which is not high-wearing.

“When we tested last December at QR the track temp was in the mid-50s and we didn’t see any blistering or structural issues,” said Burgess.

“So while you can never say never, we are not anticipating any issues.”

Originally the Northern Territory was intended to be the third outing for the tyre after Symmons Plains and Winton, but shipping delays nixed the former and COVID postponed the latter, making Hidden Valley a journey into the unknown for most Supercars drivers and teams.

One concession Supercars has made is reducing

minimum tyre pressures back to 17psi from the 19psi mandated for Winton. Higher cold pressures bring tyres up to operating heat quicker.

“The plan was always to run Tassie at 17, run Winton at 19, then see if there was any significant difference and then discuss Darwin,” explained Burgess.

“But the default for Darwin was always 17 because we knew we would be up there in terms of track temps.”

Each of the 26 Supercars racing at Hidden Valley – 24 regulars plus two wildcards – will be allocated nine sets of new super-softs for the meeting.

After two 40 minutes practice sessions on Friday they will hand four sets back, leaving them five

sets to negotiate up to five qualifying sessions and three 110km races.

The high tyre wear rate expected in Darwin could well promote the same sort of strategies employed at Sydney Motorsport Park in 2020, where some drivers and teams elected to ‘go for glory’ in one race by changing four rather than the minimum two tyres, thereby sacrificing a result in another race. Qualifying position often prompted this move.

The alternative is to try and be as even in the use of tyres a possible, perhaps sacrificing the ultimate potential result for a higher overall points collection across three races.

“I’m sure you’ll see some people take a very conservative approach to se-up and strategy and you’ll see other people roll the dice a bit,” predicted Tickford Racing boss Tim Edwards.

“It’s higher degradation at Hidden valley, so instead of going to Winton and having a soft launch of the super-soft on a track that is relatively gentle on the tyres, we are going to debut them on a track that is a lot hotter.

“It could be like Tailem Bend last year where cars blistered their rubber and ran out of tyres.

“The reality is you won’t be able to do too long a race run in the short practice sessions we have, so we will be delving into the unknown when we go racing.”

SUPERCARS SIMULCASTS START AT DARWIN

By MARK FOGARTY LIVE TV COVERAGE of this weekend’s Darwin Triple Crown will be simulcast on Seven and Fox Sports.

Seven’s second live free-to-air broadcast of the season will be shared with the pay service, available to Foxtel subscribers.

Seven Sports presenter Mark Beretta will co-host the telecast from Hidden Valley across June 19-20, with Fox Sports’ Supercars anchor Jessica Yates and expert analyst Mark Skaife.

Jack Perkins was also due to be part of the combined coverage, but Melbourne’s latest lockdown ruled him out.

As forecast by Auto Action at the start of the year, the simulcasts are a cost-cutting measure that will continue at the remainder of Seven’s six live events, except the Bathurst 1000.

Next month’s Townsville 500, August’s Sydney SuperNight and the season-ending Gold Coast 500 will also be shown live on Seven’s FTA and streaming channels.

In addition to shared race commentary, Seven’s Darwin coverage will mirror Fox Sports’

Supercars-produced telecast throughout.

Seven distinguished its return to Supercars at the season-opening Mount Panorama 500 in late February with its own hosting and segments around the common race call.

The network is planning to similarly tailor its free live telecasts of the Bathurst 1000 over October 8-10.

The Darwin Triple Crown will be shown on ‘Big Seven’ – 7 and 70 HD – and streamed on 7plus from noon to 5 pm AEST on Saturday, June 19 and Sunday June 20.

Fox Sports and its streaming service Kayo Sports will broadcast live from Hidden Valley from 9.30 am AEST on both days, as well as practice coverage on Friday, June 18.

The coverage may also be available free on Kayo to counter the 7plus offering.

The commentary line-up at Darwin will change, with Neil Crompton absent as he recovers from prostate cancer surgery.

Crompton’s place in the race commentary booth alongside Skaife, who will be elevated to chief caller, will be shared between Garth Tander and Chad Neylon.

The ‘Voice Of V8s’ is due back at Townsville.

Marcos Ambrose is also returning as a panellist and reporter, joining regular pit lane pundit Mark Larkham.

Seven’s live broadcasts of Darwin and Townsville will be in stark contrast to the network’s late-night highlights of the Sandown, Symmons Plains and Tailem Bend rounds.

Meanwhile, Seven is still pressing ahead with its 7th Gear motor sport feature show.

First revealed by AA, the program is now on hold until after the Tokyo Olympic Games, which the network will feature from July 23-August 8.

The delay of 7th Gear’s debut until after the Olympics is to give the new show an uninterrupted run once it starts.

To be presented by 7 News sports reporter Chris Stubbs and Supercars co-driver Jack Perkins, it will be a weekly one-hour look at local and international racing.

Seven Sport is looking to leverage its renewed status as the free TV ‘Home Of Motor Sport’.

Seven is Supercars’ FTA partner and the main broadcaster of ARG’s TCR and S5000 events.

Channel 7 is also covering the Australian Rally Championship.

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THE NEXT round of the Australian Rally Championship has been postponed until September, in reaction to Victoria’s latest COVID-19 lock down. Rally Tasmania was originally slated for July 2-4 but will instead be held on September 10-12. This leaves Victoria’s new Gippsland Rally as the third round of the championship, scheduled to take place in August. Also affected is the Adelaide Hills Rally, which has now been delayed a week to October 22-24. HM

TONY D’ALBERTO’S Honda TCR entry will sport a new livery to celebrate the brand’s latest ultraexclusive Civic Type R Limited Edition. Swapping the popular blue colour scheme for a new yellow design, D’Alberto’s #50 Honda Civic Type R TCR takes its inspiration from the new paint colour that is a signature feature of the new model. The new TCR livery will be seen for the first time at the newly rescheduled round at Morgan Park Raceway in Queensland, in August. RV

SIX MOTORSPORT identities have received Queen’s Birthday honours. Larry Perkins was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia for “significant service to motorsport as a touring car driver and team owner”. John Bowe received the same honour, as did former Supercars supremo Tony Cochrane for “significant service to sports administration, and to entertainment production”. Former Motorsport Australia president Andrew Papadopoulos was recognised for “significant service to motorsport, and to driver safety and education”. Australian Grand Prix event director Trent Smyth and safety expert Dr Michael Henderson were also honoured. HM THE FORMULA Ford Festival will make a return later this season at Winton when it hosts the penultimate round of the national series. Slated now for October 21-22, it replaces the recently postponed event as part of the Australian Motor Racing Series. Its new date now clashes with what was Round 4 at Sandown, which forms part of the Victorian State Circuit Racing Series program. HM

MAZDA RX-8 CUP Series driver Tom Shaw is the latest state-based young driver aiming to progress to TCR Australia after a recent test. Shaw is the son of Bathurst 1000 and production car regular Ric Shaw, but is hoping to be on the grid possibly at one of the year’s rounds after completing a test at Wakefield Park with series winning team HMO Customer Racing. HM

10 AutoAction

McLAUGHLIN’S TOUGH DETROIT INITIATION THREE-TIME Aussie Supercars champion Scott McLaughlin admitted it was a hard weekend at the office in Detroit.

Around the bumpy 2.3-mile street course at on Belle Isle, McLaughlin found out the Motor City can be unforgiving for a rookie.

In Race 2 of the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix, the Kiwi driver drove to a 20th place finish for Team Penske in the NTT IndyCar Series doubleheader weekend.

McLaughlin was 19th on Saturday in Race 1 after a late-race accident in his No. 3 PPG Team Penske Chevrolet.

His day on Sunday could have been much better had not Rinus Veekay’s Chevrolet run into him attempting a bold overtaking move late in the race, cutting down McLaughlin’s rear right tyre, when he was running as high as 12th.

“That’s probably the toughest weekend for me this year,” said McLaughlin. “It’s another step in the learning process.”

What about Veekay?

“That’s the one that got my tyre,” said McLaughlin, when he returned to his team transporter.

“He just drove into the back of me. Look, I’m defending … there’s a wall and there’s me. I was just driving the line.”

McLaughlin admitted he was “still battling from the mistake (I made) on Friday and losing a session.”

In first practice – the one and only for the weekend – McLaughlin stuffed his Chevrolet into the wall. The front suspension was damaged, and McLaughlin missed the majority of the 70-minute session.

“I feel like I’m getting there,” said McLaughlin. “But I’m a session behind.

I can only blame myself for that. But I’m

Image: Motorsport Images

proud of the team and the car they have given me.

“We are making improvements. We were on for a top 10 (in Race 1) before I hit the wall. I’ve just got to limit some of the mistakes, and if I do that, we can be there or thereabouts.”

On Saturday, the IndyCar rookie looked comfortable enough until he tagged the wall.

“I really just tapped it,” said McLaughlin.

“I bent the toe link. I’m not going to lie. I am disappointed with how it is going, but, at the end of the day, it was always going to be a challenge and I made it even harder with my mistake on Friday.”

Belle Isle, narrow, bumpy and unforgiving, is a track you need to attack to master.

McLaughlin discovered that over the weekend.

“You got to hustle the car,” said McLaughlin. “It’s incredibly tough. You can’t

give anything away, especially if you are a rookie.”

McLaughlin hasn’t had many problems running in the pack. He has just underestimated the walls.

“I’m not worried about our race pace,” said McLaughlin. “We are nearly there on that.”

Fitness in the heat and humidity of Detroit this weekend?

“No, I feel good,” said McLaughlin. “I’m so used to it in V8s. It is nothing to what I’ve been used to in the past. Darwin, the Gold Coast and Adelaide – it’s always hot. The biggest thing for me is the overall strength you need to handle the bumps, and getting used to the car.”

And wanting more from himself?

“I do expect a lot from myself, and that can be a detriment,” said McLaughlin. “I’ve been used to some big results. This is a little bit of a shock to the system.” Mike Brudenell

“You (Supercars) should actually give them a proper chance on having some sort of success and it’s hard to do that when you don’t have any tyres.”

Kostecki, who sits 10th in the championship, explained that teams are just forced to try and test on very old rubber that they would never compete on.

“We do get one set but at the same time, one set for a whole day is not much compared with the laps we do,” he continued.

“It is really tricky, we just try and do the best we can with what we have.”

His teammate and 2020 Super2 Series runner-up Will Brown agreed with his teammate, saying that although they are

unable utilise the test to its full potential, to these youngsters they are still incredibly beneficial.

“It is a massive benefit, but it definitely is restricted as well because of the tyres,” Brown told AA. If you did the percentage of driving, what I’ve done in my lifetime in a Supercar compared to say Jamie Whincup, I reckon it wouldn’t even be 10 per cent.

“It’s great for us to get that opportunity to do more test days, but on the other side we don’t get many tyres at all to be able to really optimise those days.

“But like I said, we’re still in the car, we’re still learning something, so it’s still great.”

Dan McCarthy

ROOKIES NEED MORE TEST TYRES AS ROOKIES, both Erebus Motorsport drivers Brodie Kostecki and Will Brown are allowed extra Supercars Championship test days, however the drivers feel they need more tyres to maximise the time.

Each Supercars driver is allocated three test days per season, however drivers competing in either their rookie campaign or second full-time season are allowed to complete a further three tests.

When asked if these additional tests are beneficial, both Erebus Motorsport drivers explained that they are limited due to a lack of fresh rubber.

For a rookie test, both Brown and Kostecki are dealt a single new set of tyres, while the rest of the sets are used, made up of second-hand race tyres gathered over multiple race events.

Running around on such old tyres is frustrating and has Kostecki calling for more new tyres for rookies.

“I think rookies should definitely get more tyres, and I’m not just saying that because I’m one,” Kostecki told Auto Action.

“I think teams should get a benefit from picking a young driver and giving them a chance.

NT WILL TEST TICKFORD TYRE PROGRESS TICKFORD RACING driver Cameron Waters is confident that Tickford will find out if it has got on top of its tyre life weakness this weekend in Darwin.

Waters has been a front runner all season long, taking three second place finishes before he broke through for his first win of 2021 at The Bend Motorsport Park.

The former Sandown 500 winner took two pole positions Symmons Plains, however a difficulty in conserving tyre life meant at the round he was unable to finish on the podium.

At The Bend, a track traditionally tough on rubber, Waters took a win and showed that Tickford may be beginning to get on top of its tyre troubles.

The fifth round this weekend at Hidden Valley in Darwin will see the debut of the new supersoft tyre, a less durable Dunlop compound that will pose a further test for the Tickford outfit.

“We reflected on Symmons and came up with a few things on why we think we struggled there,” Waters recalled to Auto Action.

“Obviously, you’ve touched on the tyre life woes that we have. I think we have made inroads with it but I think Darwin will be a great test for us to see how far we’ve come with it.”

The 26-year-old is confident that the team has made strides in this area, and although it is a strong area for most teams, it is where Tickford lacks compared to the major rivals.

“I feel like we’ve influenced it (the tyre life) a little bit and probably made it a little bit better, but not saying we’ve 100per cent cured it

HYPER GROOVE SLOTTING

Image: Motorsport Images

yet,” he said.

“Our car is not to bad compared to the rest of the field, it is just a couple of cars are very good, “We’ll keep working hard and I think after Darwin, we’ll probably have a better idea of what our tyre life is like.”

Heading into the weekend, only Triple Eight Race Engineering driver Jamie Whincup and Dick Johnson Racing driver Will Davison have

HPC COOLING VENTS

had any experience racing of the new rubber.

Waters believes that this will be an advantage to those two teams, however he said he would not use this as an excuse.

“I think it’s a small advantage having driven on the tyre already, you know how it’ll deg, what it does well, and what it does poor,” he said.

“That helps you get down the road before we even start. I think it is an advantage but

I’m not using that as an excuse or anything, it is what it is.

“It doesn’t really faze me, as long as it was the same for everyone, which it was.

Obviously the only people were Jamie and Will who did the initial testing on it, so no issues.

“I’m excited to get to Darwin, have a drive on them and see what they’re like for our car.” Dan McCarthy

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LEGENDARY CAR manufacturer Ferrari has announced AF Corse will run its Hypercar program in the World Endurance Championship from 2023. AF Corse has a long running history with Ferrari dating back to 2006, and currently runs the factory Ferrari program in LMGTE Pro, as well as cars in the LMGTE Am class of WEC. The team will compete in the top-tier Hypercar class under the name of Ferrari – AF Corse. DM

AUDI HAS announced an all-star driver line-up for its debut in the famous Dakar Rally, with the newly founded Q Motorsport GmbH as part of an ambitious electrified powertrain prototype entry for 2022. Leading the charge for Audi Sport will be multiple Dakar winners Stephane Peterhansel and Carlos Sainz. Long time Audi driver Mattias Ekstrom will aim to add Dakar success to his accomplishments in DTM and RallyCross with the brand. RV

BMW’S NEW M4 GT3 will debut at Round 4 of the NLS at the Nurburgring in a four-hour event.

Drivers are yet to be revealed, but it will race in the SP-X class for non-homologated models on June 26. The M4 GT3 replaces the successful M6 which debuted back in 2015 as a BMW Motorsport developed product and won the 2016 Spa 24 Hour with Rowe Racing. The new BMW M4 contains a straight six-cylinder, turbocharged engine. HM

PIASTRI AT DIFFERENT STAGE TO ZHOU AUSSIE OPEN-WHEEL star and AA columnist Oscar Piastri sits second in the FIA Formula 2 Championship, just five points behind fellow Alpine Academy Junior driver Guanyu Zhou, and has opened up on the rivalry.

In 2021, the F2 championship (second tier to Formula 1) contains multiple junior drivers from the Ferrari Academy, Red Bull Academy and Alpine Academy.

There are three Alpine juniors amongst the grid of 20, Aussie Piastri in his maiden season, former Renault Eurocup runnerup Christian Lundgaard in his second full F2 season, and current F2 championship leader Zhou in his third campaign.

While Zhou and Piastri sit first and second in the championship respectively, and are effectively vying for the same seat, the Aussie explained that on track he treats his

Image: Motorsport Images

Chinese rival like any other.

“I wouldn’t really say there’s more motivation to beat him over anyone else,” he told Auto Action.

“There’s a few other championship contenders alongside Zhou, obviously he’s had a very strong start to the year, but I certainly don’t view him as the sole threat for the championship.

“I wouldn’t really say I treat him any differently to anyone else. I think everyone else is just as much competition as Zhou is.”

The 20-year-old Victorian explained that because they are at different stages of there F2 careers, he does not view Zhou as a direct threat and gets along well with him

away from the circuit.

“Firstly, he’s a really nice guy, we get along really well off the track, and we go training at the F1 factory quite often together,” Piastri said.

“He’s in his third year and I’m in my first year, so I’ve kind of got that to fall back on a bit.”

Several weeks ago, Piastri got his second steer of an F1 machine, this time at the legendary Silverstone circuit in England.

He revealed that he was entrusted with a bit of work from the team to take on during the test day.

“We actually did a few little mapping tests for them, which was cool, for them to have their faith in us,” he said. DM

MCLEOD WANTS MORE REVS TOURING CAR Masters Holden Commodore driver Gerard McLeod is trying get 500 more revs from the category management, which he feels would allow him to compete on an equal playing field.

Relative TCM newcomer McLeod was the first driver to take on the category spec LS engine when he joined the series at the start of 2020 in his VB Commodore.

The LS engine has been limited by the category to 7000rpm, while all other competitors run from 75008000rpm.

McLeod explained that this is a major disadvantage in a four-speed gearbox and is hopeful that the new TCM management allow him to run with more revs, as originally planned, in coming events.

“I’ve got a bit of a gripe with the technical side of the category, as far as the parity is concerned with the engine that I have.” McLeod told Auto Action.

“I believe that the rev limit is hurting

us up to half a second a lap at most circuits, and that half a second would put us right on the doorstep of the top four.

“The LS engine is the only controlled engine, which is fine, we signed up for that. But we didn’t sign up for it to have 7000rpm, we signed up for it to have 7500rpm, which is what I should have in line with the other engines.

“We’re lobbying for that to be corrected, but hopefully the powers that be and the new technical management will get that fixed and that’ll put us right in the game.”

The Victorian competitor believes that it’s not only affecting his top end speed but speed out of the corners.

“I’d call it lethargic gearing compared to everybody else, our gearing window a lot smaller than the other guys,” he explained.

“With a six-speed gearbox it wouldn’t be an issue because you can just pluck another gear, but with four gears you need every rpm you can get.”

McLeod is continuing to tinker and improve the car week on week, and is confident that the Commodore will be a top five car once everything is completed.

“We are just continuing developments on the car now it’s got a few race weekends under its belt,” he said. “(We are) revisiting a whole lot of things that we didn’t get a chance to do in the rush of building the car, so a few suspension components that we probably should have done when the car was built.

“Working on and refining things like

air induction and widening the track of the car to make it a bit more stable in high-speed stuff.

“Gearbox ratios, again to try and get the most out of the engine that we’ve got and the restrictions that they have on it.

“We’re looking into some gearing upgrades and buying a second gearbox, to have a second lot of ratios to compete, so yeah there’s a whole load of areas that we’re working on.

“It (the car) was designed in its design brief to race consistently in the top five and I believe they can do that.” DM

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SPECTATOR KILLED AT FINKE THE FINKE Desert race was called early after a spectator was killed and two people were seriously injured on the final day of the legendary Aussie off-road event.

A 60-year-old man died at the scene, while another in his 50s and the navigator of the vehicle, in her 50s, were flown to Alice Springs Hospital and remained in a serious condition when Auto Action went to print.

It is understood that the car struck a group of spectators around 35km from the finish line.

“The area has been cordoned off and competitors have been diverted from the area, which has been declared a crime scene,” NT Police confirmed shortly after the incident.

“Police are investigating the circumstances surrounding the cause of the incident and calling for any spectators who may have witnessed the incident, or have dash cam or video footage, to contact police immediately.”

Motorsport Australia released a statement following the incident.

“Motorsport Australia is saddened to hear of today’s tragic news from the

with Oscar Piastri

Finke Desert Race in Alice Springs,” it read.

“NT Police have now confirmed a spectator has passed away following an incident which occurred approximately 35km from the finish line on Monday morning. Motorsport Australia extends its sympathies to the families, friends and all those impacted by today’s events.

“Together with event organisers, Motorsport Australia will begin its own investigation into the incident and will of course assist all relevant authorities with their respective investigations.

“Motorsport Australia is also providing ongoing support and assistance to all competitors, officials and those associated with the event, which includes providing counselling services.

“As these investigations remain

ongoing, we are unable to provide any further comment at this time.”

As a result of the incident, organisers called off the end of the race as many competitors were still yet to cross the line.

“The Clerk of the Course has declared the Car Section of the Finke Desert Race concluded,” organisers said.

The Finke Desert Race is annually held each June on the Queen’s Birthday long weekend, however was cancelled last year due to COVID-19.

Former Dakar bike class winner Toby Price and his navigator, Triple Eight Race Engineering engineer Mark Dutton, were declared the winners in the car category early this morning before the tragedy occurred.

All information was correct at time of printing, autoaction.com.au will provide any updates. Dan McCarthy

RENAULT TCR’S COULD HAVE BEEN DROPPED GARRY ROGERS Motorsport driver Dylan O’Keeffe revealed that the Renault Megane TCR cars would have been dropped at season’s end, had performance recently not been found.

It has been a rollercoaster ride for the GRM run Renaults in the first season and a half of the TCR Australia Series.

The former Bathurst 1000 winning operation has been plagued by Renault mechanical failures since the machines’ first race at Sydney Motorsport Park in May of 2019.

Due to the lack of Megane TCR cars globally, GRM is making a lot of improvements to the cars themselves.

Nevertheless, in the inaugural season James Moffat scored four third place finishes and his then teammate Chris Pither finished second in the final race of the season.

In the first three rounds of 2021 however, Moffat and his new Renault teammate O’Keeffe were unable to finish in the top five.

But in round four everything clicked, O’Keeffe took pole position and Moffat scored the brand’s first podium of 2021.

Mechanical issues again cost O’Keeffe some good results early in the weekend, but GRM is confident that the

Swiss built Vukovic Motorsport Renault Meganes can be tamed, and as a result will continue with the program.

“With the Renaults, if they kept not going well, we were probably going to park them up,” O’Keeffe revealed to Auto Action. “But now we’ve got glimmers of performance, we’ll continue to work through with them I think.”

The four-time TCR Australia race winner explained that they brought no new parts to the circuit that weekend, everything just simply clicked into place.

“Everything lined up, right track with the right car.”

Over the course of the weekend O’Keeffe made his way through the field and finished the final race in third, before being handed a post-race penalty for a restart infringement.

Nevertheless, with the upturn in pace, O’Keeffe is chomping at the bit to get back behind the wheel of his Megane at Morgan Park in mid-August.

“In the last race, that was my fault, I misinterpreted the rule which cost us a podium,” he admitted.

“But at the end of the day, we had pace, and the cars were quick, so bring on the rest of this year!

“We haven’t even spoken about next year, but I’m sure we’ll have that chat sooner rather than later, I assume I’ll be in the same seat next year.” Dan McCarthy

ROSEMARY PERCY, wife of 1990 Bathurst 1000 winner and three times British Saloon car champion Win, has died after a battle with cancer.

Rosemary was an accomplished equestrian dressage competitor who competed in Europe.

In Dorset, England Win had built an indoor mirror lined arena for Rosemary to train and practice in.

Rosemary and Win, who had been married 56 years, spent three years in Australia setting up Tom Walkinshaw’s Holden Racing Team in the 90s, along with Rob Benson and his then wife Kathy, with whom they shared a home for two years.

The Percys had two children, a daughter Donna and a son Matthew who died, aged 21, in a low-speed car

crash in Dorset avoiding cyclists. Win and Rosemary were in Australia at the time.

In 2003 Win was rendered paraplegic after an accident in the garden of his home, ending his active motor racing career.

He and Rosemary then moved to southern Spain, maintaining an apartment in the UK. Win ,78, had always credited Rosemary with starting his motor racing career.

They met while she was on her driving test in the village in which they both lived, became engaged on Win’s 21st birthday, and it was Rosemary who talked her new husband into going racing to keep him safe from the roads.

Auto Action sends its deepest sympathies to Win and the Percy family.

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VALE – ROSEMARY PERCY

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IT’S BEEN a hectic few weeks – Formula 2 in Monaco, Formula 2 in Baku and a Formula 1 test at Silverstone in between; it’s been go, go, go, lately!

Monaco was an excellent weekend; I think the only way we could have done any better was by qualifying on pole. I’ll take P3 in qualifying and two P2 finishes anytime; scoring a very healthy bundle of points and moving up to second in the championship was satisfying.

After driving around the tight confines of Monaco in my F2 car, it was an incredible feeling of freedom to let loose in the Alpine F1 car around the wide-open spaces of Silverstone, thanks to the Alpine Academy.

Once I got into the swing of it and learned to trust the high-speed downforce, it was a lot of fun.

Then it was time to head to Baku.

Because it’s such a unique circuit, you can’t carry any habits or learnings from the F1 car, so it didn’t take long for me to get back into F2 mode.

The weekend started on a positive note with another P3 result in qualifying.

As for the races, the things in my control mainly were fine, but you can’t do much about getting shunted on the first lap of the first race of the weekend; it would have been nice if Felipe Drugovich had apologised in person, rather than on Twitter.

Fortunately, my HP Tuners PREMA car had excellent race

pace, and I could charge through the field to score some points in the second sprint race.

In the feature race, I made the mistake of taking off when the pit stop light was red and copped a five-second penalty, but I could still finish second and maintain my top-two position in the standings.

I’m really enjoying the environment within the PREMA team. Besides giving us fast race cars, one of their strengths is their online and social media content, especially their LAP – Live at PREMA videos, which you can watch on YouTube after each race weekend.

Our press officer, Angelina Ertsou, is very good at catching my funniest moments, and it means our fans get to know who we are away from the track.

I’d also like to give a shoutout to a couple of people for their ongoing support: Rob McIntyre, who runs HP Tuners Europe and has come to my races for about four years; he’s very positive, energetic and enthusiastic, and my physiotherapist, Aussie Kim Keedle, who until the end of last year looked after Romain Grosjean and is also on hand at each event to ensure I’m in peak physical condition.

The next F2 round is at Silverstone on 16-18 July, so hopefully, I can follow in my manager, Mark Webber’s footsteps and bring home more Aussie wins on British turf!

Cheers, Oscar

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FORMULA FORD CONVERSATION CONTINUES FORMULA FORD’s future in Australia is under discussion as it reaches the consultation stage, which began with a webinar with more than 170 participants.

During the webinar, the insights of the Formula Ford Working Group’s three meetings so far were revealed, highlighted by the aim to introduce a new car tentatively for the 2023 season.

Motorsport Australia director of motorsport and chair of the Working Group, Michael Smith stated early discussions had earmarked the new car to be from a sole-manufacturer.

“We believe a single make chassis is the right way to go,” he explained.

“We debated this pretty long and hard in the working group, we certainly all know the pros and cons of each model.”

Expected to be sold only in the Australian market, the new model is targeted to cost $100,000 $120,000 and features a tubular chassis rather than a carbon tub, with running costs negligible compared to the current cars and engines to remain naturally aspirated, similar to the Ford Duratec used since 2006. A technical Working Group will also be formed.

Smith also explained FIA homologation would needed to be met for the new car, including the addition of a halo, new side impact advancements, plus front and rear crash boxes, to be reinstated as a Motorsport Australia championship.

A preliminary progression plan includes confirmation of Formula Ford returning to

Motorsport Australia championship status in 2023, while it is envisioned a national series would take place next year featuring the current cars with the winner earning six Superlicence points.

Motorsport Australia is also in discussion for the new formula to also qualify for FIA Superlicence points.

Current model Formula Fords would compete in the same races as the newer model, and continue contesting the national series.

