Motorsport News Issue 129 - 19 June-2 July 1998

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19 June -2July 1998

FIRST APPEARANCE: Larry Perkins’ new Castro! VT Commodore photographed for the first time in his Meibourne workshop.

Photos by Tony Glynn

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VT Commodore ready to strike

By CHRIS LAMBDEN

HOLDEN’S all-new VT Commodore race car looks

like being close to the pace with some further testing and race miles.

Early testing by both Castrol Team Perkins and the Mobil HRT earlier this week showed that, with a few refinements, the new car 100mm longer in wheelbase and 100mm wider in track - should be a match for the VS it replaces.

That is, of course, the intention in terms of performance parity, but both teams are cautious about how long it will take to develop the cars to that level - particularly as CAMS is proposing that their ■ championship-contending drivers use the new car at the last two SATCC title rounds (see story on Page 5).

In the course of nearly 80 laps at Winton on Monday, Larry Perkins got the Castrol car down into the lm24s bracket (lm24.8 best), which / matched his fastest race laps at the recent SATCC round at the Benalla track.

LP professed himself happy with his day’s work and indeed forewent a second day in favour of returning to his Melbourne base to begin FINAL SHAKEDOWN... Larry Perkins puts his new Castrol VT through its paces at Winton on Monday. preparation for the weekend’s Calder race.

“As I’d expected, the car was nine-tenths [right] straight away,” he told Motorsport News on Monday evening.

“If there was anything I could specifically fault, it felt just a little MoM GREG Murphy will twitchy at the rear. debut HRT’s VT “I’m not sure whether the smaller Commodore this week wing (100mm naiTower than on the end and - if HRT has VS) was part of that - we had full its way - remain in the wing on in the end ... car for the remaining “Other than that, it was fine.

SATCC races, at “Really, in the end, it’s not a Darwin and Oran whole new car. It’s just a body shell Park.

- albeit with slightly different Murphy stepped into wheelbase and track...” the car on Tuesday, fol A broken rocker brought LP’s lowing his return from testing to a halt quite early in the business in New day, but after repairs the car reeled Zealand, and was due off the rest of the day without a to test further on hitch.

Wednesday.

Russell Ingall stepped into the “It was really great NEW AND OLD... HRT’s new VT with the current VS at Calder Park on Monday. car for a brief five-lap taste and was to get back in and I’m hesitant to form too many conclu it out on a fast track ving, but he expects to sions on that basis: really looking forward the car is responding to the weekend,” he really" well to small like Phillip Island, but be right back in the “It felt okay - a little different to we can’t do that said after testing on changes, which is a groove by the week the VS, but okay. . end.

Tuesday, mainly in the good sign, because of the testing “It might be a bit twitchy at the wet. ban.”

The team was not too rear - I’m not sure about that rear “I’m pretty happy HRT’s nominated worried about times in “We got about an with it all; there is so wing...” their brief time on a test track is Calder much to work with and For his part, HRT team boss Jeff hour in the dry at the Park. end of the day and it will take a long time dry track, but for the Grech pronounced himself pleased Murf admitted that with the Mobil team’s VT after its made a few changes, to get the most out of record Greg turned a which improved the it, that’s for srme. the break from touring 56.7s lap, which was first shakedown lun on Monday. cars - he has not raced car, but there is a long “But it is already a marginally faster than Mark Skaife undertook the early one since Bathurst last way to go. beautiful car to drive, ranning wjth the car and was down Skaife had managed * “There are lots of really well balanced, year - has taken a bit into the 56-second bracket (56.8s the previous day.

- DAVID HASSALL best) at Calder within the car’s first of an edge off his drithings to improve, but ^ “I would love to get 20 laps, before any adjustments were made. and then curtailed by rain, enough with and it’s a reasonable starting and rear track - and good mid-cor . Grech was confident that with a was learned to be sure the car is point, ner speed, but a little initial under little fi ne tuning the car would be steer and less traction than the VS fundamentally okay.

It'looks like a bit of adjustment “quite close” to the speed of its VS on exit.

“Already, Mark’s saying the aerowith springs, shocks and ride predecessor. dynamic balance is good, which is height will get it somewhere near Craig Lowndes and then Greg Although the day’s testing was important,” Grech said. “If that’s the mark.”

Murphy drove the car on Tuesday. delayed by a diff failure after just a unbalanced, you’vfe got a problem.

Skaife reported very positive ini lap (the correct 3.5 ratio having to - See Page 22 for our “We just put the VS spring and tial steering response with the car be replaced in the interim by a 3.7) which is 100mm wider in the front shock settings into the car to start exclusive technical comparison

Murf takes HRT VT HOt-lii

n RurnoiH' of the week: Amaroo’s big finale may not hap pen after all. We hear that the final round of the BOC Gases Super Touring series on 30 August may be switched the Oran Park following a disagree ment with the ARDC over con tractual arrangements.

Discussions are continuing. n We also hear that, with GTP likely to be on the Shell Series bill next year, the Australian Sports Sedan Championship could go onto the Super Touring program next year. TTie Sports Sedans have been running with truck racing and could be replaced by ... three rounds ofthe Australian Super Speedway Series for NASCAR and AUSCAR. n While CAMS has let the issue of the legality ofthe Shell team rear wings at Winton go (they were deemed illegal, but no punitive action was taken), Larry Perkins is to appeal the decision before AMSAC,the Australian Motor Sports Appeal Council.

According to Perkins, the Shell cars should have been excluded from the results of the meeting. n Amidst tire team’s testing of the new Ford Falcon EF2 aerokit, the Shell team found time to give long distance recruit Cameron McConville 50 laps at Lakeside this week.

H Channel 10 viewers may have been amused to see new TEGA Technical Manager John Sheppard talcing random tyre temperatures during the slowdovm laps at Wanneroo. It may well have played its part in acceptance of Ford’s higher rear wing package last week as Bheppo apparently found an average 20 degrees difference ■between Ford and Holden tyres at the end of the races ...

■ Greg Murphy’s Supporters Club is now operating in Australia. Your $25 joining fee could win you a trip to the 1999 Long Beach GP, where Murph hopes to be racing Indy Lights.

Australian contact address for further info is P.O. Box 5093, Mordialloc, Vic 3195 (NZ resi dents should contact P.O. Box 384, Masterton).

■ Kiwi Scott Dixon could, mathematically, sew up the Australian Formula Holden Championship at this weekend’s penultimate round, at Calder.

Interestingly, his two possible challengers for the title - which carries with it a test with HRT are HRT Young Lion pair Mark Noske and Todd Kelly.

■ At the same time, Formula.

Ford championship leader Adam Macrow is close to tying up the Ford Motorsport/Slick 50 Formula Ford Championship. It also carries a test prize, in a Formula Holden, although we hear that Macrow’s status as one of the Ford Generation XR 3'oung talent team (which includes Ford V8 testing) may complicate the issue...

■ Tim Leahey will be the first Ford Generation XR driver to actually get behind the wheel of a Falcon when he steps into the Piiiek car at Lakeside on Monday, June 22.

■ Dale Brede wiO be taking on a new look in his Formula Holden campaign. The 23-yearold will appear in Repsol colours for the rest of the season and 1999. His Ralt RT23 will debut in ‘Doohan’ colours this weekend.

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4 W June ms n There have been reports in recent days that McLaren’s remark able pace this year has been largely due to the team’ use of a secret “con tractive” suspension sys tem which has been devel oped in Belgium by former racing driver Mauro Bianchi. The system is believed to have been used on McLaren sportscars as long ago as 1996 when Nelson Piquet drove one of the cars in South American sportscar events. n There were renewed rumours in Montreal that Tyrrell will shortly drop Ricardo Rosset and replace him with Tom Kristensen. The Danish drivftr tested for the Minardi team last winter and impressed but did not have any money to back up his candidacy for the drive. n Sylvester Stallone was back in the FI paddock in Montreal,taking the opportunity to open a new Planet Hollywood restaurant in the city.

Stallone co-owns Planet Hollywood with Arnold Schwarzenegger, Bruce Willis and Demi Moore.

II Pankl Racing Systems, the Austrian manufacturer oflight weight racing car parts which supplies around half the Grand Prix teams and is involved in all the major racing champi onships around the world, is to be floated on the new European Stock Exchange. n Among those wander ing around the paddock in Canada were Indy 500 winner Eddie Cheever, who turned up to see old friends, including Derek Warwick, who was stand ing in for Martin Brundle as a TV commentator.

Brundle was busy racing for Toyota in the Le Mans 24 Hours.

Lam bo to FI with Cosworth

and udi to enter Indycar racing? .

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has VOLKSWAGEN bought the Lamborghini car company and is likely to bring the Italian mar que back into FI with engines for the new British American Racing.

This will probably involve Lamborghini tak ing over the Cosworth 1999 engine project, which is currently code-

named the CK. The Ford

Motor

Company did not buy the rights to this engine before the sale of Cosworth to Volkswagen.

It is worth noting that Audi also has acquired the rights to aU the Cosworth Indycar engines - which are currently being sup plied to a number of

-JOESAWARD

and Davis Racing (Arnd Meier).

These engines may be renamed and used to pro mote Volkswagen prod ucts in the American market.

Lamborghini has been owned since 1993 by an Indonesian group which returned it to profitabili ty with new management

and more efficient tech niques.

Lamborghini has been careful to stay out of the sport during its rebuild ing phase.

If all goes to plan, we expect there to be an announcement about an FI engine deal within the next month.

