JIM RICHARDS
GENTLEMAN JIM IMAGES Autopics.com.au, Justin Deeley
The original Kiwi flyer won championships and Bathursts with Holden, BMW, Volvo and Nissan. But it was with the latter that Jim Richards hit the peak of his career with a championship and Bathurst double.
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fter three Bathurst wins in a row as co-driver to Peter Brock at the Holden Dealer Team, it remained to be seen what Jim Richards could achieve on his own. What followed was one of the greatest careers in Australian motorsport, winning championships, races and more in a variety of cars and categories. Two championships followed with BMW in 1985 and 1987, though Bathurst success eluded the JPS Team BMW operation. With a move to Nissan, Richards returned to the top step at Mount Panorama. Between 1990 and 1992, the Fred Gibson-led Nissan team won three championships and two Bathurst 1000s, including two consecutive championship and Bathurst doubles in 1991 and 1992, the latter two alongside Mark Skaife. 36
“The main thing I remember was that we knew if the car didn’t have a mechanical failure at all then we could probably win it,” said Richards on Bathurst in 1991 in the all-conquering Skyline R32 GT-R. “Basically, it was a trouble-free run for us, everything went really well and it was a great moment for Nissan…reliability wasn’t a problem because we weren’t running a lot of boost. “The car had four-wheel drive so although the Sierras could keep up for four or five laps, we could pull away after their tyres got a bit worn because we had four wheels doing the driving and they had two wheels doing the driving. So we were never really worried about them, to be honest. We knew if we drove it fast that there was no car out there in the race who could actually beat us.
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15/06/2023 10:11:00 AM