Chair of the Australian Motor Racing Commission and part of the Working Group, Dick Johnson Racing boss Ryan Story emphasised the importance of the discussions and to continue to support what is already available, whilst a decision is made.

“F4 was an unmitigated disaster,” Story said. “It did damage to the junior pathways we have within this country and a lot of mistakes were made, we acknowledge that.

“Motorsport Australia has not supported the FFA

and there’s a lot more that we can do. In working and talking to Phil Marrinon, we agreed to offer the championship winner the opportunity of a test day in one of our cars. It’s a very simple example of support we hope to provide to the FFA in moving forward.”

A Formula Ford competitor commented to Auto Action that promotion was what needed to be improved for the Working Group to achieve its aim of the category becoming a destination for young drivers aspiring to a professional motor racing career.

“Get it back onboard with everybody, get it back to where it was a decade ago. Drivers would give their right arm to win the championship, it was that intense, it was that good,” the competitor told Auto Action.

He also had doubts that a sole-manufacturer was the right direction.

“The best thing about them are the rules have been very stable, the cars have evolved, (but)

to go to a one-make thing, I’m not so sure,” he continued.

“If they use the current set of rules, the cars haven’t changed that much since 2002. There’s no real big development to be had because the rules have been the same for so long.”

The competitor also warned against fitting safety mechanisms not suited to a Formula Ford and instead tailor them to the car’s characteristics.

“I’m not sure about the FIA safety requirements,” he stated. “You’ve got to remember they aren’t doing Formula 3 speeds; we need to make the safety parameters to suit our cars, not our cars suit something that’s never, ever going to happen.

“I think there’s a lot of areas we can improve the cars without a lot of cost, over time.

“If we can get it back to a really, really well promoted series instead of (thinking) we should be going to 86s, we should be going to Excels.

“Back in the day everyone went (from) karts to Formula Ford.” Heath McAlpine

WAKEFIELD PARK FACILITIES UNDER CONSIDERATION THE BENALLA Auto Club’s Development Application to expand the facilities at Wakefield Park is due to be considered by the Goulburn Mulwaree Shire Council in an extraordinary public meeting on June 22.

DA 0117/2021 has already created controversy on social media where it was reported the submission has been recommended for refusal by the planning department, on the basis of a small number of noise complainants.

Advice from the Planning Department to the councillors is reportedly to refuse the DA. This is said to be largely based on noise and social impacts issues.

The facility operators strongly believe that its DA covers these issues fully and appropriately.

Wakefield Park strongly refutes claims that the DA doesn’t address the issue of noise.

The applicant has to consider all factors and impacts, and it is believed that 39 submissions have been received during the six-week notification period.

The up-coming meeting will allow the attendance of community members, submitters and other interested parties, and will be webcast from the Goulburn Mulwaree Council Chamber from 6pm.

“Wakefield Park is actively encouraging everyone to converse with council in support of the DA, either by attending the meeting, or signing the online petition, or both,” says

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Operations Manager Dean Campbell.

The DA for the complex, 10km southeast of Goulburn on Braidwood Road, proposes construction of a new pit lane building, an off-road experience area, and the further use of a camping ground, in total worth in the vicinity of $5.6 million The planned facility upgrade provides for a two storey complex, constructed in three stages, that will stretch from the current control tower to the furthest garage at the entrance to pit lane. The current garages would relocate behind the new structures and be utilised additionally and also leased out for those wishing to leave vehicles at the circuit

for longer or even permanent terms.

Whilst the DA should impact circuit activity, it does formalise the terms of a noise management and mitigation arrangement agreed between the company and the council, following complaints.

This followed a council noise prevention notice in the NSW Land and Environment Court. The notice restricted noise to 95 decibels when measured 30 metres from the track.

Two noise pollution action groups lodged submissions on the plan. One resident who lives 9.7km away, says in certain conditions it sounds like he has a “motor racing circuit

in his front yard.” He also argued that lifting the limit to 95dB will make it the loudest council approval racetrack in Australia.

In response, the circuit operators consulted residents and had modified activities to meet noise limits. It is believed that councillors will have a briefing session with a council noise consultant before deciding on the DA. It should also be noted that 95dB is standard noise maximum at most motor racing venues in Australia.

There are also plans to include cycling activities, car manufacturer demonstrations, learner driver facilitating, emergency service training, and markets.

Wakefield Park was founded by John Carter and Paul Samuels and began operations in May 1994.

The 2.2km 10-corner circuit was officially opened in November that year by NSW Premier John Fahey and Formula 1 World Champion Sir Jack Brabham.

In 2000 the circuit was purchased by Rob Hodkinson and Paul Phillips, with Garry Wilmington appointed as the manager. The new owners made several adjustments to the circuit, including re-profiling the Fish Hook and the final corner Turn 10.

In 2007, the circuit was purchased by the Benalla Auto Club e. The facility has been reported to have generated over $16 million into the local community in 2019.

Garry O’Brien

th Luke West iith wit

AA’s columnist considers the Extreme challenges – eco and otherwise – of a motorsport start-up.

TCM APPOINT NEW TECHNICAL TEAM IN A renewed commitment to Touring Car Masters by the category’s management, Auto Action has learned Motorsport Australia’s Scott McGrath has been appointed its new technical manager.

This follows the resignation of category manager Paul Taylor last month.

McGrath will handle the technical management as he joins category manager Liam Curkpatrick in a new structure for TCM, showcasing an increased commitment by series owner, the Australian Racing Group.

These two roles will be separated for the first time following Taylor’s stint, which began at the end of last year after replacing long-time TCM category manager Rowan Harman.

Auto Action understands through McGrath’s involvement Motorsport Australia will increase its support for TCM’s technical regulations, taking into account the current models entered.

McGrath will be joined by Motorsport Australia’s Frank Adamson and Jamie Augustine at race meetings, while technical delegate Fred Severin

will continue, receiving additional support from the sport’s governing body.

It’s believed adding further resources will quell concerns from competitors following Sydney Motorsport Park, where scheduling and category management issues were voiced in a team owner meeting held post-event.

The size of TCM fields was also brought up with the category entry in the teens rather than the 30 or more featured in the past.

During this meeting, Curkpatrick was revealed as category manager, his vast experience fulfilling a similar the role in Super3 and previously TCR Australia welcomed by competitors.

It is believed a TCM team meeting before the fourth round of the series at Morgan Park will be conducted to outline the technical direction of the category going forward.

Following its postponement due to Victoria’s COVID-19 outbreak, the next Shannons Motorsport Australia Championships round at Morgan Park will be held on August 13-15.

Heath McAlpine

TCR SERIES TO FINISH AT BATHURST AUSTRALIAN RACING Group’s Bathurst International will host the final round of the TCR Australia Series, with the planned 500km endurance race abandoned.

Originally scheduled to be a nonseries TCR endurance event aimed at attracting some of the world’s leading touring car drivers, the event will now host the category’s grand finale and will instead revert to three sprint races.

This is due to the worldwide pandemic and Australia’s overseas border restrictions.

The category debuted at Mount Panorama earlier this year in support of the Bathurst 6 Hour production car race, hlding three 10 lap races across the weekend, each won by Melbourne Performance Centre Audi RS3 LMS TCR driver Chaz Mostert.

For the event, category management pitched to teams two innovations, which it had hoped to experiment with.

The first was to introduce a soft-tyre compound with one set being supplied for use in one of the three races, while the second was to invert the Top 10 to form the grid for Race 2.

These were rejected by teams however, Auto Action understands the soft tyre option is one category management aims to introduce in the future.

The new Bathurst International format includes two 17-lap events and a 21-lap grand finale, with the winner scoring 75 points.

It is also understood an early bird incentive will

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be provided to encourage entries and help cover regular costs such as accommodation, travel, tyres and fuel.

This news expands the second season of TCR Australia to seven-rounds, after originally being slated to conclude at Sandown on September 20-22.

ARG’s Bathurst International event is set for November 26-28.

Morgan Park Raceway will host the next round of the series as part of the Shannons Motorsport Australia Championships on August 13-15, with Supercars star Mostert leading the title by 106-points. HM

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“THE FUNNY thing about getting older is that while your eyesight weakens, your ability to see through bullshit strengthens.”

By coincidence, the above meme appeared in my Facebook newsfeed as I was scrolling through my phone while watching Extreme E’s most recent round on Kayo, its so-called Ocean X-Prix. This was a beach/backshore event held near Dakar in Senegal, a month or so after the start-up series’ opening round, Saudi Arabia’s Desert X-Prix.

The Ocean X-Prix telecast began with an overdramatised voiceover from what sounded like an elderly wizard, accompanied by pictures of crashing waves and rolling seas.

“The desert is done,” a ridiculous Gandalf meets Attenborough voice exaggerated.

“A challenging wind blows our heroes west, rising from the waves battle-worn and weary. But the fight is not over. A new challenge awaits … on the ocean.”

Oh please... spare me!

And so it went on – with references to the ocean taking no prisoners and waves that devour – until, thankfully, this cornball intro was finally over. But the sensationalism didn’t end there, the female host soon declaring Extreme E to be “the greatest adventure of all time.” Big statement that one!

There is no need for this grandiose guff, as the concept has legs. It has plenty of star-power, too, in form of celebrity team owners Nico Rosberg, Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button, plus legendary drivers Carlos Sainz and Sebastien Loeb.

If it has escaped your attention, here’s a quick overview.

Extreme E is a five-round off-road series for state-of-the-art electric SUVs, with teams running spec hydrogen fuel cell-powered vehicles called Odyssey 21s.

These futuristic-looking space-framed machines – clad with bodywork made from renewable flax material – are transported to each remote location by the series’ floating paddock and race headquarters, the St Helena. This recommissioned former Royal Mail freighter will next sail for Greenland for the Artic X-Prix in August.

The schedule originally had the final two rounds of the inaugural series, an Amazon X-Prix and a Glacier X-Prix, earmarked for Brazil and Argentina respectively.

However, alternative locations are now being sought, the series announced, due to COVID. Extreme E seeks to use five distinctly different settings to highlight the effects of climate change on diverse environments. Scientists are said to work out of a laboratory aboard the St Helena on research and overseeing ‘legacy programmes’ for each host venue. Red Sea turtle conservation and mangrove restoration were focuses for the Desert and Ocean Xs-Prix. (See what I did there, a la Grands Prix?)

Now, this FIA-sanctioned and for TV-only competition should be applauded for its ecological intentions. It’s all very honourable and necessary. Climate change undoubtedly needs to be addressed, so too wide-ranging environmental issues. But apart from relaying some very basic eco messages – such as helping scientists “foster a better understanding of the dangers facing our oceans” – via pre-race colour pieces during the telecast, I’m struggling to comprehend what tangible outcomes Extreme E will achieve, especially if the telecasts are less-than-compelling viewing.

The two events thus far have had their struggles, with drivers finding it difficult to overtake in both Saudi Arabia (blinding dust) and in Senegal (a mostly too narrow course). There’s also very little actual racing compared to the all-style-but-littlesubstance scene-setting drivel.

I’m a big fan of Extreme E’s concept and mission, so I will give it a chance to find its feet. Yet like all forms of motor sport, the self-proclaimed ‘Electric Odyssey’ faces a challenge to build and retain its audience. Without a credible contest, viewers won’t stick around to absorb the important environmental and social messages.

What’s more, the clichéd voiceovers and bullshit commentary pronouncing it “the greatest adventure of all time” must stop. Otherwise it will quickly earn a reputation as a greenwashing exercise masquerading as bubblegum motorsport.

To greenwash is to present an environmentally responsible image that is not backed up by substance. To that end, I’m not sure charging along a beach and churning up coastal dune systems in an already environmentally challenged setting is a good look. One could even argue that it’s counterproductive to the series’ aims.

Hypocritical even.

Be that as it may, one aspect Extreme E does deserve credit for is gender equality, with each team requiring both a male and a female driver, who receive equal driving time and ‘switch’ during the races’ pitstops. Thus, some fine women racers are building names for themselves. None more so than the standout female competitor – indeed the series co-leader with teammate Swede Johan Kristoffersson – Australia’s super-talented Molly Taylor. The pair race for Rosberg X Racing. Nico even helped plant some mangroves in Senegal.

Luke West wrote his first Auto Action column in 2000. Today Revved Up surveys motorsport’s changing landscape. Contact via @Luke_West (Twitter) & aarevvedup@hotmail.com

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F1 TYRE INVESTIGATION LAUNCHED FOLLOWING THE two left-rear tyre failures suffered by the Red Bull of Max Verstappen and Lance Stroll’s Aston Martin during the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, the cause is being investigated.

Both failures occurred on Baku’s long front straight within 500m of each other, with Stroll’s crashed car blocking the pit lane entry and Verstappen’s opposite the pits approaching the start line.

An inquiry is underway by the FIA, control tyre supplier Pirelli and the Formula 1 teams on how these failures occurred, though early indications suggest tyre damage rather than failure.

“It seems it is a cut due to debris,” Pirelli’s racing chief Mario Isola said.

“We have evidence of another cut in the same position. Both the accidents happened on more or less the same part of the circuit and a few laps difference. We have other cars with the same number of laps, same tyres, without any issues.”

Verstappen was understandably aggrieved post-race but was fortunate to still maintain his four-point lead at the top of the driver’s standings.

“I didn’t feel anything up until the moment that I suddenly went to the right, the tyre just blew off the rim and it’s not a nice impact to have,” he said.

Images: Motorsport Images

“It’s quite a dangerous place to have a tyre blowout at that speed. It will be related to debris, it’s like that. I’m sure there will be talks; Pirelli isn’t happy with what happened here today, but it doesn’t change anything to the race and the result I got here.

“Of course I’m pissed off because of what happened today. It was a fairly easy race for me.”

The race was red-flag after Verstappen’s incident, which allowed teams to change tyres before a two-lap shootout took place, won by teammate Sergio Perez.

FIA race director Michael Masi explained that the investigation will be thorough, while Pirelli will also conduct its own examination.

“Pirelli and the FIA, together with the

support of the respective teams, will do a full and thorough investigation, gathering all the data, available footage and so forth, and have a look at what’s available, what can be learned, and obviously what the cause of those were,” Masi said.

Isola detailed how the investigation will take place.

“We need to do a proper analysis with the microscope at the laboratory,” Isola said.

“We need to check the cause and understand if there is a cut, if the cut is coming from something external before the accident, or because of when the tyre is damaged, then you can see other cuts due to the contact with the floor, due to the suspension and so on.

“So (the) preliminary investigation is that it is probably due to an external factor or debris, kerb or whatever, but I don’t want to jump to a conclusion now as the plan now is to make a thorough investigation and make a report to the teams and the FIA that will be hopefully (be) before (the French Grand Prix at) Paul Ricard.

“Obviously it is a priority.”

Pirelli had upped its minimum rear-tyre pressure after qualifying in Baku, while its C5 or softest compound was utilised for the race and the hardest C2 dropped.

Heath McAlpine

BMW JOINS LMDh RANKS

ROSENQVIST RELEASED FROM HOSPITAL SWEDEN’S FELIX Rosenqvist has been released from hospital following a terrifying accident at the Chevrolet Detroit Grand Prix, during the first race of the “Dual in Detroit” round of the IndyCar Series.

The race was red-flagged the No. 7 Arrow McLaren crashed head-on into the tyre barriers at the exit of Turn 6, of the 2.3-mile street course just outside of downtown Detroit.

A wide-open stuck throttle appeared to be the cause of the incident, with the force of Rosenqvist’s impact punching back the concrete barrier lining the track.

Emergency crews raced to Rosenqvist’s aid as cameras showed him moving in the car and opening the visa of his helmet.

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Under the red flag, the field was parked in pit land in running order as crews continued to extract Rosenqvist and make repairs to the barriers and clean the track.

In a statement provided by Arrow McLaren SP, IndyCar medical director Geoffrey Bellows said: “Following his crash during the race, Felix Rosenqvist received an initial evaluation at the infield care center at Chevrolet Dertroit Grand Prix.

“He was then transferred to Detroit Receiving Hospital for advanced imaging and evaluation by the trauma and neurological services.

Evaluation revealed no life or limb threatening injuries, he remains awake and alert, he will be observed overnight prior to discharge from the hospital.” Mike Brudnell

THE RAPIDLY expanding prototype ranks will welcome a new manufacturer in 2023, with BMW announcing its participation.

Confirmed by BMW M CEO Markus Flasch, the German brand will start its campaign at the season-opening 24 Hours of Daytona in 2023 for the IMSA Weathertech Sports Car Championship, ahead a full campaign in the Americanbased series.

“BMW is back on the big motorsport stage,” said Flasch.

“In entering the LMDh class, BMW M Motorsport is fulfilling the prerequisites to challenge for overall victory at the most iconic endurance races in the world from 2023.

“We will be fully focused on tackling this challenge. There is a spirit of optimism here.

“BMW has a successful history in prototype racing – the Le Mans victory in 1999 was unforgettable. Reviving this story in a modern prototype with M Power will thrill fans of BMW M Motorsport.

“The LMDh concept guarantees maximum cost control and offers a wide range of possible applications, including the IMSA

series in North America, an extremely important market for BMW M. “We are all eager to get stuck into the LMDh category with a compact and highly efficient team setup.”

A factory BMW attack on the IMSA Weathertech SportsCar Championship is likely to lead onto a Le Mans 24 Hour program and possibly an FIA World Endurance Championship, as a program that replaces the German manufacturer’s Formula E entry.

Its last entry into top-line sports car competition was in 2000 with the BMW V12 LMR in which it won the Le Mans 24 Hour the previous year and contested the American Le Mans Series.

LMDh is different to the new Hypercar regulations debuted last month at Spa

by Toyota, as the chassis is based on an LMP2 weighing 1030kg, with 500kW peak of combined engine and hybrid power, a single bodywork package and a Balance of Performance system between the two formulas.

Technical details have yet to be revealed.

HM

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S W NE RA CHANGING TIMES EXTheT next generation of Supercars will now debut in August 2022. Details of the new Gen3 ruleset have been sparse until now, with category head of motorsport Adrian Burgess outlining the process so far to MARK FOGARTY & BRUCE NEWTON

SINCE IT’S initial launch at last year’s Bathurst 1000, which followed much speculation, information on the new Gen3 Supercars racers continued to be drip fed out to the racing public.

Recently, the two control chassis produced

by Triple Eight Race Engineering and PACE Innovations (on behalf of Dick Johnson Racing) have been revealed, and Supercars then announced that it had delayed the introduction of Gen3 until August 2022.

Supercars’ head of motorsport Adrian Burgess provided Auto Action with an update on how the research and development is going, ahead of its mid-season 2022 implementation.

On the development stage Gen3 is currently

“The two homologation teams at the moment are just focusing on the tooling and the molding to produce the prototype panels.

We’ve got a few other designers that are finishing off some other suspension – uprights and wishbones, suspension layout, roll bar positions. So, in concept they are finalised in their position in the car, but then you have to turn the CAD into engineering drawings. It’s one thing to put the car together as a CAD model, but you can’t manufacture from a CAD model. The model is being turned into engineering drawings from which parts will be manufactured.”

On the engine parity

“We’re not going to publish finite details on

18 AutoAction

it because at the moment that’s still in the realms of the two manufacturers that both submitted engines to us. We’ve run both engines on the dynos and our job at the moment is to run through a variety of tools to use, like cam timing, injection timing, all these parameters, air restrictors. We’re going through a lot of runs on the dyno, establishing how big an affect each of those areas has in changing either the peak power or the power curve. So we’re doing that on both engines at the moment and just basically assessing what tools we’ve got to paritise the engines. Once they’ve been given to us as a final presentation from each of the engine homologation teams, then our job will be to get those engines as close as we can. You look at our engines now we’ve got five different engines from five different engine builders, and we don’t hear anyone complaining about engine parity. So, we’re confident we’ll be able to paritise them with the tools that we think we’ll have to use, but until they each give us a final specification, then nothing’s really locked in.”

On Gen3’s appearance

“I wouldn’t want to compare them to the renderings, the renderings were done very early in the piece. We allowed both manufacturers to go further down the road of incorporating as much road car DNA into the styling of the cars. For me they look sensational. We’re not quite ready to put them on view yet. Both the manufacturers need to give us permission to do that, but they will carry far more road car DNA then we’ve

Supercars has already revealed the two control chassis upon which the Gen3 racers will be built. This is the Mustang chassis developed by PACE for DJR. ever seen on a Supercar before. I don’t think anyone’s going to be disappointed when they see them. It doesn’t have a great big rear wing on it anymore because we’re not trying to create circa 400, 450 kilos of downforce anymore, we’ll be down at 150 kilos or around that area. It’s about getting the parity between the two and keeping the right amount of drag on the cars.”

On when the Gen3 bodies will be revealed “The outer skin of the cars are both pretty well locked in now, we’re just finishing some cooling work and making sure that both cars

have got the right level of cooling for these engines. Obviously, these engines, modern architecture engines with alloy blocks as opposed to a cast iron block, the cooling requirement is far greater than an iron block.

So, we’re just making sure we’ve got the right radiator ducts and core sizes. But the position of the radiator and position of the rad boxes, that’s all been locked in. We’re just making sure we’ve got parity, at least in CFD, before we go to the runway and do a VCAT.”

On teams building Gen3 cars “There will be single source suppliers of lots of components, that will only happen if

it’s the right financial outcome for everybody.

But anyone can go and put this car together or equally a small team that doesn’t have the manpower or resources to be building its cars, can equally go to a Tickford or a DJR or a Triple Eight or go anywhere and actually get those guys to put it together. But what they’re putting together is exactly the same as any other team will be able to put together. The only things that will be different will be body shape and the engine. All the cabin layout will be exactly the same. All the suspension, front and rear, all the kinematics. Everything will be controlled for them. The only thing the teams will need to worry about is what stickers they put on the outside of the thing. Apart from that, it will be a control car. It will be a very adjustable control car – we don’t want to go down the route where everyone’s got exactly the same thing. Because we want teams to be able to do a good job or a bad job. We still want people to go to a racetrack and it’s going to be the best team, driver, engineer combination of that will come out on top. But equally, we want all the small teams to know that they’ve got exactly the same as the big teams have got, or the successful teams, and they’ve all got the same chances.”

On when Gen3 will test

“August, we hope to have both the prototypes running. We’re building two prototypes, obviously a Mustang and a Camaro. The two homologation teams – along with Supercars – are building the two prototypes. Team’s testing will start probably later in the year or even early next year, it will all depend on a few more moving parts as to when that will be. We’ll do a circuit rollout. We need to do a shakedown.

It’s a new car, so we’ll go somewhere behind closed doors and run the car for the first time.”

On when Gen3 will be publicly revealed “We’d love to bring it to some of the events this year. Until we’re a bit closer to having it up and running, then we can’t really say which events. It would be logical that we’d bring it to events and show it to the public as much as

Digital Image: Scott/Yourston-SS MEDIA Design we can for our partners, sponsors and teams.

There’s a lot of body work to be produced from various manufacturers. All this takes time, and that’s why it’s impossible this far out to be more accurate with a date, other than our target is SMP (Sydney Motorsport Park) at the end of August.”

On electronic shift developments

“It will be an electronic shift, whatever happens there will be an electronic actuator on the gearbox that will actually make the shift.

The only difference is whether the signal is coming from a flipper on the steering wheel or from the lever. Like we’ve said before, we’ll test both of those systems when the prototypes are up and running.”

On the cost of Gen3

“We believe we’re still on target. When you look at the current price of cars and engines, it (Gen3) should be a significant reduction in

common prices that have been paid at the moment. We still hope to have the car around the $400,000 number. We think we’re on target for that, but as normal, we’re running a compressed production timeline that will probably incur some more costs because you have to try and rush things through. At the moment we believe we’re on target for a $400,000 but that’s a turn key car.”

On the importance of budget reduction for Gen3

race about developing a car. It’s not like Formula 1 where you’re bringing 30, 40, 50 developments to every Grand Prix. That’s not sustainable. As you can see in F1, they’re trying to bring in budget caps and the like. So, that era of motor sport is gone. So, we need to follow suit and we need to protect the teams and we need to deliver them a car that’s cost effective. And then, you don’t need an army of thousands and millions and millions to run the car.”

“It should come down to whoever’s done the best job on the day between the car engineer and driver, and the team. It shouldn’t come down to the size of your chequebook and just turn into an arms

Early renderings of the Chevrolet Camaro (top) and Ford Mustang (below) indicate the Gen3 racers will look much closer to their road car foundations. Main digital Image: Peter Hughes.

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LATEST NEWS

WAU SECURES MOSTERT FOR 2022 WALKINSHAW ANDRETTI United has confirmed that it will retain Chaz Mostert in 2022 and beyond after he signed a multi-year extension with the team.

After joining the Clayton squad in 2020, Mostert secured a podium finish and lap record on debut at the 2020 Adelaide 500.

Earlier this year Mostert scored his first win with the outfit at Symmons Plains, WAU’s first since 2018, as well as notch up nine podiums, two pole positions, and currently sits third in the 2021 Supercars Championship.

“I’m super pumped to sign on with Walkinshaw Andretti United on a multi-year deal, and repay the faith that Ryan, Martine, Michael, Zak and the entire WAU team showed in me.” said Mostert.

“It’s been pretty incredible to see what we’ve been able to achieve together in a short amount of time, under some pretty challenging circumstances, so I’m excited for the future, and have no doubt that will continue.”

“It was a no-brainer for me to re-sign that’s for sure. This team is incredible, full of amazing people and it is very family orientated. Why would I leave my family?”

Since debuting in 2013, the 2014 Bathurst 1000 winner has recorded 14 wins, 62 podiums and 22 pole positions in his Supercars career.

“We are delighted to continue our journey with Chaz, he has been instrumental in our development and the path we are on as a team, we definitely have big things we still want to achieve

together, which was always the goal when we started.” said Ryan Walkinshaw, Walkinshaw Andretti United Team Owner.

“He is without-doubt one of the leading drivers in the category, and we have worked really hard as a collective to put ourselves in the fight. It’s not just on the track we are seeing results though, he is a major part of our family, and fits into

our culture perfectly.”

“We remain completely focussed on the 2021 season, but it’s nice to know our future with Chaz is now secured, and I can’t wait to see what we can continue to achieve.”

Mostert and WAU will be on track this weekend at the Darwin Triple Crown, June 18-20. Rhys Vandersyde

there,” Waters said. “They’ve always been traditionally pretty strong at Darwin.

“They’ll be up there no doubt, like they will be all year, it will be a tough old year I think, but it’ll be fun.”

Waters displayed strong pace in the second Darwin round last year and was unlucky to come away with only one

podium after contact in the final race with Jamie Whincup.

“We had a fairly good round at Darwin 2 last year,” he recalled. “We’ve just got to kind of reflect on what we did there (last year) and marry that up with what we’ve learnt since then.”

Waters has continued his front-running form from last year to firm as a serious title contender, which he believes stems from the team’s more than 100-days on the road through the COVID period.

“Being away on the road last year helped us work closer together, knuckle down and dig deep into what we are actually needing I think,” he said.

“There were a few things we lacked last year that we have improved on, it’s not just one thing, it’s a lot of little things.

“We have a better understanding of our car, what it likes and wants, which enables us to turn up at different racetracks and be more consistent.”

Supposed to debut at Winton, the Dunlop Supersoft tyre will be raced on for the first time in the Darwin heat, which is expected to add further spice to the event.

“The debut of the Supersoft could be a bit of a baptism of fire with it being so hot,” Waters believes.

“It should provide really good racing, some more emphasis on strategy, and how you play your tyres over the weekend, so I’m looking forward to that aspect of it.” Dan McCarthy

WATERS FOCUSED ON HIS OWN PERFORMANCE SUPERCARS CHAMPIONSHIP contender Cameron Waters remains focused on his own job heading into the upcoming round at Hidden Valley as he attempts to close the margin to leader Shane van Gisbergen.