-JOESAWARD

Mick set to Rkho's Bright Bathurst quit STONE Brothers Racing has finalised its driver line up for the endurance tour ing car events.

Brad Jones will share the Mitre 10 Falcon with Mark Larkham at Sandown and Bathurst‘while, in a surprise move, Steven Richards will step into the Pirtek Falcon alongside Jason Bright at Bathurst.

The former Valvoline Commodore racer, now Nissan’s test driver in the British Touring Car Championship, is also expect ed to drive in the AMP Bathurst 1000 with Matthew Neal.

But he may not be available for the Sandown race due to his Nissan GB commitments.

“Steven is an excellent dri ver,” said team boss Ross Stone this week.

“We’re really pleased that he

MICK Doohan has announced that next season will be his last in 500cc Grand Prix racing.

The four-time World

Champion made the announcement follow ing the confirmation that Repsol will back Honda until 2001.

Speaking after quali fying at Jarama, the recently turned 33year-old said that since he is enjoying racing so much, he will continue for another season before quitting.

“But I say that every year,” Doohan added.

- DARRYL FLACK

Photo by Bothwell Photographic

has been able to join the team, , but I don’t know if that he is going to be available for Sandown.

“He and Jason wil

good pairing and, if f come out early and tet before the race, I an that he and Jason wil formidable combinatic While there is yei decision on who will car at Sandown Stom ful that “somethin; worked out to have E the car” in the Melboc sic.

The move of the tw enced drivers, both ( have finished as higl ond at Bathurst, bi three thfe number ol Holden drivers to race this season. Neil Croi already confirmed a Seton’s co-driver in t Credit team.

Dale signs a chip off the old block

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n We hear that Tom Walkinshaw’s quest to become Scotland’s answer to Enzo Ferrari is continu ing with plans to build an Arrows-branded supeicar which would be sold to the public and raced in sportscar events. Walkinshaw has designed several supercars for auto manur facturers around the world and so this should not be too difficult a task for the enterprising TWR Group. . n McLaren boss Ron Dennis has revealed some of the people who have shown an interest in rid ing in his unique twoseater Formula 1 car. In addition to TV companies and magazines, Dennis said that Sylvester Stallone has said he would like a run and FIA President Max Mosley is also keen. Dennis says that he has also been con sidering whether he would have a run.

important CART teams, notably Newman/Haas Racing (Michael Andretti, Christian Fittipaldi) Team Rahal (Bobby Rahal, Bryan Herta), Patrick Racing (Scott Pruett, Adrian Fernandez), Della Penna Motorsports (Richie Hearn), Payton Coyne Racing (Michel Jourdain, Dennis Vitolo)

n

NASCAR legend Dale Earnhardt has locked up one of the hottest drivers in stock car racing: his son.

Dale Earnhardt Inc. announced last week it has reached an agree ment that calls for Dale Earnhardt Jr to drive for the company for five years, with an option for an addi tional five.

The 23-year-old Earnhardt has already won twice in his first full year of competition on NASCAR’s Busch Grand National circuit.

But he has been driving for his father with what amounts to a handshake agreement.

The elder Earnhardt was pay ing his son $500 per week plus a percentage ofrace winnings.

“It feels good to finally have a

formal contract signed with Dale Jr, but our blood contract has been good for 23 years, and that will always be the most important con tract I have with him,” the seven time Winston Cup champion said.

DEI is to put the younger Earnhardt in a Winston Cup car for several races m 1999, and the company will decide which circuit he competes on in the 2000 season and beyond.

“I told my dad a long time ago that as long as I am racing, I want to drive for him,” Earnhardt Jr said.

“That’s the only contract I ever needed, but it’s nice to have every thing in writing so we all know what kind of commitment we have made to each other.”

Homologation items finalised

DESPI'TE a couple of last minute hurdles, homolo gation of the all-new VT Commodore V8 Supercar was completed late last week.

A few elements of the Holden were queried by the Committee, but most, such as the removal of strengthen ing supports in doors and bonnets, were shown to be in I

common practice in existing cars.

In this and other cases, TEGA discussion and approval had simply not yet found its way into official rule book.

While the Homologation Committee expresssed some concern as to the ad hoc way in which some of the regula tions regarding V8 Supercars

have been developed and implemented, the appropri ate rule adjustments were subsequently agreed and published late last week.

Key issues finalised in those last days included: l Engine height - VT engine lowered to same as EL Falcon (retaining the original height would have meant a complete redesign of

induction manifolds in order to fit inside lower front bonnet); l Side skirt modifications - the originally submitted side skirts were deemed to . have some “undertray” effect.

Intrusion of the skirts further inward than the chassis sills was disallowed; l Rear wing brace - the brace, extending across the

surface of the bootlid was queried because it was deemed to have an “aerodynamic” effect. Further discussion with TEGA’s Technical Committee resulted in acceptance of the brace, With these issues clarified, homolgation was completed last Thursday(June 11).

- CHRIS LAMBDEN

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Falcons get aero package boost

WHILE Holden’s all-new VT has stolen the homologation lime light, an opportunistic move by Ford has obtained a simple update to its current EL Falcon which will undoubtedly boost performance.

Homologation of what will be referred to as the EL2 Falcon involves raising of the existing rear wing by 53mm (by using higher wing supports) and adopting the ribbed front underwing designed and used by Holden in the existing VS(and new VT) Commodore.

On the face of it, that amounts to a downforce gain at front and rear, although early reports from the Shell and Stone teams (both testing at Lakeside) were, unsurprisingly, guarded: “Dick reported no speed gain, but the feeling that over a race distance it would look after our tyres a little better - which is what our problem has been,” team manager Wayne Cattach reported on Tuesday.

An early problem emerged, how ever, with the breakage of a wing on one of the DJR cars.

“Whether it was due to the increased air flow or downforce we don’t know,” said Cattach, “but as a safeguard, we’re talking to (TEGA Technical Chief) John Sheppard about whether we can use a small central support rod.”

Such a support was used with the VP Commodore’s end-mounted

n It’s a Bahy Boom: Possum and Peggy Bourne have also added a new Boss Jr to the crew.

Spencer Hai’old Clendon Bom-ne airived on June 14. No trath to the rumour . that, dming delivery,- the baby tm-ned hard right over crest...

READY TO GO: The Ford teams are expecting improved performance at Calder Park this weekend, thanks to the approval of a new aerodynamic package for the Falcons. As can be seen from these photos taken at Glenn Seton Racing’s workshop, the Fords now have their rear wings mounted 53mm (about two inches) higher than before, providing much better downforce. while the front will be held down by a new undertray taken directly from a Holden Commodore.

Teams upset at C MS demand top-placed SATCC drivers must race the cars at Darwin and Oran Park.

This would mean that the two drivers fighting out the title - Craig Lowndes and Russell Ingall - would have to race the cars in the final two rounds.

The move is designed to ensure that the teams Mobil HRT and Castrol Team Perkins - run the new Commodores to their full potential.

Ford teams - which could go easy themselves, remem ber, because they are out of contention - are concerned

that if the Holden teams run their second or third drivers, they may try to protect their parity position prior to Sandown and Bathurst.

But both the Holden teams are expected to contest the decision.

“We’ll be discussing that with them (CAMS),” Mobil HRT team manager Jeff Grech said on Monday.

“Our drivers are currently first and third in the champi onship and it’s too early for us to really risk the new car.

“It’s only just finished, it’s performance is uncertain and - more importantly - we have very few spares for it yet.

“It’s unfair for both the teams concerned tff decide

n Simon Emerzidis is battling to make it to Calder this week with his Commodore. His team has had its gearbox misplaced by a courier for almost three weeks and the team is only “50-50” to make it to the race. Holinger Engineering in Melbourne may be an-anging a loan of one for the weekend. n Speaking ofthe Simons Eai-thworks team, co-driver Garry Willmington has had a new anival. Ganys wife Natahe(a foi-mer Winter Nats bum-out champ!) welcomed a son, Braden, into the team this week.

wing.

Ross Stone was a little more posi tive about the revised package, but not willing to put his finger on any lap time gain.

“We did 80 laps on Friday with Mark Larkham and 80 today with Jason (Bright),” he said on Tuesday.

“The cars feel good; more driveable,” he said, “but as to any time gain, it’s hard to say ...”

Glenn Seton was due to test his revised car at Phillip Island on Wednesday.

- CHRIS LAMBDEN

CAMS has issued a bul letin telling the two teams running the new VT Commodore that their

n Mark Skaife is becom ing busier and busier.

Apart fi'om his driving and promotional commitments at Holden Racing Team, Skaife has been appointed to the exclusive Product Policy Committee of Holden Special Vehicles,

the championship in this way.

“We’ve made so many con cessions to Ford’s demands along the way and this requirement has come about because they (Ford) think our drivers are going to sandbag it in order to get a better PRC deal for Sandown and Bathurst...”

Castrol’s Russell Ingall, chasing HRTs Lovmdes hard in the title stakes, agrees: “There’s nothing to say that the new car is going to be as fast as our well-devel

oped VS race cars, at least for some time,” he said on Tuesday.

“There seems to be this view at CAMS that the new VT is going to be a rocket-

ship straight out of the box.

That’s a very naive view.

“I don’t want to run the new car. It’s too much of an unknown, and that’s an unfair way for both myself and Craig (Lowndes) to decide it.

“Who’s to say that one of the teams won’t luck into the

this proposal initially any way,” he said.