Tickford Racing driver Waters carries good momentum into Darwin, after winning the most recent race at The Bend Motorsport Park in South Australia.

Hidden Valley had not been van Gisbergen nor Triple Eight Race Engineering’s best circuit as both have lacked consistency up north, the Kiwi’s last win coming in his 2016 championship winning season.

Waters however stated he’s focused on his package and not so much on his rival’s form approaching Supercars first race in what will be five weeks since The Bend Motorsport Park.

“I don’t really look at it in that respect, on how good the competition goes at particular tracks,” Waters told Auto Action.

“For us it’s more (a case of) focusing on our car, and what we’ve got to do to maximise.”

Like Waters, new Dick Johnson Racing recruit Anton De Pasquale scored his first win of the season at The Bend.

The Tickford Racing driver believes De Pasquale and former teammate Will Davison will carry their good form through the rest of the season.

“One hundred percent DJR will be fast

PERKINS AND BOWE AMONGST QUEEN’S BIRTHDAY HONOURS LEGENDS OF Australian motorsport Larry Perkins and John Bowe have been recognised as part of the Queen’s Birthday Honours List for 2021.

The two Bathurst 1000 winners, Perkins (six times) and Bowe (twice) were appointed as members of the Order of Australia (AM) for their contributions to motorsport.

Perkins enjoyed 11 Formula 1 starts as well as a long career in the Australian Touring Car Championship between 1981-2003 as both an owner/driver.

While Bowe who continues to race in Touring Car Masters has a had string of successes, including an Australian Touring Car Championship title and two Gold Star crowns over his 50 year driving career.

In addition, long-time Motorsport Australia President Andrew Papadopoulos, Former Supercars Executive Chairman Tony Cochrane, Australian Grand Prix event director Trent Smyth and safety expert Dr Michael Henderson were also recognised for their contributions to the sport.

Papadopoulos served as President of Motorsport Australia for more than a decade until his retirement last year, having also served the sport in an international capacity as both an FIA Steward and as President of the FIA’s global ASN Development Taskforce.

Cochrane is best known for his role in transforming the ATCC into V8 Supercars, as well as serving as chairman for 16 years, before stepping down to take up a role in AFL in 2012.

Dr Henderson, originally from the United Kingdom, has made significant contributions to motor vehicles and motorsport safety in Australia.

He was instrumental in the establishment of the Australian Government’s road crash research unit and test laboratory, Crash Lab. From a motorsport point of view, Dr Henderson’s expertise and passion for the sport saw him hold

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multiple high profile roles. This included becoming Vice President of the Historic Sports and Racing Car Association of NSW, Deputy Chairman of the Motorsport Australia Historic Motor Sport Commission, and the Inaugural Chairman of the Australian Institute for Motor Sport Safety (AIMSS).

Current Motorsport Australia President Andrew Fraser praised both Papadopoulos and Dr Henderson for their major roles within the sport.

“I am very pleased that both Andrew and Dr Henderson have been recognised in this year’s Queen’s Birthday Honour’s List as they have been critical in helping motorsport get to where it is today,” said Fraser.

“Motorsport Australia has grown to be a globally recognised leader in motorsport under Andrew’s leadership, and his passion for motorsport has seen him rise to a significant position within the

FIA, particularly in the area of ASN Development.

“His commitment to driver development is particularly noteworthy and it is no accident that there are so many young and talented Australian racers competing in the world today.

“Dr Henderson established a worldwide reputation for excellence in safety, and for more than 50 years he has had an internationally recognised pre-eminent role in the area of motor vehicle safety research.

“While difficult to quantify, his contribution towards the reduction in trauma and death on both the road and the race track has been very significant.

“These gentlemen are worthy recipients of this award and everyone at Motorsport Australia is extremely proud of their achievements.”

Rhys Vandersyde

Officer in the General Division (AO) Dr Michael Henderson: For distinguished service to motor vehicle and motorsport safety, and to the prevention of road trauma.

Member in the General Division (AM) John Bowe: For significant service to motorsport as a touring car driver.

Tony Cochrane: For significant service to sports administration, and to entertainment production.

Andrew Papadopoulos: For significant service to motorsport, and to driver safety and education.

Larry Perkins: For significant service to motorsport as a touring car driver and team owner.

Trent Smyth: For significant service to international relations, to motorsport, and to business.

IGTC DOWN TO THREE ROUNDS The SRO Motorsports Group has announced the 2021 Intercontinental GT Challenge will be run over just three rounds, opting against replacing the cancelled Suzuka 10 Hours.

The 49th running of the Japanese endurance event was originally scheduled to take place from August 20-22, but was canned in March by local organisers due to Japan’s domestic COVID-19 measures.

SRO had conversations with several venues and tracks in the Middle East to replace the Suzuka 10 Hours.

Despite finding some promising replacements across the region, calendar clashes and budget restrictions resulted in venues not signing on the dotted line.

The search has been called off according to SRO Motorsports Group Founder and CEO Stephane Ratel.

“We invested much time and energy into finding a replacement event that would uphold Intercontinental’s purpose of uniting

the world’s great GT endurance races,” Ratel said.

“Although several options would have achieved this aim, each also presented a new set of challenges to overcome. Given the current global situation, I believe it is better to focus our energies on IGTC’s three existing rounds.

“I would like to thank each of the parties and promoters for their positive collaboration and hope to work with them again in the future.

“Indeed, although Intercontinental won’t be visiting the Middle East this year I

remain confident that these discussions will subsequently allow us to explore fresh opportunities.”

The Bathurst 12 Hour historically commenced the IGTC season, however also due to Australia’s COVID restrictions, this could not go ahead at the start of the year.

As a result, the traditional five-round series is down to just three events, however the global GT3 competition will race on three different continents.

The legendary 24 Hours of Spa in Belgium kicks off the IGTC season from

July 29 – August 1.

Round 2 sees the IGTC category join forces with Fanatec GT World Challenge America on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course, for the annual 8 Hour event from October 15-17.

As always, the season will conclude in South Africa with the Kyalami 9 Hour on December 2-4. Dan McCarthy REVISED 2021 CALENDAR Jul 29-Aug 1 – 24 Hours of Spa - Europe Oct 15-17 – Indianapolis 8 Hour – USA Dec 2-4 – Kyalami 9 Hour – South Africa

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POWER UNAPOLOGETIC TEAM PENSKE ace Will Power scrapped his way to a sixth-place finish at Belle Isle on Sunday in Race 2 of the Chevrolet Detroit Belle Isle Grand Prix.

After being virtually robbed of victory while leading the IndyCar Series race at Belle Isle on Saturday when the race was red-flagged, Power’s #12 Chevrolet would not restart in pit lane.

Power started Race 2 from 20th and moved through the field without too much drama.

While he didn’t have enough for eventual race winner Pato O’Ward (Arrow McLaren) or Penske teammate Josef Newgarden, who finished second, Power was pleased enough with his performance, considering he started back in the field.

“It was about all we could do,” said Power. “I got the most out of the race. To finish sixth from 20th on the grid, well, it’s good enough.”

Power couldn’t believe just how fast O’Ward went by cars at the finish to nail the win.

“Man, I’ve never seen a guy who can drive like that on cold tyres,” said Power, the 2014 IndyCar champ.

“He’s something – he’s next level that guy.”

Power hadn’t forgotten Saturday’s bitter disappointment at having a win stolen.

“Victories in this series don’t come easy,” said Power.

“Look, there’s nothing we can do about it, but I don’t feel bad for anything I said. If I wasn’t upset, there would be something wrong with me, and I shouldn’t be racing.

“All that work and you are happy to give it up and say you are happy about it – well you got problems then.”

Power has never been shy of saying what’s on his mind since joining Team Penske.

“Look, I think the problem today is, no one says it like it is,” explained Power leaning up against the Team Penske motorhome. “I say it how is it.

All this politically correct stuff – a man is not a robot. I don’t apologise for it.” MB

PERONI’S LEARNING EXPERIENCE

GROSJEAN THE FIREMAN YOU’D EXPECT Romain Grosjean to have a healthy respect for fire and try his hardest to avoid it.

The French racer almost lost his life during the Bahrain Grand Prix last season in an inferno, when his Haas Formula 1 car penetrated the metal safety barrier and erupted in flames.

Grosjean suffered burns to his face and hands, which didn’t temper his desire to race.

However, this season, Grosjean is running the #51 Honda for Dale Coyne Racing in the IndyCar Series.

On Sunday, in Race 2 of the

IndyCar doubleheader at the Detroit Grand Prix, Grosjean spun during the race and his front brakes caught fire.

Grosjean, who would be credited with a 24th-place finish, climbed out of his car under caution and ran to safety workers at the side of the track, grabbing a fire extinguisher and returning to his stricken openwheeler, which had smoke and fire pouring from the wheels.

Grosjean attempted to put the fire out until the safety crew arrived at the scene and wisely restrained the Frenchman, convincing him to return to his day job. Mike Brudenell

THERE IS no doubting young Tasmanian Alex Peroni’s courage and commitment to make it to the top levels of open-wheel racing.

Peroni, 21, survived a monstrous crash at Monza in Italy in 2019, when his Campos Racing Formula 3 car hit a “sausage kerb” at the Parabolica and somersaulted into the tyre barriers, finally coming to rest at the catch-wire fence.

The Hobart-born Peroni walked away from the monumental wreck but was later diagnosed with a broken vertebra and missed the remainder of the season.

After stints racing karts in Italy as a teen and participating in the Italian F4 Championship, Formula Renault series (winning at Pau and Monaco) and in F3.

Peroni now finds himself racing in the Indy Lights series.

Peroni made the move from F3 to Indy Lights team Carlin at the end of 2020.

Indy Lights was one of two support races at last weekend’s Detroit Grand Prix IndyCar Series doubleheader in the Motor City, the other was the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship.

“It’s balls to the walls out here,” said Peroni after setting second-quickest time in Practice 1 on the 2.3mile, 14-turn street course alongside the Detroit River.

“You leave it all on the line on this track.”

Indy Lights, the feeder series to IndyCar, “has always been on our radar,” said Peroni, who sits sixth in points.

“For sure, my goals have shifted from (Formula 1) to IndyCar. I talked to Carlin for a F2 drive but we didn’t have the budget. But then Trevor Carlin was talking about restarting his Indy Lights program, we signed on.”

Peroni admits Indy Lights “has been a big learning experience.”

“It’s a big challenge, but hopefully we are getting

better and we will get to the pointy end.”

Peroni has never raced or even tested on an oval, which is in his future in Indy Lights.

“I don’t know what to expect, but, for sure, it’s going to be a mentality change,” admitted Peroni. “On a normal circuit, you go out trying to find the limit. On an oval, if you find the limit, you are in the wall.”

Peroni smacked just about everything at Monza after sailing through the air, much of the time upside down.

Did he remember any of the accident?

“Thankfully, not much,” said Peroni, whose grandparents are from Italy. “It was a big one, for sure. I’ll be honest, when the Halo came out, I wasn’t a big fan … but it probably saved my life. The first thing I really remember was waking up on the way to hospital.”

Peroni is a big fan of Team Penske IndyCar drivers Will Power and Scott McLaughlin, and he admires Aussie F1 star Daniel Ricciardo.

“I enjoy his work on and off the track,” said Peroni of Ricciardo. “I speak to him and he helps me a little bit, though there’s nothing official. I think he sees me as a young Aussie and wants to keep an eye on me.” MB

AF CORSE AND FERRARI ALIGN FOR HYPERCAR PROGRAM LEGENDARY ITALIAN car manufacturer Ferrari has announced AF Corse will run its Hypercar program in the World Endurance Championship from 2023.

Ferrari has confirmed its partnership with AF Corse, where the two parties will collaborate in the management of the team working alongside Competizioni GT in its Hypercar program.

AF Corse has a long running history with Ferrari dating back to 2006, and currently runs the factory Ferrari program in LMGTE Pro, as well as cars in LMGTE Am class of WEC. The team will compete in the top-tier Hypercar class under the name of Ferrari – AF Corse.

Since 2012, Ferrari and AF Corse have combined to win six team and drivers’ titles in the LMGTE Pro and LMGTE Am classes, five Constructors’ titles for Ferrari, and three 24 Hours of Le Mans class victories.

“Today’s announcement is an important step towards the debut of our LMH in the World Endurance Championship,” said head of Ferrari Attivita Sportive GT Antonello Coletta.

“We are happy to have a reliable partner like AF Corse with us for this project.

“Ferrari and AF Corse have enjoyed a solid relationship for a long time, as you can see in the FIA WEC, where we run our official 488 GTEs together with the Piacenza-based team.

“We look forward to continuing together on a journey as rewarding as the years of racing cooperation to date.”

AF Corse has previous experience in higher-tier classes, the outfit ran LMP2 machines for PeCom Racing in 2012 and 2013 using the first Lola and then Oreca chassis, before running the Cetilar Racing LMP2 outfit.

AF Corse team owner Amato Ferrari explained he feels immensely honoured to run the Ferrari LHM program.

“We are proud of this announcement,” he expressed. “It is the crowning of a dream and recognition of the great effort made over the years.

“Our partnership with Ferrari is a winning one that began in 2006, and I

am delighted to continue it in the LMH project.

“We have immediately kicked off with great enthusiasm aiming to raise the bar even further and to be ready for this new challenge.”

Ferrari and AF will continue their existing program in GTE Pro up to the end of the 2022 season. Dan McCarthy

SPEEDWAY LEGEND JOINS NASCAR TRUCK SERIES DIRT RACE SPEEDWAY LEGEND Donny Schatz will make his debut in the third-tier NASCAR Camping World Truck Series (NCWTS) on the dirt at Knoxville Raceway on July 9.

Schatz will drive the #17 Ford for David Gilliland Racing, an entry which has been steered by 2014 NASCAR Cup Series champion Kevin Harvick among others.

It will be the first time the 10-time World of Outlaws (WoO) champion Schatz will have raced in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series.

The whiz on dirt is optimistic he can convert his sprint car success to NASCAR. “I am unbelievably excited to take part in my first NASCAR-sanctioned event as part of David Gilliland Racing,” Schatz said. “I’ve had the opportunity to meet David and his organisation’s record speaks for itself.

“DGR has a great group of people working with their team and I’m looking forward to making my debut in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series with them at Knoxville Raceway in July.

“The fact that my first NASCAR sanctioned event will take place on dirt and in a truck fit perfectly into the path that my career has taken.

“To make my truck series debut at Knoxville, a place that has been so good to me over the years is also very fitting. I’m hoping to represent

our partners and the sprint car community well.”

Although the upcoming NCWTS race at Knoxville will be Schatz’s first time in a National NASCAR Series race, he is certainly not short of experience at the venue.

He has accumulated 27 career wins at the track, including 17 in WoO and 10 Knoxville Nationals triumphs between 2006 and 2017.

“Donny is a legend in the dirt car world and has an incredible track record at Knoxville in the World of Outlaws,” said David Gilliland.

“His experience level and knowledge of dirt track racing and Knoxville Raceway will make him a great addition to the team for the first ever truck race there. We are super excited to welcome him aboard.”

Although it is the first NASCAR Truck Series dirt race at the venue, it is not for the series. The series ran an annual dirt round at the Eldora Speedway from 2013-2019.

In 2021 the premier NASCAR category returned to dirt for the first time since 1970 and proved incredibly popular globally.

Although well-known in the USA, Schatz has raced successfully Down Under. In 2002, he won the Grand Annual Sprintcar Classic at Warrnambool.

He was also twice a runner-up in World Series Sprintcars at the start of the millennium. Dan McCarthy

with Dan Knutson

RACE

WILLIAMS GRAND Prix Engineering has announced the departure of Team Principal Simon Roberts, with CEO Jost Capital absorbing the role. Roberts joined Williams 12 months ago, however when the Williams family sold the team, he was thrust into the role of acting team principal before being appointed on a full-time basis this year. After six races Capito now takes that role, while all trackside leadership duties will be handled by Technical Director Francois-Xavier Demaison. DM

MANSOUR OJJEH, a long-time McLaren shareholder and significant figure at the British outfit, has passed away at the age of 68. Ojjeh became involved in motor racing in 1979, when TAG – founded by his father – became a sponsor of the Williams team. McLaren boss Ron Dennis convinced Ojjeh to invest in McLaren in 1984 and he has remained with them ever since. When he joined the team Niki Lauda and a young Alain Prost finished 1-2 in the championship. DM

CANCELLATIONS INEVITABLE THE SINGAPORE Grand Prix, scheduled for 3 October, is the latest F1 race to be cancelled, but it won’t be the last due to ongoing safety and logistic concerns brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Canada was cut, as was Turkey, which had been added as a replacement for the Canadian race. Austria will host a doubleheader to make up for the Canada/ Turkey loss. Look for Bahrain, which hosted the season-opener, to hold another race late in the season, albeit on the outer ring circuit rather than the traditional grand prix layout.

So, as of now, the 2021 calendar will still consist of 23 races. But there are concerns about some of the venues later in the year.

Things look solid for the remainder of the European season, which ends with the Italian Grand Prix at Monza on 12 September. The tracks will permit fans but probably at only partial capacity.

Ultimately, it will be the governments’ decisions and not that of Formula 1 and the promoters, if the races take place.

The governments of Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi and Russia are effectively the promoters, so there are no doubts about

A FRUSTRATED Fernando Alonso believes that drivers should punished for causing a red flag in a Formula 1 qualifying session. Charles Leclerc took pole after crashing out in Monaco, while a quarter of the field crashed during the Azerbaijan qualifying hour. “I think the people need to calm down a little bit and drive 98 per cent in a street circuit, because if you crash and you start last in the race, maybe you don’t drive over your possibilities,” Alonso said. DM

MEXICAN SERGIO Perez took his first victory for the Red Bull Racing team at Baku. Just metres after taking the win, the Mexican was told to come to stop the car as it was suffering from a hydraulic issue. The Red Bull team had even considered retiring the #11 machine midway through the race, but elected to continue. DM

IT’S TIME to call it. Amid the latest COVID crisis, the Formula 1 Australian Grand Prix is unlikely to happen in November, so ditch it till next March. Victoria isn’t going to let F1 in without strict quarantine measures, which means two weeks in a hotel. The Canadian GP has already been cancelled for the same reason. AGP organisers want F1 allowed in with strict controls, but only for a maximum five-day fly in, fly out period. MF

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Images: Motorsport Images

those races. Furthermore, the latter two successfully staged their races last year with fans permitted.

The United States Grand Prix will go ahead on 24 October as both the country and especially the state of Texas are opening up post-pandemic.

Overall plans for the Australian Grand Prix on 21 November have yet to be confirmed, and the official F1 website has yet to offer tickets for the event.

Question marks hang over the races in Japan, Mexico and Brazil. If the Summer Olympics are staged in Japan, then that

should clear the path for the grand prix.

The logistics for the races outside of Europe are much more complicated for the teams.

A date change in Europe can be coped with fairly easily because the cars and equipment are hauled by trucks to the tracks. But the cars and some equipment are flown to the overseas races.

The teams also have identical sets of equipment – everything from tools to tables and chairs for their catering areas in the paddock – which are packed in shipping containers and sent by sea freight because it is so much cheaper than airfreight.

BOOTCAMP FOR TSUNODA YUKI TSUNODA was hailed as one of the best F1 rookies ever after he finished ninth in the season opener in Bahrain.

But his game dropped off sharply after that as he finished out of the top 10 in the next four races. To make things worse, he was being comprehensively out-performed by his resurging AlphaTauri teammate Pierre Gasly.

Red Bull’s racing boss Dr. Helmut Marko does not tolerate stragglers. Daniel Ricciardo and other former drivers in the Red Bull stable recall getting the dreaded Monday morning phone call after they had not performed up to expectations in the race the day before.

Tsunoda arrived in F1 thinking that his talent – which he definitely has – would be enough to

get him into the points. But Marko and the team realised that he was not working hard enough.

The 21-year-old Japanese driver had been living in the UK near Red Bull’s team base in Milton Keynes.

After the Monaco Grand Prix he was ordered to move to Faenza, AlphaTauri’s base in Italy.

Bootcamp organised by team boss Franz Tost – another one who does not tolerate stragglers – ensued.

Tsunoda spent two hours in the morning in the gym. This was followed by meetings with the engineers, lunch, English lessons, more meetings with the engineers and a 90-minute session in the gym.

“I didn’t enjoy it!” Tsunoda admitted, “but it

is what it is. I think the engineering meetings especially give me a good understanding of the car. That was a really good preparation for (the Azerbaijan weekend). The gym sessions were much longer than usual, so hopefully I won’t be like a bodybuilder at the end of the year!”

It could just be coincidence after his first week of bootcamp that Tsunoda finished sixth in the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.

The AlphaTauri was competitive in Baku, as Gasly demonstrated by crossing the line in third place. But Tsunoda’s new regime will continue.

“Generally I like Italy more than England,” he said. “The food is nice; the weather is much nicer.

For me everything’s positive. Hopefully this thing goes well with my performances in the races.”

MERCEDES NOT PLAYING ITS A-GAME It also takes a lot longer so, for example, with the races in the U.S., Mexico and Brazil on consecutive weekends, three separate sets of equipment would be shipped to each venue.

So the teams need a much longer leadtime for the overseas events. Formula 1’s CEO Stefano Domenicali is in regular contact with the teams to give them the latest updates.

Meanwhile, several tracks in Europe including Mugello in Italy and the Nürburgring in Germany are on standby to host races.

WITH HIS fifth place in Monaco followed by his second place in Azerbaijan, Sebastian Vettel looks like he has revitalized his racing career.

Last year, Vettel’s final season at Ferrari, did not go well. The car was not competitive, and Vettel had only one podium finish – third in Turkey. His next best result was sixth in Hungary, and he placed 13th in the final standings in the drivers’ world championship.

He accumulated a mere 33 points. His teammate Charles Leclerc, who also had to deal with the recalcitrant Ferrari, had 98 points which put him eighth in the 2020 standings.

The move to Aston Martin, formerly Racing Point, has invigorated the German who is now more like the driver who won four world championships with Red Bull.

Formula 1’s managing director for motorsport, Ross Brawn, named Vettel as the “Driver of the Day” in Azerbaijan, saying that Vettel was reborn, refreshed and has a different vibe about him.

“Generally I’m on the grid to win,” Vettel said. “But (second and fifth are) certainly more than a sixth or seventh or 10th place!

I always aim to win the race even though the chances are slim, but I think there’s still a chance. That’s the approach I had when I started and I still have that inside me, but for sure you’re also realistic.

“Currently we’re not one of the favourites; we don’t have the fastest package but you can get a huge buzz around it working together with the team and trying to step up. I think we’ve done exactly that.

“I don’t think we’ve left any stone unturned

THE LAST time Mercedes went two consecutive races without having a driver on the podium was the end of the 2013 season.

But now the mighty Merc has come out of the Monaco and Azerbaijan weekends with just one seventh-place points finish.

“The emotion of frustration is just so overwhelming at the moment,” Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff said after the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, where his drivers Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton finished 12th and 15th respectively.

“There are lots of things that are not running smoothly as they have in the past few years.

Operationally it’s not our A-game.

“There is just so much that we need to improve that I just want to get on it right now in order to make sure that we are actually able to compete for this championship. Because we can’t continue losing points like we’ve done in Monaco and here.”

Mercedes always expected to struggle at the

Monaco and Baku street tracks because its car has a long wheelbase.

Red Bull Honda earned 62 points in those two races and now leads the world constructors’ championship with 174 points. Mercedes got only seven points and is second with 148 points.

“In the last two races we haven’t been good enough,” trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin said after the Baku event.

“Not fast enough; we’ve made mistakes; we struggle to switch the tyres on and we’ve been on the back-foot through free practice. We know the level it takes to win championships. We are not at that level right now, so we need to re-group and come back, performing the way we know that we can.”

Hamilton had scored points in 54 consecutive races – every round since the 2018 Austrian Grand Prix. But he came up with zero in Baku.

“It’s been an incredibly difficult two races,” he said. “It’s been a very painful experience. You

can see that Red Bull is clearly the quickest at the moment. It was very, very hard to keep up with them.”

Bottas was mystified by his lack of pace in Azerbaijan.

“I can’t remember having this kind of weekend before,” Bottas said.

“Yes, there were a few weekends when I’ve had bad sessions but always, at some point, I had the pace. But this weekend it’s been like this all the time, and during the whole weekend I still haven’t understood what is wrong. I know where’s the limit and I cannot go faster than this, and then you’re still six, seven, eight tenths of a second behind. It’s not normal, so it’s something we need to understand before going to France. I’m keen to find out but, at the moment I don’t know.”

Still, Hamilton put a positive spin on the Baku weekend.

“There are lots of positives,” he said. “We’ll come back stronger.”

VETTEL REVITALISED

so far this year. I’ve had a lot to catch up and learn about the team, about the approach, and I get pleasure from that as well. I think by getting a good result it’s obviously a nice way to also give something back to the guys in the team, to the support you get from outside, but also in a way to yourself. Because like I said

before, that’s ultimately what you want, you want good results, closer to the front or the top step.”

After celebrating on the podium in Baku, Vettel said that it had taken a little bit longer than he wanted to get up to speed and adjust to the car at the start of the season.

“I think I was confident that at some point it (would) start clicking and obviously Monaco was great,” he said. “You can argue that it takes off a bit of pressure but I think obviously the expectations in general are fairly high at the beginning of the year, so it was good to get a good result.”

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RICCIARDO REGROUPS

DANIEL RICCIARDO’S backwards step is paying dividends. After struggling in the Monaco Grand Prix – a race he won in 2017 – the Aussie spent a week at McLaren’s base in the UK, where he drove the simulator and had many meetings with the engineers and other staff.

“It was really just trying to take a step back and understand what’s going on,” he said, “and let’s see how the car works and what needs to be done to get the car working well.

“I don’t want to say we started from zero, as we learned a bit in the first few races, but just to have more of an open-minded approach.

We tried lots of different things, even things that don’t feel correct, we’ll try them and understand why that doesn’t work.”

All that effort resulted in Ricciardo definitely making a forward step at the next race – the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.

“It was good to see the

hard work Daniel put in with the team is paying off,” commented McLaren team principal Andreas Seidl.

“He definitely felt a lot more comfortable in the car.”

Ricciardo certainly does not feel any self-doubt about his own skills as a driver.

“I know deep inside me what I’m capable of,” he said. “I know if I were driving with an element of fear or hesitation, then I would know that okay this sport’s not for me anymore. But it’s very much not the case. I know it’s about putting it together now.”

It is no surprise that Ricciardo needs time to adapt after switching teams. But it does come as a surprise that his teammate Lando Norris has also had difficulty adapting to the current McLaren. In fact, Norris is still learning how to drive any F1 car. This is his third year racing the McLaren, and he was a test driver for the team prior to that. But the 2021 McLaren needs a special driving style.

“There are definitely a lot of differences,” Norris said, “and it has not been easy going from the last two years to this year. I have had to adapt to a lot of different things. I cannot still this early in the season drive it the way that I want to, as a preference from how I drove in F3 and F4. So a bit of it is that you have to adapt.

Every car in F1 is different and you have to get used to it.”

He has earned points in all six races this season and has had two podiums. In fact, going back to last year, he has been in the points for 11 consecutive races. No other current F1 drivers have done that.

While Ricciardo would have preferred to finish higher than ninth in Azerbaijan, he was pleased to have completed a full race distance – another opportunity to learn more about the McLaren.

“I stand by the productivity we have had last week, and unfortunately I cannot show it on the scorecard,” he said.

“But it has been a work well done so far.”

Ricciardo is looking forward to the upcoming tripleheader with a race in France and two in Austria.

“When you’re trying to learn any sport, the best way to learn is practice and by doing it,” he said. “The unique thing with our sport is that we cannot do it every day; we cannot just go out tomorrow and run a few laps. So having three consecutive weekends and getting that practice will fasttrack my progress. We have the simulator and these things help, but in the simulator the walls don’t hurt so it is never quite the same.”