IN the meantime, CAMS has confirmed that the Parity Police will be out in force at Calder this weekend to ensure no-one has gained an unfair advantage through the new car homologations.

A statement released this week by Motorsport Manager Tim Schenken was clear: “The PRC will be monitor

right set-up immediately.

That’s no way to decide a championship.”

CAMS Motorsport Manager Tim Schenken said on Tuesday that the teams ing the performance of both were welcome to come and (new) vehicles and, should the Commodore VT or Falcon discuss the matter: “We’re always happy to EL2 be deemed faster than hear what they have to say, the existing models, immedi ate action will be taken.” but they should also be talk - DAVID HASSALL and ing to TEGA. It was the CHRIS LAMBDEN teams’ group which put up

n There will be plenty of blow hards at Calder. In n conjunction with the Victorian police, race dri vers will he randomly breath tested dming the meeting. All drivers must have a zero reading in accordance with the regu lations. Er, does that go for the media as well, ociffer? n Attach a red nose to your car on the way to Calder and you could win a heap of prizes. The Good Stuffincludes a ride in Dick Johnson’s Shell Helix Falcon, a helicopter joy ride over the track and a season’s pass to Calder. All proceeds from Red Nose Day support research into Sudden Infant Death Syndrome(SIDS). n The Shell Hehx team will set a new milestone at Calder. While several dri vers have already complet ed 100 rounds ofthe ATCC,Dick Johnson and John Bowe will rack up 100 starts asJeammates this weekend.’’^ n Nine drivers will take part in a two-day fitness camp CAMS is running in conjunction with the Australian Institute of Sport. They are Craig Lowndes, Steve Johnson, Adam Macrow, Cameron McConville, Greg Ritter, Tim Leahy, MITs own Neal Bates, Corolla Cup rally driver Steve Forsberg and karter Wesley May. n Warren Luffhas fin ished second in the New Zealand Formula Ford Festival. After qualifying fourth fastest and starting third for the final. Luff Jr finished four seconds behind South Island driver LeRoy Stevenson after 25 laps on a wet Taupo cir ( cuit.

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19JmW8 n Ferrari sponsor Asprey is facing a cut in profits this year because its owner, Piince Jefri Bolkiah,the brother of the Sultan of Brunei, has decided that his family spent too much at the store last year. The Prince's clan spent $110m at the shop last year, which amounted to almost a third of Aspre/s turnover of $347m ...

■ Police are still investi gating a fight which took place 10 days ago at a kart ing track in Lanaken, Belgium. There are allega tions that the fight involved Jos Verstappen, his father and four friends and that one man ended up in hospital \vith skuU fractui-es. The incident has been front page news in Holland and has done Verstappen’s reputation no good at all.

■ There have been namom-s in Europe that Bemie Ecclestone is trying to resurrect some of the old racing names from the 1960s and 1970s. John Surtees has confirmed that an approach was made to him about the ownership of the Surtees team name.

I We hear that Stewart Grand Prix has decided not to replace technical director Alan -Jenkins and will con tinue next year with the same management struc ture in the technical department.

-JOESAWARD

Richards tops test US chaiue for Besnard

By JON THOMSON and PHIL BRANAGAN

JIM Richards’ topped the timesheets at the Media Day for the AMP Bathurst 1000 last week.

The current co-leader of the BOC Gases Super Touring Championship ran strongly in Volvo’s S40, get ting close to the 1997 lap record set by British driver Jason Plato in the Renault Laguna.

Richards led a small group, of 11 Super Tourers, topping Cameron McConville and Brad Jones in the Audi Sport Australia A4 quattros.

Leading Independent driver Cameron McLean had to sit out the sessions after his Eastern Creek engine prob lem though he did manage a few laps in the Robson BMW. At the day event organis ers confirmed the three class structure of the October 4 race, with Schedule S and ‘Ecotech’ diesel cars.

Up to 11 cars are expected to appear in both classes, with four diesels expected from Volkswagen and BMW. As many as seven of the Schedule S cars - a cross between Super Tourers and improved' production Group Ns - are expected from New Zealand.

TOGA UK boss Alan Cow would not be drawn on how many overseas Super ■ Tourers would come to Australia, preferring to leave

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6 month/20^000 km warranty on all parts.

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By PHIL BRANAGAN

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I PREVIEW OF THE RACE?... Jim Richards will be hoping

so after topping the pre-race test. (Photo by Mn Moms/Mpix) the teams involved to make Robb Gravett’s Rock-it Cargo their own announcements.

Honda (with Lee Brookes) The current list of ‘probaand the DC Cook Racing hies’includes two Williams- Renault Laguna, There is also the chance of Renaults, two Vauxhall Vectras from Triple 8 two cars from the Swedish Engineering, a second TWRseries - a privately-imn Volvo Volvo S40 to join the local car 850 and a BMW 318i.

For the Ecotech class the of Richards, at least one Prodrive Honda and a works geld looks small but the drifor Nissan Anthony yjjjg ta,lent on hand at the Reid/David Leslie.

Nurburgring last weekend There are also expected to was first rate; Steve Soper , be leading Independents cars; Hans Stuck and Didier de Matt Neal’s Team Dynamics Radigues drove for BMW’s ‘semi-works’Nissan (pencil in winning team and Mauro Steven Richards as co-driver), Baldi drove for Volkswagefft The race was won by the factory BMW 325TD. Brad Jones, who was to drive a sec ond VW Golf, had his car withdrawn after the team dis covered a shortage of parts.

Among a wide range of ticket options for the race some of the prices include a single day general admission on Thursday for $12, Friday $15, Saturday $30 and Sunday $50 A race week gen eral admission pass costing $120. A general admission race week family pass for two adults and two children under 15 at $240.

Support events for the race will include the Porsche Cup and the International Austin Healey race originally sched uled for Le Mans.

No matOy^ the best part is the price!

RECYCLED AUTO PARTS

DAVID Besnard’s latest win in the USFF2000 series could have bigger implications for his long-term career.

Straight after winning his fifth race in six starts at Mid-Ohio Besnard was approached by American sportscar team dwner Rob Dyson and invited to test cfne of his two Riley & Scott-Ford USRRS cars.

Besnard was sitting on the pre-grid for the race when Dyson approached.

“A guy in a Dyson Racing shirt sat on my front wheel and started talking to me,” Besnard said.

“When I introduced myself to him, he said, T’m Rob Dyson’ and it went from there.”

Straight after his all-theway win Besnard was invited to Dyson’s pit for lunch and, after discus sions with drivers James Butch and Weaver Leitzinger and team engi neers, Dyson invited him to test in the near future.

“I don’t know when or where it could happen,” said Besnard.

“It (sportscar racing) is not necessarily where I want to be but, even if nothing else is going to happen, this is really some thing to look at. To race with a team like this in an event like the Daytona 24 Hour would be something special.

“The series looks to have a great future. (US car con structor Dan) Panoz is working hard on next sea son and it looks like there will be a US$300,000 purse at every race next season.”

Former driver Dyson, a New York-based million aire businessman, is one of the stalwarts of US sports car racing, having had a long history of running quality machinery (usually

Porsches) since the early 1980s.

His team runs two 670hp Ford-powered R&Ss in the USRRS, cars virtually identical to the one driven at Le Mans by Wayne Gardner.

Despite the offer of the sportscar test, Besnard and his management are work ing on securing a full-time drive in either the Toyota Atlantic or Indy Lights championships.

“I’d rather do a Lights series with my current race engineer,” said Besnard.

“We just keep proving that this (winning races) is the way it’s going to be.”

On the way from MidOhio to Iowa (where he is crewing this weekend for a karting team!) Besnard also paid a brief visit to Tasman Motorsport’s head quarters, where team owner Steve Horne met with him for 30 minutes.

Besnard is also trying to arrange a similar meeting during the next Mid-Ohio race weekend with Bobby Rahal. Both Tasman and Team Rahal run Lights programs alongside their CART efforts.

The Sydney driver got things back on the rails at Mid-Ohio, taking pole.posi tion and leading all the way to an almost seven second win over the 31 car field.

“My car was great,” said Besnard aftqr the win. “I really only had to go seven tenths for most of the race.

“I don’t really like to say it, but today was as easy as it looked.”

After qualifying on pole position for the fifth time this season - by almost half a second - Besnard ran away from the field on the classic course and was untroubled in leading home the similar Van Diemens of Marc C amir and and Greg LeMond.

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like a column from me for When Mr Hassall said he’dI the post-Le Mans issue, was rather hoping I would be able to write about how well the event had gone for Mercedes. But, as you now know, that wasn’t the case and for the past week we’ve been lick ing our wounds! That’s motor rac ing, I guess...

Ithink I mentioned my last col umn that, even at inpre-qualifying, the atmosphere that surrounds Le Mans is just unbelievable, so you can imagine what it was like in the week building up to the actual race.

Along with the rest of the Mercedes AMG team, I arrived at the track on the Monday before the race. Because it was Mercedes’ first appearance at Le Mans for almost a decade, there was a lot of interest in the team and the dri vers, and it started at the tradition al scrutineering in the city centre.

It took the team almost 20 min utes to open the back of the trans porter because the crowd was like a swarm of bees around a honey pot! The drivers had to be there for official checks, so this was my first real understanding of what Le Mans was all about.

There was an estimated 6000 people there and thjs was only scrutineering! More about the crowds later, though...

Qualifying fantastic for us ...I and thatwas is perhaps where should leave it for this issue! No, Bernd did a great job in qualifying and certainly put a rocket up Mr Brundle’s bum!