Furthermore, these races are on traditional road circuits with runoff areas, thus they do not punish small errors as do the walls in Baku and Monaco. And that will give Ricciardo a little more latitude to experiment as he continues to apply the lessons learned when he stepped back and regrouped.

Valley Supercars; Living Legends WHAT’S IN THE NEXT Hidden Spencer Martin part 2; A sit down chat with Scott and Will from Detroit; French F1 ISSUE ON SALE 1 JULY Indycar’s Grand Prix; Styrian F1 Grand Prix; all the news..

with Mark Fogarty

THE FOGES FILE AA’s punchy pundit recoils from the reaction to his hard stances on the AGP and Gen3 A CRITIC’S work is never done. Well, at least not in motor racing. The past couple of weeks have been mana for the opinionated.

Supercars officially confirms Gen3’s introduction is delayed until mid-season – aka August – next year. And then there’s a call to forget the AGP until 2022.

Oh, that one was me.

I postulated on our web site that the AGP should be put off until next March at the earliest, because Victoria government quarantine requirements for international visitors – sporting or otherwise – show no signs of lifting by November.

Melbourne’s latest, lingering lockdown confirms Spring Street is trigger-happy about the coronavirus – which, to be fair, isn’t going away in a hurry. Ergo, the chances of Formula 1 getting an exemption are negligible.

Surprisingly, my stance attracted the attention of mainstream media. Well, footy mad Melbourne sports radio station SEN, anyway.

Morning show presenter Gerard Whateley got me on air to talk about why I thought the postponed AGP wouldn’t happen.

If it were anyone but Whateley, I would have declined the invitation. But unlike the ex-AFL players who predominate the airwaves – and, by definition, dismiss car racing – Whateley is informed and credible.

He is the new Bruce McAvaney – only more open-minded to all sports, including motor sport. Can call anything on legs and has a broad view. Not a motor racing fan, but follows it enough to be aware and objective.

So I was happy to talk with Whateley because I was confident he wouldn’t go all ball sports on me. I wasn’t disappointed.

He gave me the time to present my view

Image: Motorsport Images

and asked intelligent questions.

Just shows what can happen when an informed and interested broadcaster recognises a valid story rather than pandering to the sports media’s myopic fascination with football.

I’m pretty sure Whateley doesn’t remember, but in his formative years I was on the radio covering big sport here and overseas. So I have some understanding and appreciation of his broad view.

My position on the AGP is further informed by talking to F1 people. They are adamant F1 won’t accept two weeks’ quarantine in Melbourne.

And why should they? F1 has successfully operated in fly in, fly out bubbles without rampant COVID-19 outbreaks. It – and the AGPC’s – pitch for a five-day corridor is reasonable and manageable.

But unless the Vic government accedes soon, better to cut the losses and target next March. The world, hopefully, will be much different by then – and most of our population will have been vaccinated, further reducing the risk.

A decision has to be made by late September or early October to allow time for the Albert Park track infrastructure to be built.

I don’t have a death wish for the AGP this year – far from it – but the odds of it happening appear unfeasibly long. I hope I’m wrong, but …

Just as I want F1 and Supercars to return to Melbourne in November, I wish all the best for Gen3’s mid-season introduction next year.

With the best will in the world, though, I can’t see it. Hard to imagine a messier – and more unnecessary – changeover.

Further interest in my hard-nosed opinions on the AGP and Gen3 came from the Parked Up podcast, presented by Grant Rowley and Tony D’Alberto.

They grilled me and I told them what I thought.

On Gen3, my take – as expressed in an opinion piece on our web site – is that the mid-season transition is a face-saver for Supercars.

By any measure, the timing makes no other sense.

But now we have a target, along with a sudden flood of Gen3 information, so let’s embrace the charge to change.

Most teams aren’t happy with the compromise, but they accept it is workable, unlike Supercars’ previous aim for the start of 2022.

Given the events of the past year, that

was never going to be advisable, much less viable.

Holding off until ’23 would have been the best course, but hidden agendas dictated a public position of August next year.

Heaven only knows how such a major inseason switch will affect the competition.

It could completely up-end the championship, which, while unfair, may not be a bad thing for the TV spectacle.

It’s far from a done deal that the newlook (that is, proportionate) Mustang and long-awaited Camaro will bow next year.

More delays would be neither surprising nor a disaster.

There is a school of thought Supercars needs the Camaro at some stage next year.

As in, the Commodore is no longer relevant. Well, nor is the Camaro. Neither is on sale anymore.

The Camaro will add interest, sure, but I’m not convinced the fans are bothered about the cars as long as the racing remains close and fierce.

Cheaper, simpler, racier and better looking, Gen3 is the way forward, especially with its provision for hybrid electric assistance.

Both the AGP and Gen3 face big challenges. Better that they face them realistically and flexibly.

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SUPERNOVA SIXTIES STAR SOARED SO BRIEFLY PART ONE

In the latest of our series recalling racing greats, MARK FOGARTY talks to forgotten legend Spencer Martin, who had a short but spectacularly successful career at the top IMAGES: Autopics.com.au/Dave Williamson/John Ellacott/AA Archives IM

O OCCASIONALLY, A name screams ra racing driver. None more so than Stirling Moss, whose moniker S sounded like a speed ace. s Australia’s version would be A Spencer S Martin, our best driver in the mid-1960s.

His name sounded fast – and he was. But only for a very few years. Martin only raced properly from 1960-67, but in those eight seasons he achieved so much.

In his final two years, he won back-to-back Australian

Drivers’ Championships – and then quit at his peak.

Desultory touring car comebacks notwithstanding, Martin was an allaround ace who lives on in legend as one of our best and brightest ever.

Could have gone on to Formula 1 if he wanted.

But he retired prematurely because the risk – which was real in open-wheelers in the ’60s – wasn’t matched by reward. He got out alive to make money elsewhere.

From a home-built special to pinnacle singe-seaters, Martin starred.

Famously, he regularly upstaged early Holden star Norm Beechey to earn a (barely) paid drive with David McKay’s Scuderia Veloce, which had access to ex-works F1 cars and Ferrari sports racers.

Martin, now 82, established some of his forgotten fame in a Ferrari LM250.

Enzo’s first mid-engined sports car was a sonorous V12 delight with aesthetics to match. In 1965, he won endurance races in SV’s LM250 – the same year of the model’s unlikely triumph at Le Mans.

Apart from his infamous exit from the

Martin was a dashing young star in a dangerous ous era (far left, brooding for the camera at Lakeside in late ’66). His entrée to openwheelers was as visiting F1 star Graham Hill’ss mechanic in the ’64 Tasman Cup series (right,, with Hill and his Brabham BT4 in the Warwickk Farm pit lane).

1969 Sandown Three Hour, when his HDT Monaro GTS350 ran out of brakes at the end d of the main straight and erupted into flames, Martin’s history has been largely lost.

He emerged from obscurity earlier this yearr with the publication of his autobiography, a lavish tome that recounts his short professional career, affinity with Ferraris and later days of historic racing around the world. d.

Martin raced even before my time, but his short reign at the top always fascinated me.

I finally met him through mutual friends in the latish 2000s and was captivated by his nonchalant regard for his twin ‘Gold Star’ titles in 1966/67, followed by his abrupt retirement from professional racing.

Widowed in 1990, Martin returned to racing to fill the void in his life, competing competitively in historic racing around the world until his final retirement in 2006.

As outlined in his book – with the assistance ce of veteran motoring journalist Peter Robinsonn and production advisor Dave Williamson – Martin excelled in a classic, if not golden, era. a.

He recalls his haphazard career with acuity,,

A highlight of Martin’s brief professional career was piloting the exotic il ti th ti FFerrarii 250LM in 1965 (left, at Warwick Farm). The scarlet screamer thrilled crowds with its V12 wail from Lakeside to of contemporary racing mags (right, showing appearance at Mount Panorama). humour and sardonic recollections. He is under no illusions as to where he fits into the big scheme of Australian racing, although he appreciates the ‘supernova’ description.

Which it was. Never has a driver achieved so much in so few years. In fact, he was a full-time driver for just his two Gold Star-winning years and only a semi-professional steerer the two previous seasons, when he also had to prepare his and others’ racers.

Born and bred in inner suburban Sydney, where he still lives, Martin rose to ’60s motor racing star from very humble beginnings. He had no money, just contacts he made from his early years as a mechanic.

His interest in racing was inspired as an apprentice in the mid-1950s, with his boss racing an MG TC at the longdefunct Mt Druitt ex-airfield circuit in far western Sydney.

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HERALD SPECIAL Martin used to go along as a ‘gopher’ – go for this, go for that – and “I got the bug,” he recalled. “I saw guys going around and I thought I could drive as fast as them, so that’s where the initial interest started.”

A few years later, he took over construction of a home-built sports car powered by a Triumph Herald engine, making his racing debut at the inaugural ATCC meeting at the Gnoo Blas street circuit in Orange, western NSW. Uncreatively, the car was known as the Herald Special.

“I bought a half-completed project that was offered to me at a very reasonable price,” Martin said. “It was 1958 when I got that. It took me a couple of years to put it together because I was on apprentice wages and there wasn’t a lot of money around.

“Eventually, I got it all together and had my first race at Gnoo Blas in 1960.”

Notably, that first ATCC was won by David McKay, who would soon figure prominently in Martin’s advancement.

Martin specialised in panel beating and moved on to work with noted repairer/racer Clive Adams, who combined with partner Jack Prior to build another front-running small sports car – the Prad (PRior and ADams).

It was clothed in sleek aluminium bodywork fashioned by ex-Rolls Royce and Lotus fabricator Stan Brown, regarded as one of the best alloy panel craftsman at the time.

As an incentive to keep Martin, Adams let him race the Prad.

“That was enormous, really,” he said. “It was a very special car. It was a handshake deal.”

A couple of years of stand-out performances

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in the Prad led to an offer to drive a Holden 48/215 for friend Joel Wakeley, owner of the famous BP Boomerang service station under whose banner Martin had been racing.

In ’62/63, Martin dominated ‘humpy’ racing in NSW and Queensland, scoring 17 wins from 20 starts.

Among his scalps was southern star Norm Beechey, gaining the attention of McKay, the pre-eminent racer/motoring journalist/ Ferrari dealer whose Scuderia Veloce team ran Beechey in early ’60s ATCCs. His first encounter with ‘Stormin’ Norman’ was at Catalina Park, Katoomba, where Martin held the touring car lap record.

“I could hardly sleep for a week knowing that Beechey was coming up because Beechey was the No.1 Holden man,” Spencer remembers. “Anyway, we had a tremendous race – changed places three or four times – and I ended up in front.

“The next race was at Warwick Farm and I was leading Norm when his car broke down.

Then at Sandown I had him well covered when he went out with over-heating.

“McKay took an interest in me, but he’d also taken notice of me in the Prad because I had it looking like a new pin and he liked good preparation. Then he asked me to drive with Brian Muir in the S4 Holden at Bathurst in 1963.”

They finished well back in their S4 EH – Holden’s first homologation special – in the Armstrong 500, but Martin did enough to impress McKay to get some tests in Scuderia Veloce’s Brabham BT4 during ’64.

He also contested that year’s Bathurst 500 in a Vauxhall Viva with Bill Brown, winning their class.

Spencer was the local hero at Catalina, where he famously beat ‘humpy hero’ Norm Beechey, attracting the attention of Scuderia Veloce boss David McKay. He was groomed for single-seater stardom, but the relationship was fractious and Martin defected to Bob Jane Racing in ’66.

Martin made his name in a friend Joel Wakley’s Holden 48/215 in ‘62/63 (above left), winning 17 of 20 starts. He was a star at Catalina Park (above), dominating touring car races at the tunnel-like track, which was lined by towering earth banks, high wooden fences and low steel barriers.

GROOMED FOR STARDOM Martin had joined SV as a mechanic at the team’s famous workshop underneath the Shell station on the Pacific Highway in Wahroonga, on Sydney’s upper North Shore.

“David was starting to groom me – he thought I had the potential to maybe win the Gold Star,” he said. “I had a few practice runs in the Brabham.”

McKay was incredibly well connected, attracting 1962 F1 world champion Graham Hill down under for the annual Tasman Cup summer series in Australia and New Zealand. Among Martin’s duties was as Hill’s mechanic during his visits.

At the end of ’64, McKay imported a Brabham BT11 and, most famously, a Ferrari 250LM GT endurance racer.

Martin was promoted to drive both.

McKay – who had a slight stutter – had a big in with Enzo Ferrari and secured the second last 250LM made at Maranello.

Martin debuted the exotic machine at Sandown in February ’65 in a sports car support race at the Tasman meeting, having fettled the Brabham for Hill in his limited appearances, which included winning the NZ GP at Pukekohe.

Martin’s highlight in ’65 was winning the Caversham Le Mans Six Hours in WA with McKay. “Very poor opposition, so we won comfortably,” he remarked dryly.

He was also competitive in his

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debut Gold Star season, winning the Lakeside round and finishing third in the championship, won by Bib Stillwell, who claimed his fourth title.

Others like Bill Brown and F1 star Jackie Stewart went on to score other endurance race successes in the SV 250LM, but Martin remains synonymous with the glorious-sounding V12 racer – Ferrari’s first mid-engined closed cockpit car.

Jochen Rindt and Masten Gregory won the ’65 Le Mans 24 Hours in a privately run 250LM, despite caning it in the hope of early retirement.

The sensuously styled GT racer – examples of which are now worth many millions of dollars – remains embedded in Martin’s memory.

“I couldn’t go down to the wharf to pick up the car with David and the boys because I was putting Graham Hill’s car together,” he recounted. “When they came back with it, I thought ‘Holy hell, what a car!’ Amazing.

“I was just blown away. To have the magic of a Ferrari in the workshop was something special.

“The LM was pretty crude, pretty rough in the build, but it had that magic 3.3-litre V12, which you could rev out to 8000 rpm. The noise inside and outside was just unbelievable.

“People used to come down from the hills to listen to it. They’d travel from Tasmania to Bathurst or Queensland to

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Warwick Farm just to listen to it.”

Spencer remembers the 250LM fondly as a sonourous delight that was made for long distance races.

“It was between a touring car and an open-wheeler to drive,” he said. “It wasn’t as precise as a single-seater – it was more touring car-like. It was a heavier car and, in those days, didn’t have a lot of rubber under it, but we didn’t know any different back then.

“We thought it was just the bee’s knees.

“But it was well-beaten by the time it got here by the Can-Am-style (open cockpit American V8-powered) sports cars. The LM only had 320 horsepower compared with 500-550 for the likes of Frank Matich’s Elfin Traco-Oldsmobile. But in long distance races, it was unbeatable.

“Run all day and all night. That’s what it was designed to do and that’s what it did so well.”

TOUGH LOVE Martin remains passionate about Ferraris to this today, especially after having recently sampled the 800 horsepower 812 Superfast on the road.

He fell out with McKay after the ’66 Tasman Series, fed up with working all hours as a mechanic and race driver, for peanuts.

“He was a difficult man, but very passionate,” Martin said of D-d-d-david.

“He gave me a tremendous opportunity

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to step from a Holden into a grand prix car or a Ferrari GT car. A huge step up for me.

“But I really paid for it. I had to work in the workshop and prepare the cars after work. It didn’t take long for the edge to wear off all of that.

“It all came to a head after the Tasman Series in ’66. The last race was at Lakeside and I’d put up a pretty good run in the Brabham (third).

“The Ferrari started smoking in the sports car support race and David ordered me to take motor out to be repaired when I got back to Sydney. I baulked at that because I’d been flat-out for two months.

“He said nn-nn-no, son, go straight to Sydney. So that was it. I’d had enough.”

With the backing of Shell’s legendary racing manager Archie White, Martin switched to Bob Jane Racing, moving to Melbourne.

Jane bought the BT11A from McKay, who promptly installed mercurial Canberran Greg Cusack in Jack Brabham’s Tasman BT23A-Repco.

Martin raced full-time for Jane, winning the ’66 and ’67 Gold Star crowns, scoring a further five race wins.

It may not have been the greatest era of the Gold Star, but he had at least two stern opponents in later Australian driving champions Kevin Bartlett and Leo Geoghegan, plus Cusack.

“KB was my main opposition,” he said.

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Martin in full flight in the Jane-run ex-SV Brabham BT11A, leading Leo Geoghegan’s Lotus 39 at The Farm in February ’66 (above). He rated Geoghegan highly, but not in the wet.

“We both came up from the ground up and we were driving the same sort of car – both in BT11s. Kevin and I went head-to-head.

“Wet or dry, we’d both have a go. It depended on who hit the sweep spot with the car at the time or whose engine was fresher. There wasn’t much in it at all.

“If Leo got in front, nobody was going to catch him on a good day. But if it rained, you could count Leo out. He didn’t like the wet.

“On his day, Greg was electrifying. But his day didn’t come up very often.”

Martin had only limited runs in the Tasman Cup to measure himself against F1’s best. He finished the Antipodean summer series seventh in ’66 and contested only the Australian rounds in ’67, retiring from each.

He has no regrets about not really getting the chance to be considered for F1, but maintains the locals acquitted themselves well in inferior hand-medown cars.

“We were definitely second-fiddle to those blokes, both in experience and equipment,” he shrugged. “The international blokes were racing two or three times a month, whereas we were lucky to get a race every second month.

“So they were red-hot when they arrived here with the latest equipment, the latest tyres. They also had professional race mechanics with them.

“I think the locals did a pretty good job to be anywhere near them. We’d buzz around the back and annoy them occasionally.”

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In a perilous era, Martin emerged as the country’s open-wheel ace just six years after his racing debut.

Then he quit cold.

After winning the ’67 title, he walked away from a meteoric career at his peak.

WHY HE RETIRED SO SOON “Bob was good,” he said of his time

with notorious hard-nut Jane. “He was a bit of a rough diamond, but he treated me well. Not a lot of money, though.

There was no money in it.

“They (McKay and Jane) both knew I’d do it for nothing. I didn’t have a lot of bargaining power. I was barely earning a basic wage.”

To this day, Martin’s fleeting career at the top fascinates me. When I describe

him as a supernova – a bright ball of fire that streaks across the firmament in a flash before disappearing – he laughs.

“I love that,” he chuckled.

But, seriously, why retire after so few years at your peak?

“I think I’ve mentioned money a few times in this conversation,” he responds.

“There was no money in it – zilch. I wasn’t even being paid the basic wage –

Spencer during his first drive of the SV Brabham BT4 Climax 2.5 at Mount Panorama, Easter 1964. Driving under a strict rev-limit, Martin did the quickest Conrod speed, 165.14mph to finish second in the over 1.5-litre race, but winner, Frank Matich’ Brabham was nine seconds a lap better. Image: John Ellacott

SM FACT FILE SPENCER S PENCER MARTIN MARTIN FACT FACT ffile ile Age: 82 Lives: Sydney Status: Retired Racing career: 1960-2006 Titles: 1966/67 Australian Drivers’ Championship ‘Gold Star’ Major race wins: 1965 Caversham Le Mans Six Hours, six Gold Star rounds ’65-67 Spencer flourished with hard man Jane (standing beside the car, at left and Bob Jane Racing’s John Sawyer at right rear), winning back-to-back Gold Stars before retiring after his ’67 triumph. He also excelled in Jane’s Jaguar E-Type Lightweight (below left).

and working seven days a week a lot of occasions.

“It was only a 40-hour week with Jane, which was a little more civilised, but the wage wasn’t enough to sustain a family properly.

“Late in ’67, I knew I had to get out. No money, living away from home. I missed the family and friends back home in Sydney.”

He was close to his family and was engaged to be married in ’68.

To survive, he shared a flat with fast rising youngster Bevan Gibson, who was being groomed by Jane.

Gibson was killed in a crash at Mount

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Panorama in ’69 in Jane’s Elfin 400, tragically reinforcing Martin’s decision to retire.

Thoughts of his mortality had plagued him before then and were instrumental in his decision to quit racing, having survived a desperately dangerous period in lethal singe-seaters.

“I’d seen a fair bit of disaster – three or four fatalities – and I think they shook me more than they should have,” Martin admitted.

“I took fatalities very hard.”

He was particularly shaken by the deaths of promising American Tim Mayer at Longford in ’64 and Rocky Tresise a year

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later – just a week after Tresise’s mentor Lex Davison’s was killed at Sandown.

“I was standing right beside Mayer’s wife when that happened,” he rues. “That was traumatic.

And then to see Rocky Tresise cartwheeling past the pits the following year was also terrible.

“It made you realise this caper was pretty dangerous.”

The danger and lack of remuneration was the perfect storm that triggered his walkaway.

“I don’t think you make major decisions on one particular incident,” he said.

“There has to be a combination of

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reasons that build up in you that eventually say ‘It’s time’.”

In hindsight, I wondered if he agreed that he stepped away when he still had many more years at the top, had he so chosen.

“I think that’s for people like you to judge,” Spencer demurred. “I thought I was on the game still.

“I had a short but very successful career.”

He continued: “I came from a very humble family beginning, building my own car, stepping out of a Holden into a grand prix car and winning a couple of championships, so I suppose if you look at the bones of it, yes, it was unusual.

“But my family upbringing made me fairly grounded and I realised I had to get out when I did. Besides being dangerous, there was no money and I had to get a real job to support a family.”

Martin retired at 28, barely having scratched the surface of his potential.

He went into the trucking business, making his fortune, while making more comebacks than Dame Nellie Melba.

The first was in a factory backed XT Ford Falcon GT auto in the ’68 Bathurst 500 with Jim McKeown, finishing 42nd.

But it was enough to convince Harry Firth – dumped by Ford and grabbed by Holden – that Spencer Martin was the ace he wanted to lead his new HDT. Martin’s return to the big time ended in disaster – and his subsequent cameos were unworthy, until he found a new niche in international historic racing in the 1990s.

Next issue: Martin recounts his disastrous comebacks with HDT and a sluggish Volvo, before re-emerging as an historics racing star.

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INTERNATIONA Bayley Hall has taken a unique route to Porsche racing and now has his sights set on a career in international GT competition, as he told DAN McCARTHY QUEENSLANDER BAYLEY Hall may only be 17 years old, but he has already been around national car racing scene for several seasons.

Taking an alternate path to a carer in the sport by cutting his karting career short, Hall has already dabbled in Hyundai Excels, GT racing, SuperUtes, state level Touring Cars and Sports Sedans.

In 2021 Hall is competing in his first full-time national series, emerging as a front-runner in Porsche Sprint Challenge.

The category is the second-tier one make Porsche series feeding into Carrera Cup Australia, and is the first step on the pathway to international GT racing.

But he admitted it was a tough decision to move his focus away from his childhood dream of becoming a Supercars driver.

“When I was asked at school what do you want to do when you’re older, all I said was a Supercars driver,” Hall told Auto Action.

“We’d had a lot a lot of people telling us, the two pathways these days, it’s (either) Supercars or Porsche.

“We’d been in (between a) rock and a hard place with the decision to either go Supercars or GT racing.

“I’m loving the GT style of racing, it’s the style of racing I want to do for the rest of my life, so it (Sprint Challenge) really appealed to us.

“Sprint Challenge is where it all starts,

it’s the first big step in my professional career.”

At the age of five Hall started riding a Yamaha PeeWee 50, before moving to karting a year later.

Hall karted at a national level but over a six-year period found himself racing against some of Australia’s next international and national stars in Queensland.

“I was always on a podium,” he recalled. “I never got to the top step.

We raced against some pretty highlevel names, Jack Doohan, Broc Feeney, Zane Goddard and Nathan Herne, we definitely didn’t have it easy.

“I look back now, and I wish I had’ve (competed at national level). But we made a pretty quick step, I finished kkarting at about 12.”

From there Hall began to steer cars, H Hall’s first step into car racing came in Hyundai H d i Excels E l (left) (l ft) when h he h was 12, 12 too t young at the time to hold a road car license. Five years later he is contesting the Porsche Sprint a C Challenge for McElrea Racing (below).

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AL AIMS first a Hyundai Excel where he had to learn how to drive a car, as he was not yet of age to drive on the road.

“Well, the first place you have to start is the clutch,” he laughed.

“Body roll is another thing to worry about, how you use the brake, the throttle and the limit of tyre.”

From Excels, Hall moved into more powerful machines, racing a Holden VE Commodore in the Queensland Touring Car Championship, contesting a round of the SuperUte Series, and driving MARC cars on a regular basis.

Hall explained this was all about gaining experience, and believes each vehicle was extremely beneficial for him as a driver.

“In racing you’re not going to be in the one car for the rest of your life,” he said.

“You’ve got to be able to adapt quickly and adapt properly, getting into a car and being able to handle it properly, within a few laps almost.

“I’ve taken a very different journey to most other people, and it’s just given me a heap of adaptability.”

Over the years Hall has consistently jumped into MARC machines and this is where his love for GT racing began.

“I was in my Commodore testing at

Hall has become a regular in the MARC cars, contesting the 2020 Bathurst 12 Hour in the Mustang-based machine alongside the highly-experienced Warren Luff, MARC Cars boss Geoff Taunton and Brad Schumacher.

Queensland Raceway. Dad introduced me to Geoff Taunton who owns MARC, he said ‘look we’ve actually been watching you a bit and if you ever want the chance, come and have a drive’.

“Within 15 laps I was half a second quicker than Geoff had ever done, he was stoked with that and straightaway said you’ve got to get into a full spec race car; the budget at the time was perfect.

“We couldn’t have gone Super3 or Super2 because the money for them is just nuts. The MARC car was a perfect way to start and it’s really spring boarded me to where I am today.”

Competing in a MARC car has seen Hall race around the nation in selected rounds of the Australian GT Championship, GT-1 Australia Series and even the Bathurst 12 Hour.

Alongside multiple-time Bathurst 1000 podium finisher Warren Luff, Taunton and GT driver Brad Schumacher, the quartet

contested the Bathurst 12 Hour.

Unfortunately, engine issues meant that the MARC II Mustang was not classified at the end of the day.

“I had no expectations,” he explained. “I just wanted to go there, get the car to the end and learn as much as I could.

“Racing with ‘Luffy’ who has been a family friend for a long time, I couldn’t wait for it.

“I was getting a lot of support from everyone in the team and a bit of coaching along the way, I was just taking in everything, I turned into a sponge for the weekend, just taking in all information I could.

“Obviously, the result wasn’t what we wanted, but I just took the positives out of it, one of the coolest weekends I’ve had in my career.”

During the COVID-19 interrupted season that was 2020, being based in Queensland Hall was able to keep himself sharp contesting the Tin Tops series in a MARC

Hall started karting at just six years old, racing there for six seasons against some local and international stars.

car.

Before starting on his Porsche exploits, Hall ,took part in the Bathurst 6 Hour where in a Mustang alongside Steve Hay and Cameron McLean, the trio finishing sixth in the A2 class.

Hall signed up with front running Porsche outfit McElrea Racing for his inaugural Sprint Challenge campaign.

“We made contact with Andy McElrea and he had been watching me for a little while,” Hall said.

“When I first got the chance with McElrea to test the Porsche, I hopped in and I took to it like a duck to water, it just clicked for me, thanks to me driving (all the) different beasts.”

When the first round came at Phillip Island, Hall surprised himself, qualifying on the front row for his maiden race.

“I was pretty stoked, that was only the fifth or sixth time I had ever driven the car, competing against people that have been in them for two or three years,” the year 12 student said.

In the race itself, Hall converted his front row start into second position and since then has scored a further three fourth place finishes in the series.

AA asked if Hall had reset his targets after the strong start to the season, but he explained this was not the case.

“I wouldn’t say reset, I’ve probably just been more confident in myself, I’ve just got to use the tools right,” Hall said.

“I’ve just got to do the job that I know I can do, and prove to some people that I’ve got what it takes.”