After Bernd put us on pole, I did But the variance between me My own preparation Le Mans started two weeksfor before the some set-up work with fuli tanks race when I spent a lot of time at shifting 250 revs earlier than and race tyres, and all Klaus and the AMG factory with the boys and Bouchut was between six- and Bernd were telling me was to make eight-tenths of a second per studied the telemetry from pre-qual sure we had a comfortably bal ifying with Gerhard Ungar (the straight of which there are five anced car through the Porsche at Le Mans - because the gears team’s technical chief).

Curves, which is a very, very fast One thing I was keen to have a are so tall. For example, when I right-left-left-right-left section shook the cars down at look at was one of my laps com (you’ve got to see it to know what pared to Christophe Bouchut, who Hockenheim (short circuit) with I’m talking about!) and the rest would be fine. is a previous Le Mans winner. The the Le Mans ratios, I was just telemetry told me that after his using fourth gear - yes, Le Mans Then came Friday and the tradi seven laps in pre-qualifying and my is very fast. tional street parade of the competi first seven laps, tors in vintage cars. he was four sec Again, we were unbe onds faster than lievably popular me. because we were start Where I was ing on pole position.

There must have losing 80 percent been close to 30,000 of my time was, much to my own people lining the disbelief, on the streets of Le Mans, straights! I have a which was very impres habit when I’m sive, but it caused a few problems for us on learning circuits to short-shift a little leaving the parade to return to the track. bit (shifting before maximum revs), As you can imagine, even though I’m five racing drivers packed into a driving flat out.

Mercedes road car You might think I’m stupid that I leaving a crowded could not pick or event was a recipe for feel that loss on disastp'r and, to make the day, but it’s things 100 times difficult to feel 10 worse, the team’s kays difference at THE RELENTLESS PRESSURE... Webber,Schneider and the Hawaiian Tropic giris discuss race crazy Frenchman, Jean-Marc Gounon, 335kph. tactics, pit strategy, hair care products and how to get onto poie position. (Photo by Peter Poxwords & pictures)

was behind the wheel ...

As we were inching our area, way through the very crowded Bernd mentioned it would be quick er to walk, so someone decided they would - the driver! Jean-Marc left It in “drive”, got out, closed the door and left it to Klaus in the pas senger seat to try and stop the car while hitting the least amount of people possible. A trifle difficult with a foot handbrake!

After having a tew fiery French on the bonnet, Klaus got it very harshly into “park” and, typically, Gounon got back in as if nothing had happened. People didn’t know whether to shout at him or get his autograph!

Well, I suppose ought mention to finish off by making I some of our race, but it won’t take up too much space!

You can say as many “ifs” and “buts” as you want, and I have cer tainly said them a lot since Le Mans. You can’t really expect to do a 24 hour race without running into some sort of trouble, but in our long-distance testing, such prob lems were always few and far between and we could always get back to, the pits to cure whatever the problem was.

What happened in the race was the first time we couldn’t get the car back and, even if we had, it was all over as the damage couldn’t be repaired.

It was a big empty feeling for everybody, especially since we ran for 20 hours at Homestead a cou ple of months ago and only stopped for fuel and tyres and that was our first test with the car. But “that’s Le Mans”, as Klaus told me after we went out...

Jeff Gordon for FI?

By JOE SAWARD

NASCAR star in Formula 1 \ about Grand Prix racing, Gordon is one of the United may seem absurd, Gordon may THESE have been rumours be interested in such a move.

States of America’s top sports He is still only 26 years of names and is a polished that Alex Zanardi is plan ning to return to FI,but we age but has already won the media performer.

While Gordon might see FI have recently heard a NASCAR Winston Cup title twice. With CART and IRL as a good challenge, it is hard remarkable story suggest ing that NASCAK’s Jeff currently unable to produce a to imagine that he would be has been topline American single-seater able to earn as much money Gordon approached by Williams to racer for FI, it is a logical step in FI as he can in NASCAR. consider an FI career. for FI to look to NASCAR, Last year Gordon earned The approach was made last where Gordon has been the around $65m, mainly from winter and has been confirmed dominant force in recent endorsements and licensing.

With a big marketing push

by Jimmy Johnson, the man years.

He would be a great catch from companies such as who negotiated Gordon’s deal with Hendrick Motorsport, but for FI as it tries to break into Universal (which has backed who is now working for a rival North America in 2000, with both Williams and Gordon in team. plans for an American GP and the past), a deal might be While the concept of a Sylvester Stallone’s movie * possible.

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Mansell stars in BTCC

RED FIVE, FIVE...

Nigel Mansell ran hot and cold at Donington - running off the track in race one but roaring from 19th to the lead in the wet race two.

Here he leads John Cleland just before the Scot blasted past for the win. Cleland later said the race was the best in which he had ever driven.

F1?

By JOE SAWARD AS we predicted back in March, the Honda Motor Company will enter Formula 1 in 1999 - a year earlier than generally with an expected announcement expected to be made at the British Grand Prix.

We understand that Honda has decided to concenti'ate on a one-team, in-house project to be run by former Grand Prix driver Satoru Nakajima, with technical assistance from Harvey Postlethwaite.

Our spies in Japan report that the Honda project is a lot further advanced than it appears, with a Japanesedesigned car already under construction out there, and that there is a major tobacco company involved.

The obvious candidate is RJR Nabisco through its Camel brand.

The other tobacco company which might be involved is Imperial Tobacco with the John Player Special brand.

Current Tyrrell driver Toranosuke Takagi is expect ed to be one of the Honda drivers, with current specu lation suggesting that Alex Zanardi will be the team leader, though Jacques Villeneuve has also been mentioned.

(Photo by Bothwell Photographic)

Mixed luck for Andrej, Scifleet, Ambrose and White

But then came the rain

ANDREJ Pavicevic and (which sent the^fieid in for a Phillip Scifleet have con variety of tyre choices) and tinued their good form in .several Safety Car periods. the ninth round of the During this time there was British Formula Three one constant; Mansell, smok at Championship ing through the field to take what had looked like an Snetter-ton.

The two Australian dri unlikely lead. vers qualified 18th and 19th As the pack crossed the respectively in wet condi line to complete their 25th tour Mansell held a second’s tions on the Norfolk track and finished 12th and 14th, NIGEL Mansell’s return lead over Cleland, with British Touring Car Championship Donington Park, June 12/13 Round 11(23 laps) Round 12(39 laps) Leslie third from Muller and Scifleet once again taking to top-line motor sport at GB Nissan Primera 34m 23.250s 1 Cleland 53m 49.318s 1 Anthony Reid the honours in the thinlyMatt Neal’s Nissan.

Nigel Donington Park was a +0.705S 2 Leslie +4.672S 2 Rickard Rydell SWE Volvo S40 held on in front of a deter GB Ford Mondeo supported National Class +1.110S 3 Warwick +8.632s 3 Will Hoy great success, the 1992 HOL Honda Accord 4 Peter Kox +4.672S 4 Muller +11.137s mined Cleland for five laps, for older cars.

World Champion leading GB Vauxhall Vectra 5 John Cleland +6.699S 5 Mansell +9.544S* one of the most dramatic The race was interrupted the Scot out-fumbling the 6 Gianni Morbidelli ITA Volvo S40 +7.238S 6 Neal +11.483s BTCC rookie as they by a Safety Car period after FRA Audi A4 BTCC races ever staged.

7 Yvan Muller +7.837S 7 Morbidelli+56.180s GB H6nda Accord 8 Robb Graven entered the Goddards chi- Scifleet’s team-mate Martin Mansell and his Ford +8.188s 8 Rustad 38 laps 9 Jason Plato GB Renault Laguna +8.41 Is 9 Bintciiffe 38 laps Mondeo failed to win the ( cane eight laps from home. O’Connell crashed his 10 Paul Radisich NZ Peugeot 406 +9.537S lOMoen , 38 laps rain-hit Feature Race but he ; Next it was Leslie targeting TOMS Dallara and, when 'Includes 10s penalty Fastest lap: Reid 1m13.5S4s 95.797mph CHAMPIONSHIP POINTS Rydell 121 points, Cleland se. Menu 85, Plato 34. Reid 80. Thompson 76, Mansell’s Ford, and he the racing resumed, both came from 19th on the grid Leslie 64. Hoy 42, Wamiok S Muller 33. demoted him to third with to lead with only a few laps drivers made ground in traf down to Reid to hold off a five laps to go. to go - more than making up the season. fic, finishing 16s apart. meteoric Cleland, whose Although the crowd were for his early exit from the Rickard Rydell left the cir The race was won by cheering Mansell on to what British driver Darren preceding Sprint Race. cuit with his championship Vauxhall Vectra had started seemed certain to be a podi The race victors were lead intact, but it was a dis- from fifth slot on the grid.

Manning, the first win for a But Reid’s lead vanished um finish, his old FI spar Anthony Reid for Nissan, astrous day for reigning non-Brazilian driver all sea who claimed his maiden champion Alain Menu, behind a Safety Car (twke), ring partner Derek Warwick son. Enrique Bernoldi leads BTCC win with a dominant whose Renault failed to fin- giving Rydell the chance to had other ideas. He harried the championship from performance, and John ish either race. close on his tail. But again Mansell all the way to the Mario Haberfeld, while Cleland for Vauxhall, pack In the Sprint Race, after the Nissan man was able to flag, snatching third from Scifleet still easily leads the him at the last corner. It ing up his second victory of Mansell’s lap four exit it was respond to the challenge and National Class standings as was Warwick’s best-ever keep the Volvo behind at the he has done since the first restart. Reid was 0.7 seconds BTCC placing. race of the year.

Mansell was later docked ahead of Rydell at the che In the British Formula a race position, demoting quered flag, with Hoy and Ford championship Marcos Honda’s Peter Kox third and him to fifth, behind Muller, Ambrose has had another fourth as Cleland hobbled after judges ruled he had weekend at into fifth. illegally overtaken the Audi tough Donington Park.

In the Feature Race Reid man under the Safety Car. The young Tasmanian made the early runrung from Championship front-run qualified seventh in wet/dry Leslie. The Nissan duo built ners Menu and Rydell both conditions in his works Van up an enormous lead over suffered dire races; Menu Diemen and, after slotting the pursuing Cleland: six spun into retirement from GARRY Rogers Motorsport has con- with which of the team’s regular drivers, sixth place on the third lap into fifth position on the seconds by lap 10. Cleland firmed that Cameron McLean and Jim Jason Bargwanna and Garth Tander. then made a mistake which while Rydell spun broadside first lap of the race, an off Richards will join the team for the But it would seem that a Bargwanna/ across the pit straight on though a sand trap sent him very nearly ended his race, endurance races.

McLean and Richards/Tander combination unlucky lap 13 after a clash back to 16th. spinning off and into the McLean will make his V8 debut in the GRM would match physically similar drivers, as From there Ambrose with Cleland. Reid’s strong gravel at Coppice, rfejoining Commodore at Sandown, squeezing in the well as putting an experienced qualifier in sixth behind Jason Plato’s run came to nothing also; he fought his way up to sixth Bathurst 1000 in his Greenfields BMW each car.

Renault, Thompson and lost control'and crashed out by the end of the race. between that and the Australian 1000 Classic.

McLean is expected to test the car further Warwick. on the 24th lap.

“It was a silly mistake There is still no word on who will drive before the Sandown race in September. really,” said Ambrose after the race. “It’s the first unforced error that I have made this season and it’s a shame it cost me so severe-

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ly" It was worse for Steven White in the second round of the Formula Audi Palmer Championship.

After topping allcomers on Wednesday’s test session White suffered a fire when a loose nut broke on fuel rail broke.

A lack of turbo boost ham pered him in qualifying, where he ended up 10th, but after a good start he was eighth into the first cor ner. He picked off another car during the race and fin ished seventh after setting a new lap record.

The race was won by Finn Topi Seijala, who now leads the championship with Richard Tarling on 38 points.

T

here were a few moments in Montreal when I really didn’t think I was destined to race. It’s a long time since a Grand Prix has had two pile-ups in two starts and I guess it’s typical of the way that my luck has been running this year that I got caught up in one of them.

I went to Canada feeling more buoyant about Red Bull Sauber Petronas’ prospects, following tests at Monza the week after Monaco.

My teammate, Jean Alesi, had liked a revised rear suspension geometry and after back-to-backing it on Friday morning I agreed that it improved the balance and the traction of the car. We also had a revised airbox with big ger volume, which enhanced the engine’s t^reathing and helped mid-range and top-end performance.

Unfortunately, I had a problem with a long brake pedal all through Friday morning. It was a bit like Monaco when I left the pits and went straight oft at Ste Devote because the pedal went to the floor, only this time the mechanics hadn’t changed the pads or discs, so it was difficult to explain. A change of master cylinder fixed that, but yet again I lost a fair chunk of . valuable track time.

G

oodyear had some fresh compounds for their prime and option tyres and the ambi ent temperature was lower than expected so

moment I lifted off the throttle. Even so, I nearly hit the pit wall.

We were never sure quite why the wing failed; maybe I had clipped a kerb a little too hard, maybe it was just a manufacturing problem. Thankfully it didn’t happen again!

Qualifying was another bummer. I got 12th place after losing another load of time in the morning with a clutch problem which obliged me to go into qualifying still trying to hone the set-up. That’s not the optimum way to do it.

both Jean and I opted for the softer tyres throughout the weekend.

On Friday the car didn’t feel bad, but my big problem was getting temperature into the tyres. Jean managed okay with his set-up, but we were behind and whenever I pushed too hard the car was nervous under braking, and understeered as a result. Jean ended the day third; I was 11th.

I would have done better than that, but on my last run I had a scare when the front wing literally fell off as I was passing the pits flatout. The nose began to lift without its intend ed downforce 'and, to make matters worse, the remains of the wing wedged under the car and also helped the nose to rise, but luckily everything came back down again the

uJ i'ilulu/juii/i

A

nd so to those starts. At the first I was momentarily delighted to make a decent getaway after the last two races, but almost immediately all hell broke lose in the first cor ner as Wurz went down the grass on the inside and discovered that it is more slippery than tarmac. I suddenly sensed this thing rolling over another car, which turned out to be Jean’s! .

When I saw the state of his Cl7 I thought I was out of a restart. Fie had priority on the spare as the better qualifier this weekend, and I’d walloped my front suspension on somebody, probably Trulli, as we took to the gravel to avoid the melee.

1 thought I was out of luck as we walked back, but it transpired that my car just had a bent trackrod. Flowever, the pit lane was closed by the time the car was retrieved and repaired, so I had to start from the pit lane.

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This time and I saw carnage from a better position asthe Trulli this time clambered over poor old Jean I managed to avoid it all and actually ended the lap in 12th place, despite starting lastk It was beginnirlg to look promising.

Flowever, my car was so slow on the straight that I really struggled to pass Rosset and L Nakano. n Magnussen was also very quick on the straight, but slow in the corners. I could have stayed behind him, but it’s my job to try and pass. I tried at the hairpin on the 19th lap but the back just sljd round on me.

The downchanges had been poor and the gearbox in general felt odd, and maybe that was a contributory factor because, though I didn’t stall, I couldn’t get a gear to restart.

So that was it, race over. Sooner or later things have got to get better! n

Indianapolis GP likely

By JOE SAWARD

V

TONY George, the boss of Jndianapolis and the man who runs the Indy Racing League, flew to London last week to dis cuss holding a Grand Prix at Indianapolis in the year 2000 with FI boss Bernie Ecclestone.

George flew over with Indy 500 winner Eddie Cheever and had a meeting with Ecclestone on Thursday.

George is hoping to get the goahead from Ecclestone within the next fortnight.

“We either have to pull the trig ger or pull the plug,” George told Agence France Presse.

“The year 2000 is right around the comer. FI cannot afford to mis step in the United States again. If there is going to be a US GP, it should be at Indianapolis.”

George said that he hoped that a race would attract 150,000 people, which would make it “the largest crowd ever for a Grand Prix”.

The meeting between George and Ecclestone comes just a few days after Indianapolis officials handed over details of a race track at the Speedway to the FIA. We understand that the plan is for the Grand Prix track to run down the main straight at The Brickyard in the opposite direction to the Indycars.

The track would then turn right into the infield and work its way through the golf course, probably using sections of Shaw Drive; before linking up with Hulman Boulevard - which runs down the

... and Le Mans as well?

F1 bosses believe that FI should be racing at the three best-known motorsport venues in the world: Monte Carlo, Le Mans and Indianapolis.

The future of the French GP at MagnyCours is decidedly limited and there have been several proposals to have the race switched to Le Mans.

middle of the infield to rejoin the oval in Turn One, where there is currently access for emergency vehicles.

When the golf course was designed, corridors were left between the fairways in case Indianapolis wanted to build a road course and George says that only one of the holes would be dismpted by the building work.

George said that he has the budget to do the work and to run the race and added that Indianapolis is the only FI project in the United States which is

The Automobile Club de rOuest, which runs the 24 Hour race and con trols the circuit, appears to be work ing slowly in that direction.

ready to go immediately.

He said that a Grand Prix at Indianapolis would complete his program to “maximise the assets” of the Speedway, which his family has controlled since 1946.

In addition to his meeting with Ecclestone, George visited Goodwood’s Festival of Speed and demonstrated one of the Indy tur bine cars.

He also flew down to Perpignan in southern France, a trip which we believe is related to plans to build an oval circuit in the Rivesaltes area.

Goodyear bosses expect to return to the sport in a couple of years, once expansion plans have^been completed, without considering how difficult it would be to get Williams and Ferrari back.

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Melbourne to open GP season again

FURTHER to our recent story about the 1999 Formula 1 calen dar, we understand that the intention is for the first races in the calendar to be Melbourne, Malaysia and Japan, although suggestions that the Japanese GP might be switched from Suzuka to the new track at Motegi appear to be slightly wide of the mark.

According to our moles, the inten tion is for the series to end with the two South American races, followed by the finale at Kyalami in South Africa.

The calendar will be discussed when the FIA World Motor Sport Council meets in the next couple of weeks.

The biggest problem at the moment is that there are too many tracks trying to get a race - and not enough races.

There are, however, one or two encouraging signs that the withdrawal may be reversed, Bridgestone wants to compete with another tyremaker so that tyres remain in the news.

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Hope fading for Goodyear

UNLESS there is a decisive move shortly from the management of Goodyear, it will soon be too late for the American tyre-maker to reverse its incom prehensible decision to pull out of FI. It seems that

W' :lic first ten wars

Without a tyre war, the rubber is rarely mentioned.

And our sources say that FI boss Bernie Ecclestone had talks last week with Goodyear’s chairman Sam Gibara.