Hall believes Sprint Challenge is the perfect platform to his intended destination, Europe GT competition.

“Sprint Challenge is an awesome step for me to learn how a Porsche works and to get me prepared for Carrera Cup,” he said.

“My goal is European Le Mans and GT World Challenge in Europe, they’re the pinnacle for me of that style of racing.

“The Porsche ladder has been proven in Australia, through McElrea Racing two times now (with Matt Campbell and Jaxon Evans).

“It’s got potential in it, and I can see myself doing that one day which I’m really excited about.”

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Ja n o ’ s B i g Bob Jane’s McLaren M6B Repco V8 is one of Australia’s most iconic sports-racers. MARK BISSET tells the story a racer built specifically

by Bruce McLaren & still retained by the Jane family estate today

JOHN HARVEY contested 10 Australian Sportscar Championship (ASCC) rounds in 1971/72, winning eight of them.

Then the glorious M6B was put to one side of the pint-sized-entrepreneurialpowerhouse’s Brunswick race shop. Later it became a poorly maintained mobile Bob Jane T-Mart exhibit – moved from store to store, deteriorating in the process.

Frank Matich pulverised the Australian sports car opposition with the even-more-dominant Matich SR4 Repco V8 in 1969.

Oh to have seen that dominant SR4 and the new, about to be even more dominant M6B on the same grids throughout 1970-1972 and beyond.

In both cases business decisions influenced the winning runs of the SR4 and M6B, which could have gone on for years.

Repco wanted Matich to concentrate exclusively on its nascent Repco-Holden V8 F5000 program, so they bought the SR4 from Frank and put it in a museum.

In terms of the M6B, it’s the orthodoxy that Jane’s primary sponsor, Castrol, wanted

more exposure from his touring cars, so the McLaren and Bowin P8 Repco-Holden F5000 were benched.

Bob Jane’s mechanic/engineer/team manager John Sheppard – Australian legend – thinks “that may be an urban myth, I can’t imagine Bob being told what to do by anyone!”

The fortunes of Bob Jane Racing improved a tad on Sheppo’s watch.

Bowin enthusiasts may recall that John Leffler grabbed Jane’s P8 tub after he boofed his own, beyond immediate repair, at Amaroo Park in mid-1974. Meanwhile, its RepcoHolden V8 went into Ron Harrop’s EH Holden circa 1975.

Jane never let things go to waste, albeit the McLaren was dear to his heart, so he hung onto it, restoring it in the mid-’80s.

It is a special car. Chassis 50-01 was built

by McLaren Cars rather than Trojan Cars Ltd, constructors of McLaren’s customer machines in period.

Jane’s M6B was powered by a light, potent, Repco-Brabham 5-litre, SOHC, fuel injected In CanAm the only race that the Bruce and Denny show didn’t win in 1967 was the Stardust GP in Las Vegas.

The relationship between this car and Bob Jane’s machine are clear. Image: Motorsport Images

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M ac John Harvey nails the Bob Jane-owned McLaren M6B Repco 740 5-litre V8 through the Warwick Farm Esses in 1971. John Sheppard’s meticulous preparation combined with Harvey’s skill made this car a dominant winner during the early-1970s. Image: Oldracephotos - Dick Simpson 740 Series V8 which made it unique – most of the Can-Am grid were powered by heavy, cast iron Chev and Ford lumps.

Built in late 1968, Jane’s car was in essence an M12 with M6 (’67 works Can-Am car) bodywork.

The Bruce and Denny (Hulme) Show was the name given to the papaya-coloured McLaren domination of the American CanAm series from 1967 to 1971.

The 1967 M6 (or M6A) cars, designed by Robin Herd and McLaren, were the first of these 6-litre (and later 7-litre) fuel-injected Chev V8 engined, aluminium monocoque racers.

In ’67 McLaren won five of the six Can-Am rounds – Denny three and Bruce two, the McLaren founder bagged the driver’s title as well – only John Surtees’ Lola T70 Mk2 rained on the McLaren’s parade, at Stardust Raceway.

McLaren built new works Can-Am cars for each season, with Trojan constructing a run of the just superseded model for customers.

For example, the 1968 works cars were M8As, the customer cars were M12s – the ’67 M6 rebadged – goddit?

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“McLaren delivered Jane’s 50-01 to the Tilbury Docks in London, on a trailer behind the whale (McLaren’s US Ford Station Wagon) driven by Kiwis Chris Charles and Clive Bush,” wrote Duncan Fox, an English McLaren historian.

“They managed to damage an old-gents Rolls Royce with the trailer en-route!”

Thankfully the precious cargo was undamaged.

50-01 arrived in Australia aboard the freighter SS Port St Lawrence in early April 1969, in completely-knocked-down form – sans engine and gearbox – at a cost then of U.S. $6000.

Bob Jane Racing were existing Repco Brabham Engines customers. Their floatila of V8-exotica already included 4.4-litre type 620s and 2.5-litre 830 V8s, fitted to their Elfin 400 sportscar and Brabham BT23E Tasman single-seater.

The M6 engine, E26, was big-bertha in this company. This 5-litre 740-Series with 1967 F1 style exhaust within the Vee cylinder heads was an aluminium alloy, SOHC, twovalve, Lucas fuel-injected engine producing 452bhp at 6500rpm (337kW) and 405ft/lbs

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(549Nm) of torque at 5000rpm.

The top-gun of all Repco V8s was the 5-litre 760-Series DOHC, four-valve, Lucas-injected engine. John Mepstead built it for Matich’s SR4 for use in several races in early 1970 – this beastie gave 558bhp (416kW) at 7500 rpm.

1969 was a busy time at Bob Jane Racing.

Jane and Harvey contested the Australian Touring Car Championship (ATCC) in Mustangs. Harvey raced the Brabham in the Australian Tasman Cup and Gold Star rounds.

Youngster Bevan Gibson raced the Elfin 400 Repco sportscar, though this ended in tragedy during the Bathurst Easter meeting.

Gibson got a sniff of beating Matich’ SR4 – slowed by fuel feed problems – but the Elfin took off on the Conrod Straight’s notorious second-hump, and he was killed instantly.

In addition to the routine, and dramas, Bob Britton’s Rennmax Engineering were building a new Tasman 2.5 car, the Jane V8, for Harvey to race in 1970.

The McLaren didn’t get the attention needed to be race ready. Its championship debut was finally made in the final ASCC round at Sandown in November 1969. He ran second

to the Matich SR4 steamroller.

Harvey sat so low in the car he struggled to place it on the track, so the front-guards were modified, flattened a bit, creating one of the prettiest – in a brutal kind of way – sportsracing cars ever built!

The sight of the magnificent orange-red machine barking its way around Warwick Farm with constant changes of direction and throttle openings in the hands of masterdriver Harvey, was something special to behold and hear.

Jane got his hands on it too, he wasn’t going to let Harves have all of the fun.

He raced it in non-championship events including meetings at Calder and Hume Weir.

Jane raced and owned the most mouthwatering racing cars of anyone in Australia.

That he kept the McLaren but sold his Jaguar D-Type, Lightweight E and Maserati 300S says everything about how much he valued it.

The McLaren didn’t get much of a gallop in 1970 either. Jane focused on the ATCC. His Shelby built Mustang was third behind Norm Beechey’s Holden Monaro GTS350 and Jim McKeown’s Porsche 911S.

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Harvey’s campaigns included the Australian Tasman rounds, and the Gold Star where he too, finished third. He won two rounds, one apiece in the old BT23E and new Jane P8. Leo Geoghegan and Max Stewart were first and second in Lotus 59B Waggott and Mildren Waggott respectively.

“They had the McLaren when I arrived at Jane’s later in 1970”, recalled John Sheppard.

“I had a good look at it and took 150 pounds of weight out of it. It had a heavy header tank. The bag-tanks were connected by a pipe with one-way valves which forced them to run it with full-tanks. We sorted that out, lots of little things, re-engineering brackets which added up. The nose of the car was heavy too, because it had so many hits and wasn’t repaired well.”

“The Repco engine was really good. That didn’t surprise me, I had plenty of experience installing and maintaining the 2.5-litre V8s used in Leo’s Lotus 39 when I was at Geoghegans.”

A major disappointment about late-’60s, early-’70s Australian sportscar racing was that there were some great cars and drivers, but they never seemed to be on the grid in the same year!

Matich raced the SR4 – built for the ’68 Can-Am Cup – in 1969 and early 1970.

Niel Allen’s monocoque, short-wheelbase, twitchy 5-litre Bartz Chev V8 engined Elfin ME5 looked the goods. He knocked Matich off once, but he, like Matich, focused on his McLaren M10 F5000 and sold the ME5.

Other big-bangers included Elfin 400s (Fred Gibson, Stan Keen, Ken Hastings depending on the year), the Matich SR3 Repco (Don O’Sullivan, Howie Sangster, Stuart Kostera) and Lionel Ayers’ Rennmax built MRC Mk2 Repco.

Alan Hamilton’s Porsche 906 Spyder led

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Bob Jane here driving his McLaren M6B Repco at Hume Weir in 1969 (above). Bob loved the track and raced a lot at the Weir during summer, especially as it was not too far from his boat at Lake Eildon! At Symmons Plains in 1972, Sheppard fine tunes before Harvey took the race and ASCC title (below). Images: Dick Simpson & Rob Burnett

the lower capacity charge, skilfully punching above his 2-litre, twin-cam, flat-six weight.

The Phil Moore and Henry Michell Elfin 360 Repco 2.5 V8’s time would come after Harvey exited stage-left.

And so it was that the professionally prepared and driven, state of the art, light, Repco powered McLaren M6B cut a swathe through the opposition in 1971 and 1972.

In ‘71 Harvey won three of the four rounds.

Ayers was victorious at Phillip Island, and finished second in the championship, while Sangster was third. He raced the O’Sullivan

owned Matich SR3 Repco, and McLaren LT170 Chev.

In 1972 the championship grew from four to six rounds, but the McLaren/Harvey rout was familiar. Sangster won at home at Wanneroo Park, otherwise it was all-Harvey. He ran away, 20 points clear of Hamilton’s Porsche 906, with Moore’s Elfin 360 third.

“They were both memorable seasons. In reality the opposition to the McLaren was light compared to our ATCC programs with the Camaro and Monaro, and the Torana-Repco sports-sedan.

“From a team point perspective, we were really busy running those cars. It was just Pat Purcell and I, with some help from Allan Stanfield when we needed it. Bob won the ATCC in the Camaro ZL1 in 1971 and 1972, plus we ran the McLaren, and Bowin P8 and Brabham BT36 Waggott single-seaters.

“Harves drove the McLaren really well, it didn’t give us any major grief. My fundamental approach is to build a car thoroughly at the start. Do the work well to fine tolerances, then race it to service intervals of about 1000 miles.

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“Tom Geoghehan used to say to me, ‘Bud, it’s not a trotter, you don’t have to train it!’ The perfect weekend for us was not constantly fiddling with the car at meetings. Build it right. Prepare it well, make the set-up changes the drivers want, but otherwise don’t play with it.”

In the mid-’80s, M6 50-01 was dusted off, tidied up and made running again. Some may remember

Denny Hulme doing demonstration laps in it during an early Adelaide AGP weekend.

Jane wasn’t one to look back, the next project or win was always more important to him than the last.

It’s a pipedream to think he may have historic raced the McLaren. As time marched on, Jane’s health and family problems mitigated against that.

“The M6B was one of those cars I loved to work on. We will never know how Harves would have gone against Matich’s SR4, once we got the McLaren sorted. Sure, the SR4 had more power but power sells engines, torque wins races!”

Bob Jane and his team blessed our grids with so many great cars over a half-century or so, it’s impossible to count them all.

For many of us, the McLaren M6B Repco is the sweetest of all.

Bob Jane Racing’s two Repco V8s pictured here at Phillip Island in 1972 (top right), the Sheppard-built Torana 4.4-litre Sports Sedan alongside the M6B 5-litre. Note aluminium monocoque chassis, with Pat Purcell in attendance. A key moment came in the Sandown Trans Australia Trophy in November 1969 when Frank Matich’s Matich SR4 Repco 760 4.8-litre met Harvey’s M6B Repco 740 for the first and only time (above). Matich won in his well sorted SR4, while Harvey was second in his first serious run in the McLaren. Owner Jane, at Hume Weir in 1969. The McLaren must have been a real handful on that notoriously tight circuit (below). Images: Autopics/AA Archive

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50

years of publishing 1971- 2021

The 1980s were a period of great change in motor sport. Auto Action was there to record it all, and here HEALTH McALPINE looks back.

COVER STO Issue 402 – July 25, 1986 Surfers in peril?

IT APPEARED Surfers Paradise International Raceway may have averted a crisis, after major changes to the Bundabah Ltd board, the company which owned the facility. Following the changes, there was still unease surrounding the circuit’s future, though, as it was located on prime Surfers Paradise real estate and housing re-development continued to be mooted.

Issue 394 – April 4, 1986 Aussies in Europe

MECHANICAL PROBLEMS hampered both Peter Brock and Allan Grice’s first European event, although both gave their continental rivals something to think about. Brock was out after seven laps after a rare axle breakage, while Grice took the lead at one stage by passing his Tom Walkinshaw Racing rivals, before succumbing

Issue 395 – April 18, 1986 World series tourers

WHILE AUSTRALIA’S best drivers were contesting the European Touring Car Championship, a group of Kiwis were devising a World title for Group A. FISA gave the go-ahead for a 12-round calendar consisting of eight European events, plus one each in Australia, New Zealand, Japan and Brazil. It was said interest in the WTCC was high.

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Issue 397 – May 16, 1986 Tragedy leads to change

THE GOLDEN era of Group B rallying was expected to end after a tragic crash, which took the lives of Lancia driver Henri Toivonen and co-driver Sergio Cresto in Corsica. FISA announced there was to be no further development of the Group B models, that Group S regulations were to be scrapped and that Group A would take over as the world title rules for 1987.

Issue 406 – September 19, 1986 Sacked!

CURRENT AUSTRALIAN Touring Car champion Robbie Francevic was sacked from the Volvo Dealer Team during the Sandown 500 weekend. The Kiwi failed to start the race and was left without a seat just two weeks before the Bathurst 1000. A personality clash between Francevic and team manager John Sheppard was the cause of the furore, a dispute which had been building for some time.

OORIES OF THE ‘80 Issue 410 – November 14, 1986 The Brit connection

Issue 427 – July 17, 1987 Run to paradise

FOLLOWING ON from losing his Rover deal, British team owner Tom Walkinshaw announced he would race Holdens in next year’s World Touring Car Championship.

This was to be an entirely different campaign to Peter Brock’s Holden Dealer Team, due to the Brit being supported by GM Europe.

Issue 413 – January 2, 1987 Bathurst upgrades

WITH BATHURST in line to host a round of the proposed World Touring Car Championship in 1987, James Hardie Industries committed to the classic event for another six years at $6 million. The new deal provided the budget to improve the circuit’s facilities including a new pit lane, the addition of The Chase, and additional barriers.

S

DOUBT SURROUNDED the future of Surfers Paradise International Raceway again, after its sale to what was believed to be a Japanese developer. It was thought the circuit would remain open for a couple of years, but beyond that the future appeared grim as real estate in the area became increasingly valuable.

Issue 435 – November 6, 1987 BMW and Brock

LONG-TIME BMW team leader Frank Gardner has decided to shut down the championship winning JPS BMW team, with former Holden hero Peter Brock taking over the program.

Mobil was also confirmed to have followed as Jim Richards transferred across. Gardner’s disenchantment with the future of the sport was his primary reason for disbanding the team.

Issue 419 – March 27, 1987 A surprise

ALLAN MOFFAT and John Harvey may have left HDT, but a Holden Commodore still delivered the pair victory at Monza in the opening round of the World Touring Car Championship. It didn’t happen without controversy, as the Eggenberger Sierras went home before the event started with elegibility issues and the top six BMWs were disqualified for running lightweight panels.

Issue 423 – May 22, 1987 Radical tourers considered Issue 417 – February 27, 27 1987 The unlikely split

THE UNIMAGINABLE happened, Peter Brock and General Motors split! Doubts about the future of the Mobil-backed race team where further enhanced when John Harvey and Allan Moffat also quit the team. The release of Brock’s unauthorised Director road car was the last straw for General Motors, announcing its split with its prodigal son soon after.

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INTERNATIONAL GOVERNING body FISA was planning to scrap the Group A touring car class and replace it with a hybrid ‘silhouette’ formula, spearheaded by Bernie Ecclestone. The Formula 1 supremo declared the change was envisioned due to the Group A regulations being too hard to control. A 1.5-litre powerplant was mooted to be used, conveniently the same as was soon to be dropped in Formula 1. Peter Brock unveiled hs brand new VL Group A car which was debut at the Surfers Paradise ATCC round.

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Issue 433 – October 9, 1987 And the winner is…. is

ALTHOUGH THE Eggenberger Ford Sierra RS500 Cosworth driven by Steve Soper and Pierre Dieudonne crossed the line in front to win the 1987 Bathurst 1000, there were question marks surrounding the legality of both this and the sister entry, which finished second. Many pre and post-race protests had been lodged, leaving the result in doubt.

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Issue ssue 437 – December 4, 4 1987.

1987 AGM to mend ARDC split

RESULTING FROM the sacking of general manager Ivan Stibbard by the board of directors after the Bathurst 1000, there was a split between the ARDC and Australian Motorsport Promotions. Payment between the two entities left auditors unhappy. Meanwhile, the Australian Rally Championship was won by Greg Carr, navigator Fred Gocentas and their Alfa Romeo GTV6.

Issue 443 – March 4, 1988 The new trend

THE THUNDERDOME was alive and what a way to debut. American pair Neil Bonnett and Bobby Allison raced closely throughout the first 500km NASCAR race as local fans were treated to the best of the American category, debuting in Australia. A big incident resulted in Allan Grice cracking his collarbone, while Dick Johnson was also involved, leaving the Aussie contingent depleted at the end.

Issue 447 – April 29, 1988 Perkins to Le Mans

Issue 442 – February 19, 1988. Holden’s back

HOLDEN ANNOUNCED its return to motor racing through a new alliance with both Tom Walkinshaw and Larry Perkins. Major sponsorship came from Castrol to back a full Australian Touring Car Championship campaign for Perkins, while Walkinshaw was expected to enter some European Touring Car Championship events.

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THE RECENT link up with Tom Walkinshaw proved beneficial for Larry Perkins as he was invited to join the Brit’s Jaguar attack on the Le Mans 24 Hour. The touring car star and former Formula 1 driver completed a two-day test at Silverstone in the XJS9, saying afterwards, “At the end of it I was starting to feel at ease in the car and beginning to remember what driving a real car is all about …”

Issue 448 – May 13, 1988 Bathurst court battles

A COURT injunction was imposed on both Bathurst 1000 organisers, the Australian Racing Drivers Club, and the Strathmore Group.

This delayed everything from sponsorship negotiations to television contracts with Channel Seven and rights for food and drink vendors on site. It followed a sequence of events which included sponsor James Hardie’s withdrawal.

Issue 454 – August 5, 1988 Sponsor for 1000

IN A dramatic turnaround, the ARDC and Channel 7 bought back the marketing rights to the Bathurst 1000 from Promo International.

The buyout, estimated to cost $640,000, was completed amid discussions started some months previous. It was expected one of Bond Brewing’s Tooheys or Swan were to take over naming rights from James Hardie.

Issue 461 – November 11, 1988 THE FUTURE of Australian openwheel racing, Formula Holden

MULTIPLE AUSTRALIAN champion Peter Glover tested the new Brian Shead designed Cheetah, featuring a Holden V6 engine, at the Lang Lang Proving Ground. The Cheetah was one of three Formula Holdens set to complete a demonstration run at the Adelaide Grand Prix.

Issue 465 – January 13, 1989 BMW out!

BMW WAS not to feature on the grid in an official sense for the 1989 Australian Touring Car Championship, after it announced its withdrawal from the Peter Brock led Mobil 1 Racing Team. This freed Brock to complete his move to a Ford Sierra RS500 Cosworth. The decision to amicably split with Brock was due to the M3’s lack of competitiveness compared to the turbocharged Ford.

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Issue 467 – February 10, 1989 Perkins gone

TOM WALKINSHAW was expected to take full control of the Holden Racing Team, leaving Larry Perkins out in the cold.

Walkinshaw’s plans included taking the team m in-house at Holden Special Vehicles and dealing with privateers, for which the Scot was not renowned. Perkins was not entered for the opening Australian Touring Car Championship round at Amaroo Park.

Issue 470 – March 24, 1989 IndyCars on the Gold Coast

PLANS WERE underway to bring the CARTT Indy World Series to the streets of the Gold Coast in March 1990. The 3.7km street circuit was to include The Esplanade, Trickett Street and a section of the Gold Coast Highway, the race boosting the tourist trade during the quiet season. Objections were expected to come from CAMS and FISA.

Issue 472 – April 21, 1989 Is this the end for Mad Andy?

ANDREW MIEDECKE was counting the cost of a weekend of demolition at Lakeside Raceway.

Miedecke’s Sierra RS500 was reduced to ashes after a fiery crash involving the similar Fords of Glenn Seton and Murray Carter and the Lusty brothers Commodore, in the Touring Car Championship round. The Port Macquarie native was lucky to escape the inferno and dodging race cars as he crossed the track.

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Issue 477 – June 30, 1989 Gold Coast Indy a goer

AN INDYCAR race on the streets of the Gold Coast was virtually certain to go ahead after agreement between Championship Auto Racing Teams, the Queensland State Government and the Gold Coast City Council was reached. A late February, early-March date was proposed for the event, with the likes of Emerson Fittipaldi, Rick Mears and Michael Andretti set to compete.

Issue 482 – S September t b 88, 1989 Sandown fag ban

AS GOVERNMENTS began to clamp down on cigarette advertising, a battle was won by CAMS after its case was taken to the Supreme Court around the Victorian Health Promotion Foundation’s sponsorship of the Sandown 500.

Meantime, HQ racing took a major step forward when the originally Tasmanian-only category became national and officially appeared for the first time on the Australian mainland at Winton.

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Issue 483 – September 22, 1989 Sir Jack backs track

SIR JACK Brabham threw his support behind a new circuit located on the outskirts of Sydney, backed by the NSW government. It came as doubts surrounded the futures of Oran Park and Amaroo Park. The new circuit was to be located at Eastern Creek, and built to an international standard.

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‘SUPERCARS: THE HOLDEN VS FORD ERA 1993-2020’

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Formula 1 Round 5 Azerbaijan Grand Prix

THE ‘MAGIC’ BUTTON A cockpit error cost Lewis Hamilton a certain victory in Azerbaijan as Sergio Pérez wins Report: Dan Knutson Images: Motorsport Images BEFORE THE ‘magic button’ incident came the tyre blowout that cost Red Bull’s Max Verstappen the win in those same streets of Baku.

And before that came a massive amount of work by Lewis Hamilton and Mercedes to get his car dialed in, so that he could be a contender.

And after it was all over, Verstappen’s teammate Sergio “Checo” Pérez had topped a two lap sprint race to win the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.

Two weeks earlier, in the streets of Monaco, Hamilton had been off the pace and finished seventh. After dissecting all the information, Mercedes thought it had found a cure for Baku, but Hamilton was still slow in Friday’s practice. More hard work overnight – plus a tow from sacrificial teammate Valtteri Bottas down the 2.2km straight – resulted in Hamilton qualifying second ahead of Verstappen and Perez.

On the pole, just as in Monaco, was Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc.

Unlike Monaco, Leclerc didn’t have car damage from an accident in qualifying that prevented him from starting the race. But he was only a contender for a few minutes as Hamilton passed him to take the lead on the start of lap three of 51. Leclerc faded back to finish an eventual fourth.

Early pit stops to switch from the soft to the hard compound Pirelli slicks resulted in Verstappen, Perez and the Verstappen again leading. Then things settled down with Verstappen out front ahead of Perez who was under pressure from Hamilton.

Things became unsettled when Lance Stroll’s Aston Martin had a left-rear tyre blowout at the end of lap 30. He was unhurt but his car was wrecked.

“I am not sure what happened to cause me to spin on the straight because there was no sign of any issues,” Stroll said.

Then, while leading comfortably, Verstappen took a header into the wall on the pit straight at the start of lap 46.

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Baku’s podium was the season’s most unexpected so far, with Vettel second for Aston Martin (left), winner Perez for Red Bull (centre) and Gasly third for Alpha Tauri (right).

Lewis Hamilton challenges Sergio Perez for second place, but ultimately the Mexican went on to win, his first for Red Bull, after the Mercedes driver went off at the restart.

Another left-rear tyre blowout.

“I didn’t feel anything strange with the car and then suddenly the left rear went and I was in the wall quite hard,” he said. “It’s not a nice place to crash, and we don’t know the exact cause yet. Up until that point the car felt perfect.”

Pirelli’s initial assessment was that both tyre failures were caused by cuts from debris.

After a safety car period, Aussie Michael Masi, the FIA’s race director, ordered the race to be red flagged. Only three laps remained.

The delay lasted 34 minutes and then the safety car led the field around to line up for a

standing restart and a two-lap shootout, with Perez ‘on pole’ and Hamilton alongside.

Hamilton got the jump on Perez and had the inside line for Turn 1, and then it all went wrong.

The Mercedes cars are fitted with what the team calls “brake magic” which transfers 90 per cent of the brake bias to the front, used on the warmup lap prior to the start or on a qualifying lap. That heats up the wheels and that radiates into the front tyres and brings them up to temperature.

“On that restart when Checo moved over towards me I clipped a switch,” Hamilton said.

Hitting that “Magic” button, which is at the back of the steering wheel on the top left corner, meant that Hamilton locked up his front brakes at the first corner and he slid off. He would finish 15th while Perez went on to win.

“It was a crazy rollercoaster of a race,” Perez said.

“We were basically flat out from the very first lap and I had Lewis behind pushing me so I couldn’t breathe. It was very challenging but we kept our focus.”

Perez’s car was losing hydraulic pressure, and it would not have lasted much longer, the team teling him to stop just after he crossed the finish line.

Sebastian Vettel finished second in his Aston Martin.

“The key was being able to start with a free choice of tyres in P11,” he said. “It meant we could use a new set of softs to make up two places at the start and then run longer to overcut Yuki (Tsunoda). It gave us a platform for the second half of the race and put us in a position to take advantage.”

AlphaTauri driver Pierre Gasly placed third.

“After the restart I thought that Charles (Leclerc) would pass me on the straight because we had lost performance,” Gasly said, “but I saw the podium ahead of me and I tried everything; I just wanted it so badly. It was hard but fair racing, just as we like it.”

Daniel Ricciardo qualified 13th and finished ninth, while his McLaren teammate Lando Norris crossed the line in fifth place.

“We survived and not everyone did,” the Aussie said. “There were moments today in the race where I was thinking ‘I hope it becomes a bit more exciting’ and suddenly it did! We had some positive moments, but also a few difficult periods. I flat-spotted the hard tyre a bit, so that became tricky for the last few laps before the red flag, but not too bad beforehand.

“The last start, I felt like I got a good launch, and had a good run on the outside but there wasn’t really much room with a couple of cars on the inside. It just all bottlenecked into Turn 2 and I felt a hit from behind.”

After the walls of Monaco and Baku, the F1 circus now heads to the wide open spaces of the traditional tracks in France and Austria.

Max Verstappen vents his frustration on the left rear tyre that failed late in the race (above left), when he was on his way to a seemingly certain victory. The cagey Fernando Alonso, here passing the iconic Baku castle, made a great restart (above right), jumping several spots to sixth. Sebastian Vettel (below) was an unexpected star at Baku, overcoming a poor qualifying to race to second. Pierre Gasly starred again, taking another podium for Alpha Tauri (below right).