-JOE SAWARD

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World of Sport

Motor Rating Calendar Shell Australian Touring Car C'ship* June 21 . .Calder Park ... .Rd 8 July 19 .. .Hidden Valley ..Rd9 10 round series held around Australia

Slick 50 Formula Ford'* June 21 . .Calder Park ... .Rd 8 July 19 .. .Hidden Valley . .Rd 9 Eight round series held in Australia

Australian Formula Holden Championship'* June 21 . .Calder Park ....Rd 4 Five race series held in Australia

BOC Gases Super Touring Championship'* Rd5 Rd6

June 28 . .Lakeside

series held In Australia 3 July Eight 19 .round . .Mallala

Century Batteries June 28 , .Lakeside

Rd 5 Rd6

July 19 .. .Mallala

Eight round series held in Australia

FedEx Champ Series'* Rd9 Rd 10 Rd 11

June 21 . .Portland .

July 12 .. .Cleveland July 19 . . .Toronto .

19 race series held in the United States, Australia, Brazil and Japan

Pep Boys Indy Racing League June 28 ..Loudon

Rd 5

July 19 .. .Dover Downs . . .Rd 6 11 race series held inthe United States

Formula 1 World C'ship Rd8 Rd9

July 12 .. .Britain July 26 .. .Austria

16 race series held around the world

Winston Cup NASCAR June 21 . .Pocono

Rd 15 June 28 . .Sears Point .. .Rd 16 33 race series held in the United States

NHRA Winston Drag Racing Series June 28 ..Madison July 19 ...Denver .

Rd 1 1 Rd 12

22race series held in the United Stales

SOOcc Motorcycle Grand Prix C'ship'*

June 27 . .Netherlands

Rd 7

July 5 . . . .Great Britain . . .Rd 8 16 round series held around the world

Australian Rally Championship

July 5 . . . .Hobart

Rd4

7 round series held in Australia

World Rally Championhip'*

June 26 . .New Zealand . . .Rd 9 U rally series held around the world

All event dates in this calendar were corredi at the time of printing. Please consult any individual tracks and/or associations for date changes.

Series or events telecast on Network Ten are marked with an asterix.

Check your local guides for screening details.

A career-best third was MICK Doohan’s Spanish another Spaniard, Sete curse continued in the Gibernau, who shone on the Madrid Grand Prix when Honda V-twin, while Japan his race lasted only one ese Nobuatsu Aoki flew to comer at Jerez. fourth on the factoi-y Suzuki.

'The World Champion quali Gibernau scored his firstfied on pole and made a good ever podium finish despite a start but, after being forced wide by Max Biaggi, he was straight-line speed handicap, hit by New Zealander Simon finishing just 1.8 seconds down on Checa.

Crafar and, with a damaged “The bike has been good all handlebar, was forced to park weekend, but I never thought his Repsol Honda.

“Max went wide and I ran I’d be in the top three,” he said. “We’ve made progress wide with him,then somebody with set-up here and of came through at speed and hit course this track suits the my left handlebar,” said Doohan, who sprained his left twin.”

Criville leads the World wrist in the fall.

“The bar broke clean off - Championship despite run ning off the track at mid-dis that’s why I didn’t even try tance, seconds after taking the and pick up the bike.”

But the good news Doohan lead from Checa. He dropped salvaged from the wreckage of to eighth position tempormily.

“The pressure got to me the weekend was that champi today-it was my mistake and onship rivals Alex Criville and Max Biaggi struggled to stay I paid the price,” he said. “I shouldn’t have been in such a on the pace and finished fifth hurry to pass Checa, but at and sixth respectively..

'The podium had a distinctly leastH’m still'leading on odd look - and local flavour - points.”

Aussie Garry McCoy was about it, with Carlos Checa one of the many riders to take taking his second career victo an off-track walkabout, but ry. His MoviStar Honda led every lap of the race and just the Aussie kept his head down to score more points with an held out the strong challenge 11th on his Honda twin. of Norifiime Abe, who took up the Yamaha assault after “1 went straight at turn one, Luca Cadalora went out with but I only lost one place,” he engine problems four laps said. “I was lining up Waldmann on the last lap from the flag. until the back let go and spat “The race pace wasn’t so fast but that doesn’f matter,” me out of the seat. We knew said Checa. “What matters is we’d struggle here on race-dis that I won and I’m now very tance grip.” close to the championship AN incident-packed 250 race lead.” was won by World Championship leader Tetsuya The YZR500s looked feisty Hafada (Aprilia), who beat throughout qualifying and the Honda’s Tohro Ukawa by race. Veteran Cadalora quali fied second fastest and eight seconds. Harada’s team mate Loris Capirossi took pressed Checa all the way third, fighting back from an until his engine went sour and Abe scored his best result early off-track excursion since 1996 on his Team which dropped him to 20th.

Aprilia’s third factory rider Rainey Yamaha. He ran in Valentino Rossi led the early the front-running group stages before crashing. He throughout the race, and only just failed to overcome Checa rejoined the race near the on the final lap. back of the field but pulled out “I ran softer tyres than the two laps later. others and I thought my IN the 125s Lucio CecchineUo chance was gone when they (Honda) scored his first GP victory in the race, winning by started sliding early on,” he nine seconds after close rivals said. “But the pace wasn’t so Tomomi Manako (Honda) and fast, and the others seemed to be sliding too. I tried so hard, Mirko Giansanti (Honda) but it wasn’t possible to pass crashed together on the penul Checa.” timate lap.

PerkinS ENGINEERING

Larry Perkins invites comments from CAMS competitors who have been excluded from races or meetings as a result of ineligible or deemed ineligible components or vehicles during the last five years or so.

Please contact Larry Perkins by phone on 03 9587 6199 or by fax on 03 9587 6807.

SEASON’S GREETINGS... Norick Abe scored a season-best second place for (Photo by RaceAccess) himself and Yamaha in ^ strong run in Spain.

Corser extends lead at'Ring

BRAVE EFFORT... NZer Aaron Slight had a fourth after remounting his fallen Honda.

DESPITE another xmhappy meeting, Troy Corser has extended his lead in the Superbike World Championship following round five at the Nurburgring on Jime 7.

In the first 21-lap race, the Ducati works rider suffered gearbox selection problems that dropped him off the front group led by Colin Edwards and Aaron Slight (Castrol Honda) and team-mate Pierfrancesco Chili.

Fighting the cold, wet conditions and an inventive method of shifting gears that brought on leg cramps, Corser was finally pipped for sixth place by fellow Aussie Peter Goddard two corners from home.

But his chief nemesis Carl Fogarty (Ducati Performance) recorded a miser able pair of 13th places that has stretched Corser’s points advantage to 16, 160 from Chili and Slight who share second on 144.

After Edwards shot away to a com manding lead, a composed and confident Slight came from fifth place to finally '■ usurp his team-mate to record a welldeserved six-second win from the Texan, with Chili, Akira Yanagawa (Kawasaki) and gravel-trap expert Noriyuki Haga

(Yamaha) back in fifth.

Chili led the charge in race two, but inexorably. Slight threaded his way passed Corser and Edwards to chase the Italian down. But with six laps to go, the ICwi high-sided dramatically coming on to the straight, and luckily remounted to continue in an amazing fourth place.

“I was trying hard to keep the pressure on Chili and just lost it, there was noth ing I could do. I’m just lucky that the bike was okay,” Slight said.

Chili went on to win by over 11 sec onds, with Corser well in front of Slight , who pulled a monster wheelie the full length of the straight, for third.

Next came Yanagawa and first priva teer, the impressive Spaniard Gregorio Lavilla (Ducati) from Haga and Goddard.

While Corser remains winless at the top of the points standings, Slight’s rise to second place is equally mystifying fol lowing his get of at Phillip Island, a blown engine at Monza and his crash the ’Ring.

Early leader Haga has slipped to fourth on 143, from Edwards (138) and Fogarty (134).

- DARRYL FLACK

'-V V,

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Report by PHIL MORRIS ALEX Zanai-di brought the donuts to winnei-’s circle for the After a dazzling performance on the Motown streets Zanardi performed two of his trademark bui-n-outs on the victory lap after he won for the third time this sea son in the Detroit Grand Prix.

Zanardi, who led 50 laps to claim the 11th win of his cai'eer, led Adrian Fernandez, Gil de Ferran, Dario Fi-ancliitti and Greg Moore to the line in the fh’st of an eight-fi’om-ten street or road coui-se stiing that will go a long way to deciding the outcome of the 1998 CART championship.

The win today gives Zanardi a 17 point lead over Moore in the championship battle.

Pole sitter Moore beat Zanai'di off the stait/finish line and led the race for the first 22 laps. Zanardi looked around the side of Moore several times, anticipating an opportunity to pass the leader, but the Mercedes was too quick.

That speed - or, rather, the fuel cost of it - had a big say in deciding the race. When Moore pitted under gi-een on lap 22 he tm-ned the lead over to

Zanardi, who subsequently made two very quick flying laps before a very quick pit stop, never rebnquishing the lead.

L^ter the Player’s Forsythe team suffered some difficulties with the fuelling system in the pits and Moore continued to see his position on the track erode as a result. He was passed

by Fernandez and de Fen-an and ran in fomth place until being passed by Franchitti on lap 55.''