2021 AZERBAIJAN GRAND PRIX 51 LAPS

Charles Leclerc claimed pole position for the second race in a row (above) and was able to take the start this time, though the Ferrari lacked the race pace to threaten for a win. The McLarens ran together early (below) before Lando Norris again out paced his Australian teammate.

Pos 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 DNF DNF DNF

Driver Team Laps Margin Sergio Perez Red Bull 51 Sebastian Vettel Aston Martin 51 1.385s Pierre Gasly AlphaTauri 51 2.762s Charles Leclerc Ferrari 51 3.828s Lando Norris McLaren 51 4.754s Fernando Alonso Alpine 51 6.382s Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri 51 6.624s Carlos Sainz Ferrari 51 7.709s Daniel Ricciardo McLaren 51 8.874s Kimi Raikkonen Alfa Romeo 51 9.576s Antonio Giovinazzi Alfa Romeo 51 10.254s Valtteri Bottas Mercedes 51 11.264s Mick Schumacher Haas 51 14.241s Nikita Mazepin Haas 51 14.315s Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 51 17.668s Nicholas Latifi Williams 51 42.379s George Russell Williams 48 2 laps Max Verstappen Red Bull 45 Incident Lance Stroll Aston Martin 29 Incident Esteban Ocon Alpine 3 Power loss Points: Verstappen 105, Hamilton 101, Perez 69, Norris 66, Leclerc 52, Bottas47, Sainz 42, Gasly 31, Vettel 28, Ricciardo 26, Alonso 13, Ocon 12, Stroll 9, Tsunoda 8, Raikkonen 1, Giovinazzi 1.

Constructors’: Red Bull-Honda 174, Mercedes 148, Ferrari 94, McLarenMercedes 92, AlphaTauri-Honda 39, Aston Martin-Mercedes 37, AlpineRenault 25, Alfa Romeo-Ferrari 2.

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MOTOGP

MAGICAL MIGUEL Report: DAN MCCARTHY Images: MOTORSPORT IMAGES AT THE Circuit de Barcelona Catalunya, Miguel Oliveira took an unlikely win after pre-race favourite and championship leader Fabio Quartararo had to overcome several hurdles.

The 2021 edition of the Catalan Grand Prix was won by Portuguese rising star Oliveira, his third career victory, and his first for the factory KTM team.

Oliveira held off a hard changing Johann Zarco late in the race, while Aussie Jack Miller recorded yet another podium.

Pole sitter and factory Yamaha rider Fabio Quartararo did not have things go his way in the race, and was lucky not to be disqualified.

Drama began before the weekend even started, when factory Suzuki rider Alex Rins suffered a cycling accident at the circuit, fracturing his radius bone and was subsequently ruled out of the weekend.

At the end of practice 3 Miller, Marc Marquez, Pol Espargaro and Takaaki Nakagami were all outside of the top 10, and were forced to navigate their way through Q1.

It was an incredibly tight session, Miller progressed, while Marquez who even using the tow of the Aussie, didn’t, and was demoted by his factory Honda teammate Pol Espargaro by 0.011s.

In Q2, despite several challenges, nobody could coould stop Quartararo from taking his fifth consecutive pole position.

Miller qualified second, just

Miguel Olivera took an unlikely victory for KTM (above) after pole man Fabio Quartararo (leading Jack Miller, left) had a difficult race.

Olivera celebrates (bottom left).

0.037s down of Quartararo. On his final attempt Miller was up in the first sector, however, he suffered a monster high side around Turn 3 and was lucky to escape uninjured.

Zarco was fastest to the third sector, however he lost a chunk of time in the sector final sect c or and qualified third.

Morbidelli Oliveira, Franco Morbid de and Maverick Vinales M Ma verick Vina le made up the second row, roow ahead of Aprilia rider Aleix A Espargaro, Brad Binderr and a Francesco Bagnaia. and Reigning champion cch sole Suzuki rider rrid Joan Mir ninth, qualified in ni nt ahead of Valentinoo Rossi and Pol Valentin Espargaro.

Espa ar In the race itself Oliveira made a Ol O great start from ggr

fourth position on the grid and exiting Turn 2 he sat in second, behind only Miller.

A slight mistake from the factory Ducati man at Turn 4 on lap 2 then allowed Oliveira into the lead.

Oliveira led for much of the remainder of the race, only losing the lead to Quartararo for two laps at the mid-race stage.

From there the Portuguese youngster rode a faultless race and saw off the late race charge from Zarco to take the win by just 0.175s.

Zarco fell back to as far as seventh on lap 5, but the Frenchman slowly and methodically made his way through the pack.

With three laps remaining Zarco took second position from Quartararo and quickly caught up to Oliveira, however the Pramac Ducati rider ran out of laps.

Miller did not have the speed of his satellite Ducati brand mate and crossed the line in fourth, however the Queenslander inherited third after Quartararo was handed a penalty.

Quartararo ran through the Turn 1 and 2 chicane on lap 22 and stewards deemed that he did not slow sufficiently after doing so and thus gave the championship leader a three second penalty.

Several hours later Quartararo was dealt a further three second penalty after he was seen racing with his leathers unzipped during which his chest protector flew out.

This is against the rules and he was handed the second penalty, demoting him to sixth position behind Mir and Vinales, who were unable to challenge late in the race, caught up in their own battle.

Several seconds further back, championship front runner Bagnaia finished the race in seventh, pipping

TWO AUSSIES FOR MOTOGP FOR 2022 NEXT YEAR two Australians will be on the MotoGP grid, with the news that KTM has confirmed its Moto2 championship leader Remy Gardner is set to make the step up to the premier class.

Gardner will race for the Austrian brand’s satellite team Tech3 in 2022, replacing either Danilo Petrucci or Iker Lecuona, who are both only contracted until the end of the current season.

The Sydneysider will be joining fellow Aussie, factory Ducati rider Jack Miller on the grid next year.

It will be the first time that two Aussies have raced full-time in the premier class since 2009, when Casey Stoner and Chris Vermeulen competed.

The deal was signed just days after Gardner took his first victory with the KTM Ajo squad.

“I’m extremely happy that KTM has given me this opportunity,” Gardner said. “It’s a dream come true for me and what we have worked for up until this point.

“It’s an incredible chance for me and I cannot wait to ride the bike. I just want to thank KTM for believing in me.

“Right now, we need to focus on finishing 2021 in a strong way. I want to thank everyone who has supported me to reach MotoGP. We’re just getting started.”

44 AutoAction

The 23-year-old is the son of 1987 500cc Motorcycle World Champion Wayne Gardner and will be joining the championship 29 years after his father retired from motorcycle racing.

For the 2021 season Gardner moved to the Red Bull KTM Ajo squad in Moto2, and has finished on the podium in six of the first seven races, which included two victories.

Gardner joins the likes of Brad Binder and Miguel Oliveira who both came through the KTM ranks in Moto2, before progressing to the premier class.

KTM motorsport director Pit Beirer feels that it would have been silly not to promote Gardner.

“It’s a real pleasure for us to bring Remy to MotoGP next season because we knew about his speed and ability for Moto2 and he has confirmed that potential,” Beirer said.

“We believe there is much more to come from him and it’s important he has this opportunity to keep growing.

“Remy is a typical racer. He’s super-determined and never gives up. He’s exciting to watch and we’re looking forward to working with him in this next step.

“Again, we’re also showing that the KTM GP Academy can give the right opportunity for riders that want to go all the way.”

Tech3 KTM Factory Racing team principal Herve Poncharal

factory KTM man Binder to the line by 0.2s.

Morbidelli came home in a lonely ninth from Enea Bastianini, Alex Marquez, Luca Marini and Nakagami.

Returning from injury, Pramac Ducati rider Jorge Martin finished 14th ahead of Lorenzo Savadori, who rounded out the finishers.

Marc Marquez was fighting in the top six when he crashed at Turn 10.

This latest DNF marks the first time that the six-time champion has not greeted the chequered flag in three successive races.

Likewise, Rossi’s wretched season continued, crashing out of the race on lap 16.

Standings: Quartararo 115, Zarco 101, Miller 90, Bagnaia 88, Mir 78, Vinales 75, Oliveira 54, Aleix Espargaro 44, Binder 43, Morbidelli 40

Image: Motorsport Images

believes that making the announcement now will help Gardner to focus on the job in Moto2.

“We are very proud, happy and confident to welcome Remy,” he said.

“We believe he will be a strong asset to the KTM MotoGP line up and I think having taken this decision is now going to help Remy to focus 100 per cent on his Moto2 World Championship and will also help us, the Tech3 KTM Factory Racing Team, to focus on our 2021 season.”. DM

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GARDNER DOES IT AGAIN

AUSSIE MOTO2 rider Remy Gardner has continued his rich vein of form by winning his second consecutive Moto2 race, to extend his title lead over KTM Ajo teammate Raul Fernandez in Spain.

Gardner’s back-to-back successes are the first for an Australian in MotoGP’s intermediate class since Casey Stoner completed the feat in 2005.

The victory is his second of the season and third of his career to date and comes just

days after being announced as a Tech 3 MotoGP rider for 2022.

Starting from pole, victory didn’t come easy for Gardner as he was challenged by Fernandez for much of the 22lap encounter.

A strong start allowed Gardner to lead early, but Fernandez remained in touching distance, pouncing on lap 11.

Fernandez got in the tow of his teammate and made a fair and well executed move,

sliding up the inside at Turn 1 to take the lead.

However, the result-deciding pass came with three laps remaining when Gardner returned the favour, pulling off a successful late lunge Turn 1 to retake the lead.

In clear air, Gardner gapped Fernandez by 0.6s on lap 20, before further extending the margin to 1.1s on the penultimate tour, breaking his teammate’s sprit.

Gardner crossed the line with a margin of 1.872s to

Image: Motorsport Images

Fernandez, the duo securing the team’s third 1-2 finish in a row.

“Today was tough for us, but I knew we could fight,” Gardner said post-race.

“With yesterday’s pole we started well and, on the opening laps, I was able to conserve my tyres – which helped me at the end of the race.

“Raul [Fernandez] passed me and I thought we could up the pace, but it didn’t work out like that. I decided that on the last two laps I would try to overcome him and establish a gap.

“The contest went very well for me, we achieved 25 points and it is the second victory in a row for us.”

In taking victory Gardner extended his championship lead over Fernandez to 11 points.

Xavi Vierge came home third to score his first podium since Phillip Island in 2018, and secured Petronas Sprinta Racing’s maiden Moto2 rostrum.

VR46 rider Marco Bezzecchi came home in fourth ahead of Augusto Fernandez. DM

IN THE third round of the FIM World Superbike Championship at Misano, Michael Ruben Rinaldi and Toprak Razgatlioglu were a step above the rest in all three encounters.

Heading into the Italian round, only six-time reigning champion Jonathan Rea and former MotoGP rider Scott Redding had taken race wins, however at Misano neither would do so.

Rinaldi had moved up to the factory Ducati team alongside Redding for the 2021 season, however in the first two rounds the Italian failed to score a podium.

In front of his home crowd, Rinaldi finally delivered, taking two out of three race wins.

In Race 1 Rinaldi made a blinding start from fourth on the grid, immediately passing factory Yamaha rider Razgatlioglu and Redding, and even tried sweeping around the outside of Rea at Turn 1.

Rea put up a fight at Turn 2 and this saw them both briefly fall back behind Turk Razgatlioglu.

Soon Rea and Rinaldi got back through on the Yamaha rider, before Rinaldi dispensed of Rea.

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In the first half of the race Rinaldi was unable to gap the WSBK legend, with the margin not opening to more than 0.5s.

Eventually a mistake was made, however it was from Rea, the Kawasaki rider nearly losing the front at Turn 1. A stunning save kept the Northern Irishman upright, however he fell back behind Razgatlioglu.

That was the way it remained with Rinaldi taking an emotional win by 4s, just the second victory of his career, and first in front of his home crowd.

Razgatlioglu finished second ahead of Rea, Redding and Alex Lowes.

In the shorter Superpole Race, Rinaldi again took victory but in this one he had to fight his way to the front.

Razgatlioglu got the jump on Rea at the start and was followed a lap later

by Rinaldi, who had his eyes firmly focussed on a second consecutive win.

The two fought hard for several laps, the Turk able to hold the Race 1 winner at bay for the first half of the 10 lap affair.

Into Turn 11 on lap 6, Rinaldi pulled off a surprising move to take the lead, and despite Razgatlioglu’s best

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SOUTH AFRICAN Brad Binder has signed a long-term contract to remain with the factory KTM MotoGP team until the end of the 2024 season.

After finishing as runner-up in the 2019 Moto2 championship with the KTM Ajo squad, Binder was promoted to the factory MotoGP team last year.

Binder took victory in the Czech Grand Prix, just his third race in the premier class. At the end of 2024 Binder will have spent 10 years as a KTM rider. DM

Standings: Gardner 139, Fernandez 128, Bezzecchi 101, Lowes 75, Di Giannantonio 60 MAVERICK VINALES topped the times in the post Catalan Grand Prix MotoGP test, while factory Honda rider Marc Marquez completed the most laps. Vinales led a factory Yamaha 1-2 with the Spaniard 0.137s faster than Fabio Quartararo.

Impressively, as well as being the fastest, he also completed 85 laps, the second most of anyone and just two shy of Marquez. Takaaki Nakagami was third, while Aussie Jack Miller ended up 14th. DM

YOUNGSTERS SHINE IN MISANO Report: DAN MCCARTHY Images: MOTORSPORT IMAGES

SATILITE DUCATI outfit Pramac Racing has announced the re-signing of riders Johann Zarco and Jorge Martin for the 2022 MotoGP season.

As both are directly under contract with Ducati Corse, Zarco and Martin will again ride the latest spec Desmosedici GP machines to come out of the Bologna-based factory. The news of the riders’ re-signing came one week after Pramac renewed its contract to be a satellite Ducati team until the end of 2024. DM

efforts trying to repass the home hero, he was unable to do so.

Rinaldi took the victory by 0.485s from Razgatlioglu, Rea was a further second back, with Redding and Lowes again rounding out the top five.

In the final race of the weekend, Razgatlioglu dethroned Rinaldi to take his and Yamaha’s first win of the season.

On the opening lap Razgatlioglu showed his intentions, making an aggressive move on the Italian rider.

However, the move pushed both wide and Rea took the lead.

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Rinaldi quickly recovered taking the Turk and the Northern Irishman in quick succession to find himself back at the head of the field.

A lap later Razgatlioglu was able to pass Rea, closed down the small leading margin and began to hound Rinaldi.

Lap 8, Turn 14, Razgatlioglu made his move and made it stick, quickly pulling out a 0.5s margin.

From that moment on Razgatlioglu controlled the gap and took the win to continue chipping into Rea’s championship lead.

Rinaldi finished the race in second from Rea, Redding, Garrett Gerloff and Lowes.

Standings: Rea 149, Razgatlioglu 129, Redding 104, Lowes 88, Rinaldi 82, Gerloff 59, van der Mark 52, Sykes 51, Davies 48, Locatelli 45

MOTOGP CHAMPIONSHIP leader Fabio Quartararo admitted he was lucky not to be disqualified from the Catalan Grand Prix. With five laps remaining the factory Yamaha rider’s leathers became fully unzipped before his chest protector flew onto the circuit. Although not intentional, both are breaches of the rules on safety grounds. The Frenchman was dealt a three second penalty for the incident demoting him to sixth. On reflection Quartararo thought he might have been disqualified. DM

IN THE lead up to the Catalan Grand Prix, factory Yamaha rider Maverick Vinales’ crew chief Esteban Garcia left the team. The Monster Energy Yamaha team and Garcia had mutually agreed to end their working relationship, with immediate effect.

Well-known MotoGP crew chief Silvano Galbusera, Valentino Rossi’s former crew chief, will take over the vacant role for the remainder of the season. DM

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DETROIT CRASH CITY Images: Motorsport Images

FORMER FORMULA 1 driver Marcus Ericsson took his maiden IndyCar win in the first leg of the Detroit doubleheader, while Arrow McLaren SP rising star Pato O’Ward took the second race.

It was a chaotic weekend of action marred by a stuck open throttle for O’Ward’s teammate Felix Rosenqvist, which resulted in heavy contact with the Turn 6 wall on lap 24 of the opening race.

IndyCar rookie Scott McLaughlin was not averse to contact either, crashing during practice and also during the first race, where he finished 19th. A cut tyre due to contact with Rinus VeeKay late in the second race compounded his tough weekend in the Motor City, leaving him 20th.

Will Power was another to experience drama after his Team Penske Chevrolet failed to restart after a late-race red flag during the opening leg.

He recovered to finish sixth in second leg of the doubleheader.

Running on the red soft tyre compound at the start of race one, O’Ward led from pole ahead of Alexander Rossi and Grosjean, but it was a short stint as he pitted on lap 3.

Herta and Newgarden tangled after stopping a lap later at Turn 3, with the latter losing his left rear wheel as he returned the Team Penske Chevrolet to the pits.

Unlike the frontrunners, Power elected to run longer on his reds and ran second to five-time champion Scott Dixon, who ran an alternate strategy on hard tyres.

Power pitted on lap 20 right before a red flag was needed to recover Rosenqvist’s stricken Arrow McLaren SP Chevrolet from the Turn 6 wall, which took an hour to clear as the Swede went to hospital for checks.

The race was restarted under safety car with

Marcus Erricsson (top) took his maiden Indycar victory in the first leg of the Dual in Detroit and celebrated with one of the street circuit’s renowned Lion statues (above left). Pato O’Ward (above right) won the second race to take a one point lead in the series.

Dixon leading a host of drivers to stop, allowing Power to take the lead from Ericsson.

Dixon’s stint on the reds failed to impress as he pitted on lap 43, five laps before Power, as McLaughlin’s chance of a strong result ended when he hit the wall, damaging the left-rear toe link.

Power returned to the lead on lap 53 of 70, followed closely by Ericsson and VeeKay, but the race was neutralised when Grosjean crashed in the fountain section, causing a yellow, then a red flag with five-laps remaining.

When racing resumed, it was without Power as he failed to restart, leading to Ericsson taking the lead and holding it to the end from VeeKay. O’Ward finished third, Dixon eighth and Power 20th, three laps down.

Although polesitter, Josef Newgarden dominated the second leg of the Dual in Detroit, but failed to

capitalise as O’Ward took victory.

The two-time IndyCar champion led 67 of 70 laps, but was unable to hold O’Ward out during the closing stages, after sliding wide at Turn 6.

At the start, Dixon, Grosjean and Rossi all tangled sending the Kiwi into a spin, but the 2016 Indy 500 winner tapped him back into line. Sebastien Bourdais was another to have dramas on the opening lap, bouncing off the kerb at Turn 3, which resulted in James Hinchcliffe and Max Chilton colliding.

This resulted in a yellow flag and the majority of the field pitted except for Newgarden.

At the restart, Newgarden held a 2.3s margin from Colton Herta, but this extended to 10s by the first sequence of pit stops for the leaders. However, the margin was back to 4s by the time Herta pitted and was further reduced by 3s once Newgarden completed his service.

A late-race safety car caused by a spinning Jimmie Johnson closed the field and suited Power, after he had pitted late to fit reds placed in seventh.

Another to watch was O’Ward as he charged to fifth, before Grosjean spun and another caution was required. Once the race restarted, O’Ward passed Graham Rahal, then Alex Palou and Herta, before he started to pressure Newgarden.

Turn 7 on lap 67 was where O’Ward made his move successfully to take the win ahead of Pagenaud and Palou.

By winning the race, O’Ward assumed a onepoint series lead from Palou, while Dixon remains in third 36-points in arrears heading to Road America this weekend. Heath McAlpine Points: O’Ward 299, Palou 298, Dixon 263, Newgarden 248, VeeKay 243, Pagenaud 243, Ericsson 211, Rahal 209, Herta 202, Sato 181

CADILLAC 1-2 IN IMSA DETROIT IN A thrilling finish, the Chip Ganassi Racing DPi-V.R shared by Renger van der Zande and Kevin Magnussen won the Chevrolet Sports Car Classic at Detroit’s Belle Isle street circuit, in the fourth round of the IMSA Weathertech SportsCar Championship.

Van der Zande held off a charging Felipe Nasr to take the win by 0.573s, as he survived a late-race restart with three-minutes remaining.

Magnussen and van der Renger led throughout the 1h 40m race for DPi, GTLM and GTD entries, as the event became a fuel mileage race until the untimely safety car at the end.

Nasr, teamed in the Action Express Racing Cadillac with Pipo Derani, was easily able to finish ahead of the championship leading pair of Filipe Albuquerque and Ricky Taylor as their Images: Motorsport Images Wayne Taylor Racing Acura ARX-05 battled handling problems.

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A depleted field of two contested the GTLM class, both being the factory Chevrolet Corvette C8.Rs, with Tommy Milner and Nick Tandy pipping teammates Jordan Taylor and Antonio Garcia.

Peregrine Racing’s Jeff Westpahl and Richard Heistand took victory in their Audi R8 GT3 LMS contesting GTD, defeating The Heart of Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT3 of Ross Gunn and Romain De Angelis.

The Grasser Lamborghini Huracan GT3 made it three marques on the podium through Marco Mapelli and Misha Goikhberg.

The next round of the IMSA Weathertech SportsCar Championship is the Six Hours of The Glen at Watkins Glen on July 2. HM

Points: Albuquerque/Taylor 1398, Jarvis/Tincknell 1327, Derani/Nasr 1270, Magnussen/van der Zande 1219, Duval/ Vautier 1211.

Images: Motorsport Images

LARSON WINS AGAIN KYLE LARSON continues his incredible run of NASCAR results, not only winning Round 16 at Sonoma Raceway but also by taking victory in the non-championship All-Star race at the Texas Motor Speedway.

By taking the All-Star win, Larson scored himself a cool USD $1 million (AUD $1,298,350), his second victory in the legendary race in the last three years.

Larson becomes one of only eight drivers in NASCAR history to win multiple All-Star events.

The race provided a thrilling finish thanks to a brand new six-segment, 100-lap format.

The fight for the win went down to the final laps as Larson was part of a three-way fight for the lead with eight laps remaining.

Larson, Team Penske driver Brad Keselowski and reigning champion Chase Elliott went three wide, with Larson able to snatch the lead.

Keselowski pulled into second and remained on his tail for the remainder of the race, however the former champion was unable to make his way by and Larson took his third win in a row, while it was Hendrick Motorsport’s fifth consecutive victory.

“It was wild,” Larson after taking victory.

“This format set up for an exciting finish and there was a lot of grip on this race track for us to be passing. It was a helluva race from my seat.

“That last restart worked out exactly how I needed it to.

“It was a little slick up there, but I was able to get it (the lead) and then hold him off from there,” the 28-year-old Californian continued with a smile. “I can’t believe it.”

Larson held Keselowski at bay, taking the win by just 0.206s with Elliott coming home third.

Elliott’s crew won the pit-stop contest

and thus the crew were rewarded with USD $100,000 USD (AUD $129,800).

All three team Penske drivers ended the race in the top five, with Joey Logano in fourth ahead of Ryan Blaney.

Alex Bowman and William Byron put all four Hendrick Motorsport cars in the top seven.

Byron led 30 laps, the most of the evening, however he could finish no higher than seventh.

Aric Almirola was the first of the nonHendrick or Penske machines in eighth,

beating Kyle Busch and his older brother Kurt Busch, who rounded out the top 10 in the 21-car field.

A week prior Larson dominated the 92 lap race on the Sonoma road course.

Larson led home his teammate Elliott in what is quickly becoming a memorable year for the legendary Chevrolet outfit.

Martin Truex Jr, with his Aussie Engineer James Small, rounded out the top three, from Logano and Busch brothers Kyle and Kurt.

Dan McCarthy

FIRST TOYOTA 1-2 OF HYPERCAR ERA THE SECOND round of the FIA World Endurance Championship was held at the Algarve International Circuit in Portugal, with Toyota taking its first 1-2 finish of the season.

The inaugural 8 Hours of Portimao was decided by pit stop strategies, with the #8 Toyota trio of Sebastien Buemi, Kazuki Nakajima and Brendon Hartley taking the win after pitting seven times.

The second #7 factory Toyota driven by Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi and Jose Maria Lopez completed eight stops, though it finished just 1.8s behind.

The win was a historic one for Toyota, the Japanese manufacturer recording its 100th toptier world sportscar championship result.

A safety car in the last quarter of the race enabled the pole sitting Alpine A480 to keep the Toyotas honest.

But a need to refuel more regularly meant it had to complete an extra stop before the end of the race and thus finished 1m 08.597s off the Toyotas.

The debut for the Glickenhaus Racing outfit did not go as planned, as a collision early when Aussie Ryan Briscoe was at the wheel saw them

lose many laps in the pitlane making repairs, the #709 car finishing 30th overall and 54 laps down.

In LMP2 the Jota racing cars scored a 1-2 finish despite the two machines came to blows on the opening lap of the race.

The #28 machine with Tom Blomqvist at the wheel turned across the nose of the #38 machine, which spun as a result.

With just minutes of the race remaining that car had made its way back up to the front of the class.

But they were overhauled by the #38 of Antonio Felix da Costa, Anthony Davidson and Roberto Gonzalez, who went on to take the win.

In GTE Pro the Ferraris got the better of the Porsches, James Calado and Alessandro Pier Guidi leading home a 1-2 finish for the Italian manufacturer.

Our Aussies had a day to forget, that early race incident with Briscoe damaging the hopes of the other Aussie, Matt Campbell.

Briscoe moved over on a GTE Am Aston Martin before completing the pass and sent both spinning into the innocent #77 Porsche. The damaged forced Campbell, Jaxon Evans and Christian Ried to retire. DM

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TOYOTAS TAKE SURPRISE WIN IN SARDEGNA SEBASTIEN OGIER took his third win of the Images: Motorsport Images season as, for the second rally in a row, Hyundai’s pace went unrewarded in Round 5 of the World Rally Championship, the Rally Italia Sardegna.

Despite leading a day and the half, Hyundai’s Ott Tanak retired on the second day after hitting a rock, which broke his rear-left suspension. Following this, teammate and two-time reigning winner Dani Sordo crashed out to hand Ogier victory.

Up to that point, Tanak had dominated after winning five of the eight stages on the opening day to a 19s lead, although his lead was cut after his front-left tyre delaminated during the final test.

Sordo backed up in second, but was not Sebastien Ogier took his third win of the WRC season for Toyota (above), despite the pace of the immune to problems early on as he ended Hyundai squad, though the consistent Thierry Neuville (below) was out-performed by his teammates. the day 16.8s clear of Ogier, who in turn surprised as he played road sweeper as championship leader.

The Frenchman’s Toyota teammate and winner last time out in Portugal Elfyn Evans languished in sixth at stages through the day, but recovered to be fourth 1.5s clear of the third Hyundai driven by Thierry Neuville.

Takamoto Katsuta in the fourth Yaris was sixth, with teammate Kalle Rovanpera the only victim of the day, after damaging his front-right suspension on the final stage of the day.

The next day was a disaster for Hyundai as Tanak retired while holding a 40s lead to Ogier, who had relegated Sordo to third earlier. However, the lead battle was

ONE ALL AT NORDSCHLEIFE HONDA AND Hyundai shared the honours at the opening round of the World Touring Car Cup (WTCR) at the Nordschleife, as a support to the Nurburgring 24 Hour.

Argentinian Nestor Girolami won pole but started the first race from 10th due to an inverted grid, which left a Lynk & Co lock-out at the front in the form of Yvan Muller and Yann Ehrlacher.

A major loser during the opening skirmish was Hyundai’s Norbert Michelisz, who dropped to 10th, while veteran teammate Gabriele Tarquini rose to third.

It was Tarquini making the moves on the second lap but it was detrimental when he ran wide at Tiergarten after passing Ehrlacher, who gained the position back. Turn 1 on the third and final lap provided a shake up with Tiago Monteiro in his Honda rising to second.

A slipstream pass at Dottinger Hohe by Monteiro relegated Muller to second as the former Formula 1 driver took the first win of the weekend.

Muller held off teammate Santiago Urrutia for third, while the debut of Audi’s new RS3 LMS TCR in the hands of Nathanael Berthon resulted in 11th.

The weekend marked the first event for the Hyundai Elantra N TCR in Europe and it didn’t take long to score its first victory, as Jean-Karl Vernay greeted the chequered flag in the second race.

Vernay started alongside Girolami, but the Frenchman made the best start as the pair

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decided during the penultimate stage when the Spaniard hit a bank, which sent the i20 onto its side and ripped the right-rear suspension out.

Ogier was able to win five of the eight stages, the only worry he had being two hard impacts with rocks which had lifted the car off the ground. However, he was still able to maintain a 38.9s margin back to Evans, with Neuville in a comfortable fourth.

With only the final day to negotiate and his teammate behind, Ogier was able to take a 46s victory over Evans, while Neuville completed the podium.

“Coming here first on the road we were thinking it would have been better to stay at home,” he said. “We did a good job in the test; the car was working much better than the previous round in Portugal.

“We had an amazing day on Friday and then yesterday we managed to come back up to the top. At the last moment in the final power stage, I had a misfire for a long time after the watersplash. We survived, but lost a couple of seconds there.”

Ogier extended his championship margin to 11 points back to Evans, as the WRC now makes its return to Kenya for the Safari Rally on June 24-27.

Neuville leads the Hyundai entries, 39 points behind and Tanak a further 18 in arrears. HM Points: Ogier 106, Evans 95, Neuville 77, Tanak 49, Katsuta 48, Rovanpera 44, Sordo 30, Breen 24, Greensmith 22, Fourmaux 20 Image: Motorsport Images

Image: Motorsport Images

headed the chaos behind. It all started when Michelisz and Mikel Azcona in the Zengo Motorsport Cupra Leon Competicion TCR contacted, which then led to the Hungarian hitting Rob Huff after he had been taped by Andreas Backman’s Hyundai. All four retired from the race.

At the end of the opening lap, Vernay led teammate Luca Engstler, as Girolami led the Honda charge behind, joined by teammate Attila Tassi in fourth after he passed Urrutia for the position.

Engstler was forced to obey team orders during the final lap to ensure a Hyundai 1-2 as he followed Vernay home, while Girolami held onto third ahead of Tassi and Urrutia, as Berthon finished sixth in the new Audi.

Vernay holds a six-point lead in the championship heading to the next round of WTCR at Estoril on June 26-27. HM Points: Vernay 39, Monteiro 33, Girolami 33, Muller 29, Urrutia 29

SUTTON HOLDS ONTO SLENDER LEAD LASER TOOLS Racing’s Ash Sutton continues to lead this year’s British Touring Car Championship after Round 2 at Snetterton, but his margin is just two-points to Tom Ingram.

Sutton took Race 2 honours in his Infiniti Q50 and Ingram took his first victory in the Excelr8 Hyundai i30 Fastback N in the third, to cap off a strong weekend.

Perennial frontrunner Colin Turkington, for West Surrey Racing, dominated the opening race and is now third in the points driving a BMW 330i.

A multiple champion, Turkington started from pole after returnee Gordon Shedden, driving a Team Dynamics Honda Civic Type R, was excluded from qualifying due to the angle of his rear being outside the championship parameters.

Turkington won the first race after a torrid battle with Ingram on the option soft tyres, while

the Toyota Corolla of Rory Butcher rounded out the top three, 6s adrift of the lead duo.

Sutton used his softs in the second race and duly charged from 11th on the grid to win ahead of Turkington and MB Motorsport Ford Focus ST driver Ollie Jackson.

Turkington’s teammate Stephen Jelley led the majority of the final race, but Ingram took his opportunity on lap 5 to snatch to pass and build a margin, which proved unassailable for the remainder of the event.

Sutton was also able to pass Jelley to take second, as Shedden took third on his soft tyre set.

The weekend was the first to feature fans this season, with the title now moving to Brands Hatch’s Indy layout on June 26-27. HM Points: Sutton 80, Ingram 78, Turkington 75, Cook 60, Hill 57

INTERNATIONAL

AUSSIES

PIASTRI CLOSES IN IT WAS a mixed bag of results for Australian Oscar Piastri in the third round of the FIA Formula 2 Championship in Azerbaijan.

However, Piastri did close the gap to championship leader Guanyu Zhou.

For the second round in succession, Piastri qualified third for the Feature Race, this time behind the two Hitech Grand Prix teammates and Red Bull academy juniors, Liam Lawson and Juri Vips.

Zhou, meanwhile, could only qualify in eighth.

In Race 1 the inverted top 10 grid race, Piastri was involved in a lap 1, Turn 2 tangle.

As the pack concertinaed up into the tight left hander Piastri was tagged from behind by Felipe Drugovich, the impact lurching him forwards into the side of Vips, damaging the Aussie’s steering.

With the damage Piastri struggled to make the turn and as a result unwillingly escorted Lawson, who was on the outside, into the tyre wall.

While Piastri and Lawson were out, Drugovich and Vips continued on to the finish.

Piastri’s Prema Racing teammate Robert Shwartzman dominated the race out front. From pole, the Russian driver was never headed, taking the win by 5.144s.

Englishman Dan Ticktum charged from sixth on the grid to finish

Images: Motorsport Images

second, while Zhou finished where he started in third position.

For Race 2, the top 10 finishing positions from Race 1 were inverted, and while Vips broke through to take his maiden F2 race win, his Kiwi teammate Lawson and Piastri starred, charging through the field on the streets of Baku.

It was an attritional and chaotic second F2 sprint race that contained multiple safety cars and a virtual safety car.

Vips started third, the Estonian briefly fell to fourth, however once he found his rhythm he scythed through the front runners.

Vips took the lead from David Beckmann on the approach to Turn 1 at the start of lap 11 and never

looked back.

The Hitech driver took the win from Formula 3 graduate David Beckmann, fellow Red Bull junior academy driver Jehan Daruvala, Bent Viscaal and Shwartzman.

Piastri started from 19th, just ahead of Lawson and together the pair marched forward.

Incredibly Lawson came home in seventh to score two points, while Piastri scored a point for finishing in eighth, and was rewarded another two for setting the fastest lap.

In the Feature Race Vips scored his second victory of the weekend, while Piastri finished second despite being handed a 5s penalty.

Vips took the lead from Lawson into Turn 1 and drove a mature and controlled race from that point on.

He survived an early race safety car restart and remained out front to take his second successive victory.

Vips took the win by 6.1s but on the road he was hounded by Piastri all the way to the finish.

Vips knew that Piastri had been handed a five second post-race penalty for an unsafe release into the path of Drugovich during the compulsory pitstop sequence.

This allowed the Hitech Grand Prix driver to bring the car home untroubled and take the victory.

Despite the penalty, Piastri was classified in second as he built up an 11.5s margin over Shwartzman in third, who had charged from 10th on the grid.

Brazilian Drugovich and Ralph Boschung stayed out of trouble and finished the 28-lap affair in fourth and fifth respectively.

Dan McCarthy Standings: Zhou 78, Piastri 73, Shwartzman 66, Vips 63, Ticktum 60

PERONI’S MIXED FORTUNES

IN AMERICA it was a weekend of ups and downs for Tasmanian Alex Peroni.

The Indy Lights competitor finished fourth in race 1 before retiring from the second.

As with all tracks on the 2021 schedule, the Belle Isle Park Street Circuit was a new venue for the FIA Formula 3 Championship graduate.

Nevertheless, for the opening encounter Peroni qualified in fourth position, less than 0.6s behind pole sitter Kyle Kirkwood.

As the green flag waved the leaders remained in formation with Kirkwood leading Linus Lundqvist, Toby Sowery and Peroni.

The leading quartet quickly pulled a margin on the rest of the pack as they each exchanged fastest laps during the first eight laps.

As the laps continued to tick over it was clear that Englishman Sowery was unable to keep in touch with the leading duo, who began to pull away.

While Lundqvist remained on the tail of Kirkwood, Peroni kept Sowery very honest in third position.

The pressure from the Australian was relentless right up until the end of the 25-lap encounter.

Peroni was unable to find a way by and snatch what would have been his second straight podium.

Kirkwood took the victory, holding off Lundqvist by 0.51s, while Sowery held Peroni at bay by 1.2s to take third.

For the second and final race of the weekend, Peroni qualified in eighth position.

The Australian made a reasonable start and held position for the first few laps of the race.

Keen to make progress however, the Carlin driver knew he had to make some bold and forceful moves on the tight streets of Detroit.

On the seventh lap Peroni caused a fullcourse caution when he found the tyre wall at Turn 3 while attempting to pass Andretti Autosport driver Robert Megennis for seventh position.

After the race Peroni was apologetic to his

team on social media for the incident.

“Got excited, tried around the outside and hit the barrier. Sorry Carlin Racing, we’ll bounce back next weekend,” he said on Facebook.

As he did in Race 1 Kirkwood took the win after holding off the Swede Lundqvist. In the second encounter David Malukas rounded out the podium from Sowery.

The championship fight is incredibly tight up front, Peroni sits sixth in the standings, within touching distance of fourth. DM Standings: Lundqvist, 191, Malukas, 190, Kirkwood, 187, Sowery, 146, DeFrancesco, 130, Peroni, 128

IN ROUND 2 of the FIA British Formula 4 Championship at Snetterton Aussie Marcos Flack scored his maiden podium. Flack scored points in all three races by finishing in the top 10 in each. In the opening affair Flack secured his first top five finish of the season and followed it up with a 10th in the reverse grid encounter. In the final race he finished second, 3.771s from winner Matthew Rees.

The podium vaults him to seventh in the standings. DM

THE NURBURGRING 24 Hours turned into the 9.5 hours due to the race being red flagged for 14.5 hours. Two Australians took part in the race, but neither was successful.

Matt Campbell driving alongside Nick Tandy, Earl Bamber and Mathieu Jaminet in the #9 Frikadelli Racing Team Porsche did not make it to the chequered flag. The other Aussie, Josh Burdon in the #18 KCMG Porsche, was classified 63rd, 10 laps down. DM

THE THIRD round of the European Le Mans Series took place at Circuit Paul Ricard in France. The four-hour race featured an Aussie and a Kiwi. New Zealander Jaxon Evans raced in the #93 Proton Competition Porsche.

Evans and his teammtes were up the front until mechanical issues cost them several laps and they came home in eighth in the GTE class. Aussie James Allen finished eighth in the LMP2 class, moving up two places from 10th grid position. DM

AUSTRALIAN SCOTT ANDREWS competed in the second round of the Michelin Le Mans Cup, the undercard to the European Le Mans Series. At Circuit Paul Richard Andrews and his long-time American co-driver Gerald Kraut, racing in the #22 Andrretti Autosport prepared Ligier, did not make it to the chequered flag. Racing in the LMP3 class, Andrews and Kraunt completed just 21 laps in the 2-hour race before their Ligier stopped.

DM AUSSIE CAITLIN Wood has been announced as an official W Series reserve driver. The W Series is the all women junior open-wheel championship which will feature as a support category to Formula 1 at selected rounds this year. In the W series season one Wood was a regular competitor, finishing 13th with a season best result of fifth at Assen. Wood will this year replace any driver if they are injured or contract COVID-19. DM

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FINKE

PRICE COMPLETES

FFlying high (above) ... winner Toby TOBY PRICE along with co-drivers Joseph P Price celebrates with co-driver Joseph Weining and Mark Dutton won the Finke Weining and navigator Mark Dutton W ((left).

Desert Rally, two years after the event finished in heartbreak for the two-time fifive-minutes from his time two-years ago.

Beau Robinson and Shane Hutt finished Dakar winner. the event third, 4m 20.9s in arrears of In 2019, a rear gear failure ended his th Price. campaign while in the lead, but this P The bike section’s return trip was year Price was not only able to gain T cancelled before bikes could make the redemption but achieve a record. ca return to Alice Springs, due to the death By winning the event, Price became the re first competitor to win on both two and of a spectator resulting from a vehicle leaving the road 35km from the end. four wheels. lea Another spectator was injured as was the It wasn’t all plain sailing for Price, get to the finish line. But we’re here.”

An “Credit Eric, navigator in the vehicle.

Reigning though, after his Mitsubishi Triton trophy R i i Australian A t li Off Road R d champion h i “C dit tto my navigator i t E i every callll he made was spot on.

At the time, David Walsh led the field Josh Howells cut the two-minute margin truck developed an overheating problem “We don’t run on GPS, we’re just after recording a 1h 45m 34.9s to Price held after the opening leg to Aputula on the way back to Alice Springs, Aputula, a time which was 10-minutes in half, and caught the six-time King of the running on memory. threatened to derail his campaign.

“We caught Toby and I thought there faster than that he recorded two years Desert winner on the 226km return trip.

“About 100km out, the engine water ago. must have been some kind of issue for us However, Price ended the event 1m (temperature) just started fluctuating and Jack Simpson placed second after to catch him in that section there, but then 19.5s ahead of Howells and his co-driver having heaps of dramas, so we just tried winning the Prologue and starting he put his foot back down and there was Eric Hume, who replicated their runner up to preserve it and look after the truck,” alongside Walsh, but finished 4m 23.7s no catching him.” explained Price. position from two years prior. behind the reigning winner.

“We gave it everything we’ve got … I’m Price won the Prologue by 2.8s and “Then Josh (Howells) got on the back of Third was Beau Ralston, 33.3s behind. stoked to be back on the podium,” said continued that form into the first leg, us, and I thought ‘it’s now or never’ and Howells. recording a 1h 39m 15.6s time, which cut Heath McAlpine we were either going to cook the motor or Beau Robinson/Shane Hutt were spectacular on their way to third (below left) while David Walsh (below right) was on target to go back to back on two wheels when the event was halted by a major accident.

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FINKE DOUBLE

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p ra w S L A N NATIO

AMOS GRABS ANOTHER QLD TITLE

FOR THE third time in four years, NSW’s Dean Amos has won the Queensland Hillclimb Championship at Mt Cotton.

Held on May 29-30, it attracted 66 entries.

Three weeks earlier Amos had wrecked his Nicholson McLaren V8-engined Gould GR55B in the fourth round of the NSW championship at Mt Cooperabung. Together with his father, they burned the midnight oil in the effort to make the Queensland single round title event.

On the second of the six runs available, Amos went through the 946 metre course in 36.16s for FTD and the Perpetual Trophy that went with it.

Archrival and 2020 Queensland champion Dean Tighe and his supercharged Hayabusa-powered Empire Wraith was closest to Amos with a 37.09s stab on his third run.

He would have to settle for second – his fifth runner-up place in six years and again take the John English Trophy for the fastest Queenslander.

Warwick Hutchinson (OMS 28 RPV03/ turbocharged rotary) was half a second away in third spot, just where he finished last year.

Six of the top seven were in the Over 2.0-litre Formula Libre class, with David

Image: Ian Colley Mahon and his Hayabusa powered Dallara F394 the exception with fourth place and first in 751-2000cc F/L. Fifth place went to Brett Bull (VD- Kawasaki RF03K turbo) ahead of Michael Von Rappard (Dallara F392/ supercharged Hayabusa F392) and current NSW champ Ron Hay (Synergy Dallara).

Eighth outright and second in 751-2000cc F/L was Ed McCane in his DJ Racecars Firehawk, with Greg Tebble (Group R Van Diemen FF2000) ninth and the winner of the Hamilton Trophy for fastest Historic.

Ross Mackay was 10th in his Ford Escort Mki. Besides being the fastest tin top, which earned him the Vince Appleby Trophy, Mackay was the only one to set a new class record. He lowered his Sports Sedan 16012000cc previous benchmark by a sizeable 0.92s.

The Glyn Scott Perpetual Trophy for fastest time by a Sports Car went to Michael Larymore in his Toyoya MR2 with 11th overall, ahead of Prodsports Cars’ Brian Pettit (Westfield SE) by 0.7s. GOB

Image: Terry Regester

MGCC TAKES HILLCLIMB LEAD THE MG Car Club of Victoria took control of the Interclub Championship after mustering 30 entrants at Rob Roy Hillclimb for round two on May 23.

The club scored 43 points and leads from the VHCC, which fielded only six entries for 18 points.

In the outright stakes it was Daniel Leitner (Subaru Impreza WRX) with the outright and over 3.0-litre win for the MX5 club with a 22.58s FTD. He finished ahead of Col Hunter (WRX) on 23.08s and a class second for the Gippsland Car Club.

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Mike Barker (Elfin Clubman) claimed third outright and a class win to boost the points for the VHRR. The club points are awarded for class positions against the number of entries, with the outright results for the honour only.

Mike Ellsmore (MGA Coupe) was one of the top performers for the MGCC with second place in the strongly supported 1601-2000cc class, ahead of fellow club members Russell Seymour (MGA Roadster), Paul Slawinski (MGB) and John McGovern (MGF).

Greg Carter (Honda Civic) also took a

class second for the MGCC behind John Hardy, who was top scorer in his beautiful Alpine A110 for former champions the Renault Car Club of Victoria, which is currently fifth in the points.

Jeremy Booth (Suzuki Cappuccino) scored the 1001-1300cc class win for the Gippsland Car Club which is fourth.

With very few competitors, the Austin Healey Drivers Club is punching above its weight to be third with Warren Reid (Austin A30 Girino) the top scorer after the win in the up to 1000cc class.

Gary Hill

BASKERVILLE BACKWARDS ROUND TWO of the Tasmanian Hillclimb Series took in the familiar Baskerville Raceway venue, though the course was reversed on May 22.

Backing up his first round win, the Backwards Basky Hillclimb was won

by Nathan Oliver in his Mazda RX8 with the fastest time of 39.071s.

The combination was 0.67s quicker than James Lonergan, while a similar time gap separated the Subaru Impreza WRX driver from Omar Hasan (Toyota GR Yaris).

Just 0.14s adrift of the latter was Brad Van der Drift in his Nissan 200SX. The organisers, the 500 Car Club of Tasmania, had presented a brand new tarmac short-course hillclimb event. The course utilised the raceway in a clockwise (rather than its usual anti-clockwise) direction, with the runs starting from under the bridge and then working their way to the top of the circuit via the back straight, with a couple of chicanes thrown in.

Oliver also took out Class E for over 4.5-litre naturally aspirated and 3.04.5-lt forced induction, while Lonergan was the best of the 4WD and Special Purpose vehicles. Van der Drift took out Class D (3.0-4.5-lt and U3L forced induction).

There were 48 competitors with Stuart Benson (RX7 SP) fifth ahead of a trio of WRXs in the hands of Robert McIntyre, Beau Johnson and Matt How. Ninth was Michael Watt (Mazda 3 MPS) ahead of Wayne Monson (Ford Escort), the winner of Class C – 2.0-3.0-lt and under 1.6-lt forced induction).

Class A (under 1.6-lt) was taken out Michael Robson (Legend) who finished 14th outright, while Class B (1.6-2.0lt) was won by 21st outright Jordan Howlett (Toyota Corolla). GOB

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TAURANAC TRIBUTE AT HISTORICS ONE YEAR after his passing, the Sydney Classic at Sydney Motorsport Park on June 11-12 paid tribute to late Ron Tauranac.

That included a parade of various Brabhams and Ralts of his creation, which the Historic Sports & Racing Association had planned for the 2019 before Covid intruded.

Heading the line-up was the Brabham BT19 which the late Sir Jack Brabham took the World Drivers Championship in 1966, driven this time by grandson Sam Brabham.

The on-track racing action had good sized fields for Group S Production Sports and Group Historic Touring Cars, while the recent lockdown in Victoria affected the Heritage Touring Cars of the Group C and A period, and most of the open wheeler categories.

GROUP S PRODUCTION SPORTS

Sam Brabham demonstrated his grandfather’s World Championship winning Brabham BT19 Repco as part of the Ron Tauranac tribute (above) while Tom Tweedie took the Elfin MS7 to yet more wins, as did Brad Tilley who won all four Goup N races. Images: Riccardo Benvenuti/Bruce Moxon

Will Lowing (Van Diemen RF88) won race one well ahead of a close battle for second between Bruce Connolly and Wayne Cooper in their Elwyns.

Lowing was the leader of race two until a gear linkage issue put him out. Cooper won after dicing with Connolly who held second despite a quick spin and the loss of his nose cone. Garry Watson (Mawer) was third while there was nothing between Andrew Taite (RF89) and Geoff Walters (Van Diemen) for fourth.

In race three Connolly got the nod over Cooper by a couple of tenths but Cooper had a 5s penalty which put him back to third behind Lowing. Watson and Taite were the next two. Lowing won the last comfortably from Cooper, Watson, Taite and Connolly.

WAYNE SEABROOK overcame a Friday crash in his Group O Renmax to take his Group S Porsche 911 Carrera to three comprehensive victories over Stan Adler in his modified 911, running as Invited.

They headed the fourth race as well, but it went safety car after one lap and was red flagged later without a result.

Third across the line in the opener was Terry Lawlor (Shelby GT350) after a poor start dropped him to sixth. However, he was relegated to fourth behind Carey McMahon (DeTomaso Pantera GTS), with a 5s start line infringement penalty. Behind them were Geoff Morgan and Doug Barbour in 911s and Simon Meyer (MG Midget).

McMahon was third in race two under lights, and despite a penalty, maintained the spot ahead of Lawlor, Morgan and Rick Bates (911). The latter improved to third in the next outing where Lawlor was fourth ahead of McMahon after a shocking start.

The last went safety car when Greg Smith (MGB GT) and Ashton Roskill (Lotus Elite) came to grief before Turn 1. The latter had some dented panels while the MG was heavily damaged.

FORMULA VEES/GROUP L

GROUP N HISTORIC TOURING CARS

THE WEEKEND was a domination for Group Nc Ford Mustang drivers, in particular Brad Tilley, who won all four races.

In the first two encounters he finished ahead of Adam Walton before the latter was relegated to third in race two after a 5s penalty was imposed. Walton was always Tilley’s nearest rival and even led part of the next two races. In the last he stopped at Turn 8 with a blown gearbox.

Ian Mewett chased the pair in races one and two, before electing not to start the last two when an oil seal leak was found. After two fourth places John Harrison (Mustang) finished with a third and second. Best of the Nb cars was Andrew Bergan in his Mini Cooper S. He pushed Harrison in the early laps and then had good tussles with David Noakes (Nc Ford Escort RS1600).

HERITAGE TOURING CARS

THE EX-GIO Nissan Skyline R32 GTR with Tony Alford at the helm was on fire and never looked in doubt of winning the four

races. Second in race one was Rick Allen (BMW E30) while Norm Mogg finished third once he passed fellow Holden Walkinshaw VL driver Adrian Allisey.

David Towe (BMW) was next in front of Kyle Alford (Nissan Skyline GTS HR31) and Terry Lawlor (Ford Falcon XD), who was the best of the Group Cs ahead of Glenn Gerstel (Holden Commodore VH). Towe was second in the second outing under lights.

Mogg survived a clash with Allisey at Turn 7 for third ahead of Lawlor, Allen and Kyle Alford.

In race three Allen and Towe finished second and third, followed by Allisey and Mogg, then Alford, Lawlor and Michael LoGiudice (Commodore VK).

Allen ran side by side with the race leader off the start of race four before being sidelined with a loose wheel nut. Towe took over second while Mogg came under a late challenge from Alford. Lawlor was fifth and unbeaten in Group C, where Don Dimitriadis

(Ford Falcon XC Coupe) was second through consistent results.

GROUPS M, O, P

BRABHAM CARS featured prominently with Sean Whelan (BT30) well clear of Les Wright (BT21/23) in every race. The tussle for third in race one was enthralling with five cars covered by a second.

Paul Hamilton (Elfin 600) won out ahead of Herbert Neal (Neal Ford), David Kent (BT21), Wayne Wilson (BT35) and Colin Haste (BT2).

Kent was a close third in the next two races, well ahead of Wilson and Hamilton, as Neal and Haste each recorded a fifth and sixth. In the last it was Kent again third despite a penalty, while Wilson was just ahead of Neal.

FORMULA FORDS

THERE WERE mixed results with three different winners.

FOR THE most part, the race wins were fought out between Steve Normoyle (Spectre) and Mathew Pearce (Renmax).

Normoyle won the first race from Pearce after Nigel Jones (Renmax) and Anthony Paynter (Stag) who were also in mix, had mid race dramas.

Race two went to Pearce over Normoyle by 0.008s. However, the latter copped a 5s penalty which still left him second.

Normoyle came back to take the third and Pearce took the last by 0.005s over Paynter, and just ahead of Normoyle.

Best of the Group L cars was Barry Bates (Thompson Special) whose best overall results were a third and fourth.

GROUPS Q, R, SPORTS & RACING

THEY WERE split for the opening two races where Tom Tweedie (Elfin MS7) won QR Sports ahead of Andrew Kluver (Lola T332 Can Am), and Josh Kean (1986 Benetton F1) took QR Racing ahead of Vivian King (Ralt RT4).

The first combined race was predominantly behind a safety car after Ian Buddery put the March 86C Indy car into the tyre barrier on the exit to Turn 5.

Tweedie led after the resumption before Kean nailed the win on the final lap, from Peter Lucas (RT4), Andy Cantrell (Katitcha F2), Kluver and Malcom Oastler (RT1). Kean led all they way in the last from Tweedie, Lucas, and Cantrell. GOB

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NATIONALS wrap n compiled by garry o’brie

NUMBERS HIGH AT QLD STATE ROUND

THE MAZDA RX8 Cup Series and a pair of Production Touring Car enduros were the feature events on a packed 13-category second round of the Motorsports Australia Circuit Racing Championships at Morgan Park on June 5-6.

RX8 CUP

OVERALL VICTORY in round three went to Marcus La Delle from Steve Devjak and Ryan Gorton. They were the top three in qualifying and took the top three places in each of the four races.

After he qualified eighth, Terry Lewis picked up a couple of spots for sixth in Race 1. He was sixth in the next and picked up a couple of fourths in the last two.

Tom Shaw was the fourth fastest on the grid for Race 1 but erred off the start, dropping to 11th, before he finished seventh behind Shannon McLaine, Justin Barnes, and Lewis. Shaw followed up with a sixth right behind Lewis, and two fifths.

Sixth at the end of the weekend was Barnes

where, after his initial fifth, he carded with a fourth, a sixth and 12th. McLaine’s positive start faulted with a broken wheel bearing on the roll out lap of race two, which he endured for 13th before a ninth and sixth for seventh on combined points.

Eighth overall went to Aiden Riley with Jackson Noakes and Jake Lougher next.

PRODUCTION TOURING

OVER COMBINED results of the two enduros, the second round was taken out by Brad Carr, who drove his BMW M3 singlehandedly to win both races. Second overall went to Richard and Jimmy Beggs (HSV Clubsport) and third to Ben Gersekowski in a BMW M3.

Carr took the maximum points as he was the fastest in qualifying as well. Carr won the first race which ran 25 laps from lap 1 until he pitted, and regained the front running after everyone else had completed theirs. Coleby Cowhan and Lindsay Kearns were strong challengers until their Ford

Mustang blew a top radiator hose.

Gersekowski started third but a slow pit eliminated him as a winning prospect, and he ultimately finished seventh. An early blown turbo put out the Robert Gooley/Maika Ter Horst Mitsubishi EVO X after they started fourth. The M BBeggs’ were second in the race ahead of Chris aand Karl Begg (M3), Mark Griffith (Mercedes A45 AMG), Gregg Symes (EVO X), and Scott Dean A (A45).