Fernandez had a shot at Zanardi in the closing laps of the race but Andre Ribeiro,seemingly unaware ofhis position amidst the race for the lead, refused to yield to Fernandez. That allowed Zanardi to open the lead \ip considerably and he finished 6.624 seconds ahead, Some of the best racing was between Fernandez, de Ferran, Franchitti, Moore, Jimmy Vasser and Bryan Hei1:a as the group travelled the 2.346-mile chcuit nose-to-tail. Herta was forced to retire on Lap 69 with a blown engine, the others all finished within fom- seconds ofeach other.

There were only two caution periods in the race. The fh-st came mid-race as the cars ofChiistian Fittipaldi and Paul Ti-acy touched briefly sending Fittipaldi

A real Ford?

FORD’S CART racing future looks secure, despite the recent acquisition of long-time Ford engine builder Cosworth.

“We’ve been very well aware that Cosworth has been looking at various options and plans, including the possibility of buying Cosworth ourselves,” commented John Valentine, Ford’s chief engineer.

Advanced Vehicle Technology.

“We’ve been trying to work on our part nership and in the last few years we’ve been working together on a great depth of technol ogy. We still have an offer on the table, but we know the negotiations with VW are well along and we will not get into a bidding war."

Valentine insisted that Ford will remain a competitive force in CART and Formula One. “We are committed to CART and Formula One," Valentine declared. “We’ve got con tracts and commitments with teams and we are going to go racing regardless of what happens with Cosworth. We own all the intel lectual property rights to our racing engines and technology and we will not let our teams down. They have put a lot of faith in Ford and we will continue to return that faith in us.

Valentine said that if necessary. Ford will build its own racing engines. “We have built our own racing engines in the past in sports cars and Indy cars in the 60s and 70s and we could do it again if need be,” Valentine said.

spinning into a tyre barrier. Both dri vers were able to finish the race.

The second brief caution period came only 10 laps later as the engine of Richie Hearn’s Swift - which was having a troubled run after qualifying on the second row ofthe grid -exph^ in a cloud ofsmoke.

Mark Blundell slid into the wall minutes later, but his car came to a rest off-line and the officials only called for a local caution. He was the only dri ver to retire as a result ofcontact.

The Target Chip Ganassi Racing Team is in firm control of the champi onship. Zanardi has won three of the eight races to date, Vasser has won two. They are first and third in the points, respectively.

At this stage last year,the team had accumulated only one victory, with Zanardi picking up a win at Long Beach. It was about at this,point of 1997 that the Italian went on his championship-winning run.

If he does that again this summer put down the glasses,folks...

DONUT KING... Zanardi was in brilliant form in taking his first Detroit win.

MAX DOES DETROIT... Papis shocked everyone -including himselfby topping Friday’s damp sessions. If it had rained on Saturday a Toyota would have been on pole... (Photos by Jamie Squire/Allsport).

Points after eight rounds: Zanardi 113, Moore 96, Vasser 80, Fernandez 75, de Ferran 55, Andi*etti 52, Franchitti 50, Herta 39.

Who drives for Ganassi in '99?

DESPITE winning the last two CART di’ivers’ championships - and the last two races of 1998 - Team Ganassi’s dri ver line-up is anything but settled for 1999.

After winning his third race of the year Detroit, Alex Zanardi was asked again about the possibility of him returning next year to FI. ' “My wife will be having a kid this year,” Zanardi remarked,“and for her and the baby it would be best if they could spend more time at home (ie Monaco). That is one thing and, you know,I may one day decide to spend more time with my family and friends. This is the only big plus that I see.

“People think that if I get an offer from a very good team, then I will go back to Foi-mula One, but I have to look at what I would be leaving behind, which is a very good team that can win races.”

Some sources insist that Zanardi has already signed with the ne'w- British American Racing FI team for 1999, but the 31-year Itahan suggests othei-wise.

“Nobody knows what exactly Schumacher or Villeneuve are going to do,” Zanardi com mented. “Things still have to open up, so I don’t feel like I should nish in. What I do have to respect is my situation with Chip Ganassi which is a very good one from many points of view, and I will certainly put 120 per cent into

TQtfTBl WWUi WHKTfuss

The lirmbfitsf of Champion^

CEREAL KILLERS... Vasser and Zanardi trying to do a deal with Chip, Zanardi’s team-mate, 1996 champion Jimmy Vasser, has won two races and is

third in points after eight races behind Zanardi and Greg Moore.

Vasser’s conti’act with Chip Ganassi also rans out at the end of this year so that both of Ganassi’s diivers are hot propei-ties this summer.

It is strongly rumoured that Vasser is talking to Bobby Rahal about replacing the retiring Rahal as well as negotiating with Ganassi, but both Rahal and Vasser refuse to admit they are talking to each other or comment about any of their alternatives.

Rahal is also beheved to be talking to Gil de Ferran.

“It’ll work itself out,” was all Vasser would say in Detroit.‘Tve just got to win races and race for the championship. That’s the key. ff that happens, then I’ll be able to make the kind of deal that I want.

“I want to have a chance to be in the best team,” Vasser added, “and right now, Target/Chip Ganassi Racing is that team.

We have a gi-eat package, great people and the team is really working well together.”

ZANARDI and Vasser are the first open-wheel race car drivers ever to appeal- on a Wheaties cereal box.

Only one race driver has previously appeared - Dale Earnhardt, two years ago.

The new Zanardi and Vasser l^^eaties box was unveiled in Detroit and w'as due to be on sale across the United States this week.

\

12

Jordan to get new technical director Mike Gascoyne, Tyrrell’s deputy technical director, is expected to move to Jordan shortly to take over as technical director from Gaiy Anderson, who has n designed all the Jordan cars since it entered FI in 1990. Gascoyne, a former McLaren and Sauber engi neer, has been talking to a variety of teams in recent weeks because there is no obvious rolV.for him when Tyrrell closes down. n We hear that Vickers chairman Sir Colin Chandler received a less than warm welcome when he visited Cosworth recent ly, with some of the employees in Northampton hissing at their boss fol lowing his decision to sell the company to Volkswagen’s offshoot,

Audi.

n British F3 team Portman Racing, which is run by Piers Portman, may be linking up with the Arrows Grand Prix team next year to run a Formula 3000 junior team. One dri ver is expected to be Warren Hughes while another candidate in Arrows test driver Stephen Watson. n Two of Ken Tyrrell’s grandchildren have bought the first Tyrrell 001 chas sis at auction during the Goodwood Festival of Speed. They paid nearly $120,000 for the car, which appeared for the first time in the hands of Jackie Stewart in 1970. The car failed to finish a race, but modified versions of the car went on to win the World Championship in 1971. n Mika Hakkinen gave everyone a big surprise when he unexpectedly married on the Saturday between the Monaco and Canadian Grands Prix. His wife Erja Honkanen is a television presenter in

Finland. Having been mar ried in a civil ceremony in Monaco, Mika and Eija had a church wedding in Finland last week in the ancient cathedral at Porvoo, outside Helsinki. n The Minardi team sent Esteban Tuero and one of its M198 chassis to Misano last weekend to take part in World Ducati Weekend, a celebration of the famous motorcycle company. The team then left Misano and headed for testing at Magny-Cours. n Michael Schumacher and Ron Dennis have met to discuss the possibility of working together in the future, although DaimlerBenz chairman Jurgen Schrempp has made it quite clear that he does not want Schumacher in the team and is quite happy with Mika Hakkinen and David Coulthard. n The regional coxmcil of the Nievre departement in France, in which the Magny-Cours circuit is sit uated, has invited all stu dents between the ages of 11 and 16 to apply for free tickets to the French GP. There are 11,000 such chil dren. The move has been made because of poor tick et sales for the forthcoming French GP. We understand that only 45,000 tickets have been sold. n Sylvester Stallone is trying to convince some of the current Grand Prix dri vers to consider acting in his planned FI film.

Stallone is believed to have offered the opportunity to Jacques Villeneuve and to the photogenic Giancarlo Fisichella. Stallone would be wise to remember a sim ilar experiment tried in the 1960s movie Grand Prix in which director John Frankenheimer used sev eral stars of the day, with rather “wooden” results.

- JOE SAWARD

Ford moves to build own engines ns VW buys Cosworth Ford take over Stewart now?

By JOE SAWARD EUROPE’S biggest car maker, Volkswagen, has agreed to buy Cosworth Engineering as part of a bid to win control of the Rolls Royce car company, which is also owned by the Vickers group.

Cosworth will supply engines for Rolls Royce cars in the future.

The Rolls Royce and Cosworth deals were agreed by Vickers shareholders at the end of last week and the sales are expected to be finalised in July.

The sale of Cosworth - for $330m - is a blow to the Ford Motor Company’s motor racing activities as Cosworth designs, builds and services Ford engines in both Formula 1 and CART racing.

'1 It remains to be seen how the sale of the company will affect this year’s activ ities, although in all likelihood the con tracts will probably run until the end of the season.

Ford has been quick to limit the dam age of the announcement, indicating that it has been aware of the possibilities for some time and hinting that it has been working on alternative plans which will be revealed within a few weeks.

This may be true as Ford looked veiy hard at the possibility of setting up its own engine-building operation in Milton Keynes a year ago when it was trying to put pressure on Cosworth to produce more reliable engines.

There are many arguments in favour of an in-house Ford FI engine program and in recent months there has been more and more involvement from Ford in the VIO pncgect.

Ford already has all the data on the current Cosworth VIO engine, but we understand that there is a dispute going on over who owns the intellectual prop erty rights to which engines.