(A It was a similar scenario in the next outing with Carr the winner from Gersekowski second and C PPaolo Buccini and Brock Paine in their shared BBMW M135i. The Beggs’ were fourth ahead of Tony Levitt and Jason Simes (Mercedes C63 To AMG), and Jake Camilleri (Mazda 3 MPS). The A

ANOTHER ONE-DAY MRA ROUND MOTOR RACING Australia’s fourth round on June 6 at Sydney Motorsport Park on the Gardner Circuit layout, a one-day meeting that was big on one-make categories which put on absolute thrillers.

MRF TYRES PULSARS

WITH VICTORY in the fourth round, Tim Colombrita atoned for an error that cost him dearly at the previous round.

He was the fastest qualifier and was in a major tussle with Josh Haynes as they swapped the lead of race one several times. It became a three-way stoush when Josh Craig became involved, and ultimately Ben Sheedy and Chris Manning joined in. Haynes grabbed the lead before the end, Colombrita had a moment on the final lap and lost out to Craig and Sheedy. Karl Raper was next from Will Foot, Dan Smith, Luke Eberhart and Harry Inwood.

Sheedy had the lead of the second race until he spun off at Turn 2 and became stuck on the kerb.

Colombrita had passed Haynes and took over the lead, which he held to the end. Craig was a close third with Raper fourth ahead of Manning , Eberhart, Foot, Inwood, and points leader Gavan Reynolds. Michael Osmond, who missed race one due to a broken gearbox, clawed his way to tenth.

Colombrita led the shortened last race from the outset and won ahead of Craig and Haynes.

Osmond worked his way to second before a flat

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Cowhan/Kearns were again non-finishers, as was the Begg M3.

FORMULA VEES

WITH WINS in the last two races, Tim Alder (Rapier) was the round winner over Gerrit Van de Pol (Sabre) and Scott Andrew (Rapier).

Alex Macdonald (Jacer) started Race 1 from pole and won a close-fought battle over Lachlan Murphy (Polar) and Van de Pol, while Alder was fourth. In a second race, five-way tussle Van de Pol broke through for his first win from Macdonald, Alder, Murphy, and David Hedemann (Bee Cee). Macdonald and Murphy clashed in Race 3 and DNF’d. Alder took the honours just in front of Van de Pol with Alexander Hedemann

Ford also had a 5s penalty in race three and once past Saade, opened up a sizeable lead to hold onto the win. Godfrey was second well ahead of Vucicevic, Saade, Mathew Harris (Civic), Charlie Khoury (Civic) and Stuart McFadyen (Mazda MX5).

PRODUCTION TOURING/BMW E36s Image: Riccardo Benvenuti battery dropped him to seventh behind Foot, Raper and Inwood. The race circumvented when Matt Early crashed at Turn 1.

SERIES X3 NSW

THE TWO leading protagonists in Wil Longmore and Cody Burcher duked it out over the three races of round four ,where fortune favoured the former and left the latter with a harsh penalty.

They exchanged the lead a couple of times in race one before Longmore won by 0.25s, while Jeremy Hodges was third. Next across the line was Sam Christison ahead of Ben Crossland and Lewis Buhagiar. Christison and Buhagiar were penalised post-race, which elevated Preston Breust and Matt Woodward.

Longmore led the first two laps of race two before Burcher passed him and held on for a narrow win.

Almost 5s away, Christison came through to take third off Hodges. Crossland was fourth and clear of Woodward, Breust and Cameron Brown.

Bucher led the opening lap of race three before Longmore challenged at Turn 1. Both slid through with Longmore worse off and dropped to fourth.

Burcher was out in front from Christison until a questionable drive-through penalty was ordered on Burcher.

Longmore was adamant there was no contact

after he rallied to take the win ahead of Christison, Hodges and Crossland. Brown was on his own ahead of Woodward and Buhagiar, as Monique Sciberras triumphed in her four-way stoush for eighth. Burcher finished 17th.

SUPER TT

OVERALL HONOURS went to John Ford in his LSpowered Nissan Skyline after he had to overcome some penalties. Lloyd Godfrey (Honda Integra) was the early leader of race one until stopped by a suspected electrics gremlin.

That left Jimmy Tran (Honda Civic) in front but was he was relegated to second behind Ford with a start-line penalty. Endree Saade (BMW E36) was third ahead of Tom Vucicevic (Civic), and Anthony Soole (BMW M4).

The second outing finished behind a safety car after a clash between Ford and Tran saw the latter’s Civic impact a wall at Turn 8. Ford took the win but was repositioned two places and Saade took the win ahead of Soole. Vucicevic was fourth from Mark Granger and Nathan Bourke, both in Ford Falcons.

IN HIS Subaru Impreza WRX Chris Sutton was unchallenged and led the first two races throughout. Only in the third did he lose the lead, but not for long, to Glen Wilson (Holden Commodore SSV). The latter finished second twice after Corrine Virag (SSV) beat him in the first. Matt Shylan (Honda Integra) was fourth twice, ahead of Jason Walsh (Kia Proceed) but did not start the last.

The BMWs produced close results with David Bailey ahead of Jeff Barnes in the first before Barnes toppled him in the next two. Marcus Rummler was third in race one ahead of Matt Herberstein and Aaron Lloyd. Rob Boaden was fastest in qualifying and he was fifth after front damage from an off. Shaun Penwarden picked up third in race two ahead of Herberstein, who was third in race three. GOB

Image: Bruce Moxon

Waldon were non-starters while Paine was off the road at Turn 1 whilst second. He recovered for sixth behind Grimmond and Cook before a fourth in the last.

CIRCUIT EXCELS

Images: MTR Images

(Rapier) third. Alder won the last, easily clear of Andrew with Mark Moran third after Van de Pol and Macdonald speared off at Turn 10.

IMPROVED PRODUCTION

POLE SITTER Justin Keys (Holden Commodore) was beaten away in Race 1 by Zak Hudson (Mazda RX7). The latter had a miscue down the back of the circuit on lap 4 and Keys pounced.

He went onto win from Hudson while Brock Paine (RX7) was third until a gear selection issue which left David Waldon (RX3) third with Kyle Organ-Morgan (Commodore) fourth, ahead of Bruce Cook (Ford Escort) who started rear of grid.

Hudson was best away and won Race 2 from Keys who battled a misfire. Waldon was a close third as Jason Grimmond (Commodore), OrganMoore and Paine diced behind.

The last two races went to Hudson over OrganMoore and Troy Marinelli (Nissan Silvia). Keys and

THERE WAS just one point in the final outcome of the second round with Luke Pink the winner over Riley Beggs, as Nash Morris, Bradi Owen and fastest qualifier Connor Roberts completed the top five.

Pink’s weekend started off poorly with a smashed windscreen on Friday from a wayward bonnet. He qualified fifth, finished second twice, just behind Race 1 and 2 winner Beggs. Pink made a great start to race three to lead before a prolonged safety car and victory. He then won the last outing, after lead swaps with Beggs.

Roberts took third in Race 1 ahead of Morris, who was third in the following races. Brett Parrish, Ryan Casha, Jamie Furness and Parr Jack Wood all finished in the top 10 before being involved in Turn 3, Race 2 fracas that bein had the safety car out for five laps.

Oscar Comley finished fourth ahead of O Owen and Roberts. There was a safety car Ow at tthe end of the opening lap of race three, after which Owen placed fourth ahead of aft Roberts and Comley. In the last Roberts Ro was out early, Comley spun and that left wa Owen fourth from Jackson Faulkner and Ow Jett Johnson.

Je

HISTORIC TOURING CARS H

THE FIRST race went to Graeme Wakefield (Ford Mustang) but after that it was all Grant Wilson (Chev Camaro) at the forefront. Wakefield was second in Race 2 but did not figure in the rest of the races. John Tupicoff (BMW 2002) was second overall ahead of Matt Clift (Mazda RX2)

who DNF’d the first race, and Pete Trapnell (Toyota Corolla).

SPORTS SEDANS

FOUR WINS gave Daniel Crompton in his father Phil’s Ford Mustang maximum round points.

Beau Hatton (BMW E30) finished the weekend second ahead of Peter Brown (Mazda MX5 turbo).

Colin Smith (Monaro/Chev) missed the first race before recording three seconds to finish fourth overall.

FORMULA FORDS/SPORTS & RACING CARS

WHILE BLAKE Varney (Dallara F304) was unbeaten in Sports & Racing, a DNF in Race 3 cost Grant Green (Radical SR3) second overall.

He had finished ahead of Jamieson Davies (SR3) in the other races but had to settle for third for the round.

Cameron McLeod (Spectrum) scored enough points early to take the overall Duratec Formula Fords honours, ahead of James Piszcyk (Spectrum) who was best in the last two races.

Fergus Coutts (Van Diemen) was the best in the Kent class last race but could not overhaul three race class winner Tim Hamilton (Spectrum).

HQ HOLDENS/GEMINIS/SALOON CARS

FORD FALCON AU driver Shayne Hine won the four outings, in each over Jamie Manteufel, while fellow Holden Commodore VT pilot Cameron Klee notched up three thirds to take third overall.

Brad Madden also chalked up four wins among the HQs. Jake Madden finished second twice for a round second, while Bruce French was third.

Justin van Twest and Scott Andriske also had seconds and finished fourth and sixth in the end.

Garry O’Brien

NO HIDING VALLEY MOMENTS

SEVEN TYRE blow outs, car dramas and even a fire were just part of the Shannons NAMSC Pointscore second round at Hidden Valley on May 29.

The meeting had its biggest entry for the year but then lost a couple from COVID and illness. The categories had three races with the first two race starting orders drawn from a hat.

HQ HOLDENS

REGARDLESS OF where he started, Marian “Scab” Bujnowski was unbeaten across the three races. It was not so good for his son Dylan, however, who only put on one lap of the morning’s practice before his engine detonated.

Gavin Thompson won the first race start and led for two laps until Bujnowski (snr) grabbed the lead and went onto victory. Third just 0.6s away was Peter Anderson, with a gap to Rossi Johnson and Angel Agostini.

The latter started from pole for race two and led until Johnson shot past at Turn 1.

Johnson had the front running for a couple of laps before he again fell to Bujnowski. Before race end Thompson relegated Johnson to third, as Anderson and Agostini filled followed.

Accumulated points determined the grid order for race three and Bujnowski bolted away for his third win. Thompson maintained second throughout but it was close in the end

Image: Insyde Media as Anderson closed, closed once he was able to get

by Johnson.

IMPROVED PRODUCTION

DESPITE A puncture on his Holden Commodore in practice, Rod Jessup still produced the fastest time, not that it mattered as the race one start order came via a hat draw.

Ross Salmon (Commodore) was best away but was soon overhauled by Jessup. His lead did not last long due to a spin at the Turn 6 hairpin which damaged a steering arm.

Stephen Johnstone (Commodore) assumed the premier spot and won from Salmon and

WA’s Evan Bartlett (Ford Falcon).

Two stoppages and restarts could not deny Salmon the victory in race two. Johnstone pressed the race leader early when the race finally ran, but faded in the latter stages to hold onto second ahead of Bartlett. There were also two red flags in the last before Salmon again showed the way to Johnstone and Bartlett.

COMMODORE CUP

MIXED IN with the IP cars, the Commodore Cup runners were headed by Brad Fullwood.

Category favourite David Ling was out after a practice flat tyre. Geoff Cowie had one also,

the first of four for him. th Fullwood led them from the outset. Cowie was w close behind until Jason Robson displaced him out of second. Ryan Robson di was w fourth up to when Gabriel Thorbjornsen slipped past and left Robson to fend off Garry sl Dempsey.

Dempsey ultimately relegated D Robson at Turn 6.

R Dempsey was off pole for race two and made m the best of it until a gearchange miscue allowed Fullwood, Thorbjornsen and m Cowie through. Dempsey had a tyre let go C which resulted in a red flag due to the debris w scattered along the main straight, and even sc some so on top of the timing tower.

At the restart Shane Smith speared off at Turn Tu 5 and shortened the front of his VH by around half a metre, and therefore caused a ar second red flag. Fullwood again led away yet se struggled to shake off Thorbjornsen. Robson was leading Cowie. Jason Robson (father of Ryan) was ahead of Dempsey until the last lap.

In race three Fullwood led off before Cowie brought about a red flag with another tyre failure. Just after they rolled out of the pits for the restart, Dempsey’s car developed an engine bay fire.

The race was eventually restarted with Fullwood the winner. Cowie jumped to second until Thorbjornsen passed him on lap two.

Ryan Robson fought with Cowie for third until the latter blew another tyre. GOB

AutoAction 55

s w e n Y A W D E SPE

56 AutoAction FEATURE

ANSELL ALL THE WAY IN STONEY POINT 500 Reports: Paris Charles Images: Shane Sharrock.

A FIELD of 13 entries assembled for the annual running of the Stoney Point 500 for Wingless Sprint, as Chris Ansell took the win in just his third start at Mid-Western Speedway.

The event marked the end of a challenging season for the Mortlake Speedway Club, which overcame challenging weather and track related conditions during the lead up.

Ansell headed into the 20-lap feature race after taking two heat race victories, while Alex Thomson and Greg Bishop also won single qualifier events.

Ansell’s top point score gave him pole position.

At the drop of the green on a freshly manicured surface, Ansell took control after a drag race with Thomson to Turn 1, followed closely by Steven Hateley, Jeremy Pearson and the rest of the field, which was jockeying for position.

Robert Whiteside’s tilt was soon over as he retired to the infield after the opening circulation and then, on lap 2, the caution lights bought the field back together for an Indian File restart.

For the next 18 laps the bottom line proved to be

the fastest way around as Ansell fended off early race challenges for the lead and managed to hold sway.

A 14.27 lap set Bishop up for a late-race challenge for the lead but Ansell managed to hold on for the win, while third was Thomson.

Rounding out the lead contenders were Aron Lawrence, Pearson, Kasey Garlick and Gavin Fizpatrick.

WARREN WINS HANNO TRIBUTE RACE BRAD WARREN won the Street Stock ‘Hanno Tribute’ race, held to commemorate the late Brendan Hannabury.

The Street Stock feature event is staged in a unique split format, with 12 laps being ran in one direction before the cars are regrouped and restarted in the opposite direction for the second half of the race.

Warren had successfully negotiated the opening stanza with Shane Ardley, Queensland champion Matt Nelson, Morris Ahearn, Ricky Throckmorton and Paul Domburg completing the first six competitors in the opening half.

Just two laps into the second portion, Nelson retired while Warren continued to lead the pack to take victory.

Rounding out the podium was Ahearn, followed Domburg and Throckmorton, who had traded places throughout the closing laps.

From that point, the score sheet would read Mitch Viney, David Chivers, Jacqui Whatmore,

South Australian Dylan Wilkinson, Graham Price, Matt Nelson, Jordon Ellifson and Chris Hay. The six heat races were shared among Matt Nelson and Brad Warren, who took two each, leaving singles won by Morris Ahearn and Troy Hose.

Supporting the card were the popular Super Rods and Limited Sportsman categories.

Making the most of pole position, Dane Court led every lap to take victory in an action-packed Super Rods feature race from Jacob Pitcher and Jamie May. Heat races wins were shared between Stanley Marco Jnr, Dane Court and Neville Gange.

A field of eight Limited Sportsman fronted for their supporting races, Nathan Buckley and Dillon Siely sharing the two race wins, while due to track conditions the third race was abandoned.

On overall points Buckley would head Siely followed by Troy Curran, Joshua Aston and Craig Ansell.

JASON BATES’ NO BULL VICTORY Report: Paris Charles Image: Mark Whitehead - Maximum Action Photography A FIELD of 41 Wingless Sprint competitors rolled into Goulburn Speedway to honour the late great Peter Craft.

After the heat races were run and done, the top 20 point scorers gridded up for a gruelling Peter Craft No Bull 86 lapper.

Luke Sayre started off pole and shared the front-row was Jason Bates, who used the top side of the track to lead the first few circulations before Sayre fought back to control the tempo of the race.

The yellow lights were thrown with 79 laps still to travel, and then Sayre again led the field away followed by Bates, while the Australian Champion Kyee Mock lurked in third as the rest of the field quickly settled in for the long haul.

With approximately 20 laps in the book, lapped traffic came into play for the first time, which allowed for some top three positional changes.

Bates took control, Mock also advanced

56 AutoAction

forward while Sayre was relegated back to third and Mark Blyton sat in fourth, until Sean Dicker’s entry expired on lap 24.

At the restart, Blyton soon retired to the infield while Bates opened a handy lead over the rest of the field and before too long he started threading his way through lapped traffic. Mock had second locked away just past the half distance mark as Victorian Todd Hobson moved into third demoting Sayre to fourth.

Meanwhile Tyson Williams had used the topside of the track to his advantage moving from 17th to fifth.

The race ran express for a gruelling 37 more laps before Peter Granger spun bringing on the cautions, bringing the field back together and most importantly providing a rest for the competitors.

At the Indian File restart with 25laps remaining Bates opened a handy break on Mock, before Adam Wray regrouped the field with 20 laps to be ran.

At the restart mayhem broke out with a three-way collision involving Wray, Jaidyn Boulding and Bradley McCarthy. This crash

brought on the red light, as Jaidyn Boulding required some medical assistance.

Bailey Goodwin spun next. Again, Bates led the field away, extending the real estate between himself and Mock. Hobson fought his way to second with nine remaining.

Mock and Tyson Williams locked horns for third but as they battled it allowed the fast finishing Jason Davis to swoop past both to take the final step of the podium.

Bates won more than $6,000 for his efforts ahead of runner up Hobson.

Mock, Williams, and Sayre would round

out the top five.

The 10 lap heat race victories were shared between Bates, McCarthy, Blyton, Lucas, Hobson, Briton, Sayre, Pacchiarotta, Dicker and Wray, while the twin B main events were claimed by Williams and Boulding.

Competitor Jake Ionn was involved in an unfortunate incident during the first of the B-Mains. He was airlifted to the Nepean hospital, where it was later confirmed that he had passed away.

Auto Action extends its condolences to Ionn’s friends and family.

www.autoaction.com.au

AutoActionMagazine

FEATURE AutoAction 57

Auto_Action

COTTRELL CLAIMS SUNLINE VICTORY Words: Paris Charles Image: Ray Ritter VETERAN SOUTH Australian Super Sedan pilot Kym Cottrell proved the man to beat at Waikerie’s Sunline Speedway.

Taking the drive because regular Shane Lambe had racing commitments elsewhere, Cottrell took the opportunity to undertake some research and development on the entry, with the win being a bonus.

Cottrell lined up in pole position, with Neville Nitschke alongside for the 12-lap feature event. Young gun Mitchell Rigney started from position three in just his third event, while regular driver Steve Schwarz continues to recover after recent surgery.

Cottrell created a commanding lead at the start and held a steady tempo as the top three gapped the field. Behind, Sarah Pope made a successful pass on Andrew Leach to take fourth.

As the laps dropped away Cottrell continued to lead, his only challenge coming with three to go when Nitschke made light rear contact out of Turn 4 to give the leader a

hurry up as the race reached its conclusion.

Nitschke and Rigney joined Cottrell on the podium, while Leach managed to snatch fourth, and Pope rounded out the top five.

The opening heat race proved the most exciting race of the meeting with multiple challenges and passes throughout. Leach took victory from Rigney, Nitschke, Cottrell and Pope.

Heat 2 proved a comfortable race for Cottrell as he took the maximum points ahead of Nitschke and Rigney, despite collecting the wall.

The support classes were well stocked including Modified Sedans, Street Stocks and Junior Sedans plus Wingless Sprints,

Modlites and Classic Sprintcars.

The final round of the Modified Sedans state series was won by second-generation racer Nathan Thorne in his maiden appearance aboard the Terry Brown SA9 BA Falcon.

Ben Whitehead and Tony Hardy, who is an adept racer on both bitumen and dirt, rounded out the podium.

Thorne performed double duties on the night to win the Street Stock feature ahead of Sam Brumfield and Keith Moore.

The third round of the Junior Sedans Sunline track championship was also the second and final round of the Robert Gwynne Memorial for 2020/21.

Chelsea Gwynne won an emotional feature from Lachlan Brown with Ky McEwin third.

Brown hung on to win the Robert Gwynne Memorial by a solitary point ahead of Gwynne.

Rhys Heinrich was victorious in an incident-packed Wingless Sprint feature ahead of Tyson Martin and Harley Alexander.

The Modlites feature was won by Patrick Hewitt who continued his fine form to make it three feature wins in a row. Scott Webb was second with Whyalla’s Justin Chadwick advancing to third.

Finally, the Classic Sprintcars turned back the hands of time to delight the crowd with some spirited demonstration runs.

ONE LAST TIME WITH FEELING FOR LACHLAN MCHUGH! Report: Paris Charles Image: Declan Brownsey - 44photography IN WHAT proved to be his final Australian event for the 2021 season before departing for the USA, Lachlan McHugh parked the Hi-Tec Oils NQ7 Cool in Victory Lane at Round 12 of the East Coast Logistics Sprintcar Series, at Archerfield Speedway.

In doing so, McHugh notched up an unparalleled 12th Australian feature race win for the 20/21 season, which includes eight of the 12 ECL Series rounds.

Going into the 30 lap feature, the front-row was shared by polesitter Dave Murcott, who was making his first appearance at the venue in over 18 months, and McHugh.

At the drop of the green Murcott set the early tempo while McHugh, Cody Maroske and Kevin Titman held down the minor placings.

After a handful of circulations, McHugh slid underneath Murcott as the duo entered Turn 1 but the latter fought back. However, McHugh then passed and gapped Murcott, who fell into the clutches of Maroske for several laps until he too passed the veteran at Turn 1.

Further back in the pack the race for fourth was shaping up as a hard-fought affair between Titman and Brent Kratzmann, damaging both.

Kratzmann and Aaron Kelly also touched a few circulations after in similar circumstances, ending both of their bids and bringing on the only caution of the race.

With 10 laps left to run the field restacked nose to tail, McHugh again making the most of the clear track to storm home with yet another dominat win.

www.autoaction.com.au

Maroske and Murcott, who both nursed their rides home with little braking, completed the podium. Last round winner Callum Walker, who had made a great recovery after crashing out in the Dash race, and Bryan Mann rounded out the top five.

Sixteen-year-old Jy Corbet set the Cat amongst the Pigeons, coming from near the rear after

AutoActionMagazine

Auto_Action

winning the 15-lap B Main event, to storm his way to a creditable sixth.

Heat race wins were shared by Aaron Kelly and Adam Butler, taking two apiece while Callum Walker and McHugh snared one each.

New South Welshman Jessie Attard claimed the KRE Quick Time award with an 11.876, however his night would not progress past his second heat race.

instagram.com/autoactionmag/

The Petzyo Development Series feature race, which also doubled as the C Main and thereby guaranteed the first four finishers a spot in the B Main, was dominated by Brad Keiler who led every lap of the 12-lap journey. Second was Jeremy Gaudry from Jason King.

Heat race wins were shared by Brad Keiler and Jason King.

AutoAction 57

We take a look back at what was making news in Auto Action 10, 20, 30, 40 and 50 years ago 1971: BOB JANE was a winner at Mallala in the fifth round of the Australian Touring Car Championship, defeating Ian Geoghegan in his mighty Ford Mustang. CAMS made the decision to retain Formula 5000 as the national racing formula until 1974. The Mt Compass rally provided challenging and boggy conditions for competitors.

Images: Motorsport Images

1981: VERN SCHUPPAN’S impressive performance in his maiden race for the factory Porsche team at Le Mans led to the German marque offering him a contract. The South Australian’s efforts to get the 936 restarted after it ground to a halt during his stint impressed the Porsche hierarchy. Meanwhile, Auto Action revealed Ansett had ended its sponsorship of Elfin.

1991: AS THE Nissan Skyline GT-R continued to dominate Australian Touring Car racing amid plans for a new Holden vs Ford formula for 1993. Meanwhile, the Australian Racing Drivers Club were pushing ahead with an unpopular plan to include Group E Production cars in the Bathurst 1000. This was a reaction to meagre fields at touring car rounds.

2001: A PERTH street race appeared the only way a V8 Supercars round would continue in the Western Australia. A race on the Swan River foreshore was mooted as the prime location after a variety of locations through Perth and Fremantle were knocked back. John Cleland was confirmed as co-driver to Brad Jones for Bathurst.

2011: TEAMMATE VS teammate. Craig Lowndes was emerging as Triple Eight Race Engineering counterpart Jamie Whincup’s main rival for the title, after taking 106-points out of his lead at Hidden Valley. Car of The Future was expected to test within the next week, with Mark Skaife set to get behind the wheel at Queensland Raceway.

Across

1. Who was the first Formula 1 World Champion to win backto- back F1 titles? (surname) 6. Who was the first driver to win the Australian GT Championship twice? (surname) 8. Who won the 1978 Formula 1 World Championship? (surname) 10. Two drivers share the record of eight Supercars wins in Darwin, Scott McLaughlin is one, who is the other? (surname) 12. Didier Pironi won the Le Mans 24 Hours with Jean-Pierre Jaussaud driving for what manufacturer?

15. Colin Edwards won the legendary Suzuka Eight Hours on several occasion, who did he win the race with in 2001? (surname) 17. How many turns does the Hidden Valley circuit contain?

19. Who is the only driver to win all three races in a Darwin round? (surname)

(surname) 27. How many race wins did New Zealander Kaleb Ngatoa take in the inaugural S5000 Australian Drivers’ Championship?

28. Which driver won the 1993 IndyCar Championship? (surname)

Down

20. In F1 history, only one team has begun with the letter ‘Z’, what was the name of this outfit?

21. How many points do you earn for winning a Formula 1 race (without setting the fastest lap)?

22. Who holds the record for the most amount of points scored in an F2 season? (surname) 26. Williams has earned 114 F1 Grand Prix wins, but who won the team’s 100th?

2. New Zealander Liam Lawson is a junior academy driver in which Formula 1 team programme?

3. After a successful career on two wheels, Kevin Schwantz raced which cars in Australia and then America?

4. Which current Supercars driver is tied with Jonathon Webb on four Supercars Championship race wins?

5. Who scored his maiden Supercars victory at Hidden Valley in 2020? (surname) 7. Who did Peter Brock pip to the Australian Touring Car Championship in 1978? (surname) 9. With what team did Martin Brundle make his

Formula 1 debut?

11. What was the nationality of five-time Formula 1 World champion Juan Manuel Fangio?

13. Who is the reigning World Touring Car Cup (WTCR) series winner? (surname) 14. Who am I? I have won the Australian F4 Championship, Toyota 86 Series and the inaugural TCR Australia Series? (full name) 16. The 2004 Super2 Series was decided on a countback. Andrew Jones won the title after finishing equal with who? (surname) 18. Who is the only driver to win the Bathurst 12 hour and Bathurst 1000 in the same year? (surname) 19. What is the name of the reigning Australian Rally Champion Harry Bates’ co-driver? (surname) 23. Rod Stevens finished third in the 1978 Australian Touring Car Championship, driving what model Ford?

24. Who did Valentino Rossi famously overtake on the final turn to win the 2009 Catalan Grand Prix in 2009? (surname) 25. What is the nickname of three-time British Touring Car champion Gordon Sheddon?

#1812 Crossword Answers 1 down – Suzuki, 2 across – Australia, 3 down – Steven Richards, 4 down – Lowndes, 5 down – Hildebrand, 6 down – Winterbottom, 7 down – Kankkunen, 8 down – five, 9 across – Klark Quinn, 10 across – Hamilton, 11 across – Porsche, 12 down – six, 13 across – Oran Park, 14 down – Vernay, 15 down – McLaren, 16 across – Josef Newgarden, 17 down – Jacobson, 18 across – Damon Hill, 19 across – Bartlett, 20 across – Nissan Altima, 21 down – Sweden, 22 down – Mostert, 23 across – Brabham, 24 across – Pace, 25 down – Foyt, 26 down – Wolf, 27 across – Golding, 28 down – DTM, 29 across – Senna, 30 across – Tyrrell.

58 AutoAction

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