We believe that there is no dispute

Canada tobacco move Hill to.CART? Health CANADIAN Minister Allan Rock last week introduced legisla tion which will result in a complete ban on tobac co sponsorship in Canada within five years.

The 1997 Tobacco Act introduced all kinds of restrictions on tobacco advertising and sponsor ship. These are due to come into effect in October but intense pressure from Imperial Tobacco Ltd -

which controls around 65 percent of the Canadian cigarette market - has led to these restrictions being amended to allow for a twoyear period of grace, fol lowed by three years of restrictions and then a total ban.

While officially Canadian GP sponsor Players (an Imperial brand) will contin ue for the next two years, we hear that Players may pull out next year and that a deal has been struck for

Air Canada to become the new backer for the race.

Quebec province, in which Montreal is situated, will not be bound by the national legislation from Ottawa so it remains to be seen exactly what will hap pen with Canada’s tobacco ban.

FI boss Bernie Ecclestone has threatened that FI will pull out of Canada if the authorities do not allow cars wdth tobacco sponsorship.

- JOE SAWARD

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over the rights to the current engines, which are codenamed VJ at Cosworth, but there are question marks over whether Ford owns the rights to the 1999 engine (known as the CKj and that this design may go with Cosworth to Volkswagen.

There is little doubt that Volkswagen will use Cosworth’s racing expertise and use the purchase of Cosworth to break into topline racing on both sides of the Atlantic.

It remains to be seen which of the Volkswagen marques will be used in FI and which teams will be Volkswagen’s partner (or perhaps partners).

We recently hinted that Ford may go even further and move into FI as a complete team, just as Honda is plan ning.

This is most likely to be achieved by the takeover of Stewart Grand Prix which Ford has largely funded.

The only problem to be overcome is that any Stewart takeover will involve the dehcate matter of how to get Jackie Stewart out of the picture without it appearing that Ford is dumping the man who has been one of its interna tional ambassadors for the last 31 years.

Contact Martin fell at EARL'S PERFORMANCE PRODUCTS RUST. PTV LTD Unit B, 284-290 Parramatta Rd, Ruburn NSW 2144 (to find us turn in beside Carpet Cify) Phone (02) 9748 6011 Fax (02) 9748 6241 Bankcard, Mastercard, Visa COD available

THERE are rumours in America this week that Damon Hill has been offered a drive with Team Rahal in CART next year.

Hill would replace Rahal himself, the triple CART Champion having announced that he intends to retire at the end of this year.

There are also stories that Jan Magnussen may decide to cut his losses in FI and head for CART next year.

-JOE SAWARD

13

FORMULA 1

The Monza Gorillas, rock apes and monkey men n Formula 1 slang “an animal” is a driver without finesse, although there are times in the Ft paddock when you hear the wilder members of the driving fra ternity described as “rock apes”.

Probably the most famous Formula 1 '“animals” were two wonderful Italian brothers called Tino and-^Vittorio Brambilla. They were both pretty good racing dri vers but they had a tendency to be a little wild and to do daft things from time to time. And so they became known as “The Monza Gorillas”.

Both had raced motorcycles before switching to four-wheeled competition (which is usually the sign of a raving lunatic) and a series of crashes and wild moments added to their reputa tion.

They were both testing one day at Monza when Vittorio’s car broke down out on the circuit. Tino saw what had happened and decided that he would stop and give his brother a ride back to the pits.

The only problem was that as he was driving along, with his brother hanging on to the roll bar, Tino forgot all about Vittorio and was soon up to racing speeds again. When he arrived back at the pits the team asked him why he was there and he explained that he had stopped to pick up Vittorio and that ... and then he turned round and realised that his brother was no longer there.

They found Vittorio in the sandtrap at the Parabolica looking rather disoriented...

Tino never did into FI,a although he make once ittested Ferrari. Vittorio joined March and scored an unexpected win in the rain at the Austrian Grand Prix in 1975, giving Max Mosley’s March team one of its rare FI victories, AS he crossed the line Vittorio punched the air with both hands, in exuberant Italian style, and promptly lost control of the car and smashed into the barriers.

They don’t make racing drivers like that any more, although, having watched Jean Alesi’s qualifying lap at Monaco, one has to say that there is at least one great rock ape left in a sport full of smoothies.

Everyone else looks so neat and tidy. You get the feeling that Michael Schumacher could throw his car around if he needs to but that efficiency - a much-beloved concept in Germany - is not best served by such behaviour.

I was, therefore, rather sur prised in Montreal when someone in the press office muttered: “There are always lots of animals on the track in Montreal aren’t there?” during one of the irrelevant sessions on Friday.

It turned out that he was talking about a groundhog which had hopped across the circuit in front of a passing car, in much the same way as the spectators do on rallies in Latin countries - and with about as much intelligence.

A few years ago in Montreal I remember Sandro Nannini running over one of these furry critters in his Benetton, leaving his mechanics with the unpleasant task of scooping what was left out of the radiators. There was enough fur left for them to have a hat made for Sandro ...

on the screen showing what the driver looks like and giving a few basic details about him.

In NASCAR they believe that the public should be looked after and so before a race all the drivers go into a kind of boxing ring which is set up opposite the biggest grandstands and are introduced by a commentator with a suitable level of showmanship. The crowds boo and hiss the bad guys. Some wear black hats, some wear white ones. They all limp like racing dri vers should and they all have great names like “Rusty Trawler”, “Fireball Roberts” and “Buckshot Jones”.

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In Canada thi^ year most of the animals I saw yvere in the Formula 1 paddock, dressed up in blazers and doing security work for the teams. Yes, folks, you may think you get a rough time getting close to the drivers because FI has (his

expect McLaren will go one better and have a drawbridge and minefields.

In fact I can imagine a situation where members of the Formula 1 press corps will have to arrive with a vaulting horse and, while some

fixation out of their about ivory keeping towers, people but today, even if you get into the paddock, through the high fences and the swipe card machines, you now have to get past the monkey men, the PR interception teams and the personal managers to get into the presence of a great and glorious individual. It is like an obstacle race. A sort of Alice in Wonderland above ground.

At the moment paranoia is run ning high in the FI paddock because of the vagueness of the regulations and the concept that all new ideas must be hidden,

will pretend to practice leapshorse and bounds, inside the wooden others will tunnel their way under the wire to talk to the drivers,

The blazer-clad thugs orders to let no-one intohave the hallowed areas unless they have a team pass dangling around their neck. No-one is safe because monkeymen have no knowledge whatsoever of motor racing so can turn away everyone, even His Formula One-ship, Bernard Ecclestone.

In an effort to create a veneer of civility, they ask the visitors the purpose of their visit and they receive a variety of different replies. My favourite comes from the wife of one FI team owner who went to visit the wife of another team boss and was refused entry. What did she want? She was there, she said, to look at the design of the table cloths.

Monkey men rarely have a sense of humour, Criticising the use of monkey men, however, is not a very bright thing to do because it will only be a matter of time before some team or other will institute its own systern of swipe cards and will put up chain-link around themselves. I

For a long time now I ha^eof been pondering the purchase serious bugging devices to save myself the trouble of actually wasting my life trying to talk to important people. You can buy directional microphones these days which will pick up the quietest conversa tion. You can buy laser-beam bugs which measure the tiny move ments of a window made by sound waves and then converts the vibrations back into word form. Several teams have already foreseen this and have installed double-glazing in their motorhomes.

If things do not change, access to the big players will soon be restricted to big press conferences - where nothing of any value is ever said - or to the drivelsome press statements which teams feel the need to dis perse after the major ses sions during a Grand Prix __ weekend. These consist of such really useful quotes such as: “I am very happy with the alter ations we made to the car and I expect to improve tomorrow” or “We made a big step forward but it was not obvious from the timesheets” or even “I am very happy to be on pole position but I think that my teammate did a real ly good job.”

Foi'mula 1 is so politically-correct and corporate that you never see a driver quoted as saying what he really thinks. Wouldn’t it be nice if press releases said: “I think the

designer of this car needs psychi atric help” or “I hate my team, they couldn’t run a sharp stick through a rice pudding" or even “I really enjoyed beating my teammate because he deserved a good kick ing”.

Actually, speaking to a driver these days is a pretty difficult thing to achieve because they spend most of their time staring into com puters and having meetings to dis cuss what the team’s official line will be when the media ask certain questions.

Jacques Villeneuve and his consultants have done a brilliant job hijacking the image of the Formula 1 rebel. It was not hard because nobody was out there dressing in silly clothes and tipping bottles of Royal Blue Washable ink over their peroxided hair.

There of good ties inare F1lots racing, butpersonali for some reason everyone thinks it is wrong to say anything even vaguely con troversial. They might just as well be talking dummies, which say; “I am very happy. My car is perfect. I will be World Champion for sure” when you press the right buttons.

I was reminded of the plastic stars the other day when I was on the flight to Montreal and found myself reading one of those won derfully daft inflight magazines one stumbles across on US air lines.

Clearly American consumers will buy anything, although I would love to know who buys the remotecontrolled indoor flying saucers or the nose hair trimmers. I enjoyed the idea of a drinking fountain for cats and even the vacuum cleaner which sucks flies off walls so that one no longer has to squish them with a hefty blow from the latest National Geographic.

I also loved the idea of a per sonal yellow plastic smoke hood which you put on your head in the event of a serious fire in the hotel room in which you are staying.

This is such a useless item that the manufacturers actually offer a

As he crossed the line Vittorio punched the air with both hands^ in exuberant Italian style, and promptly lost control of the car and smashed into the barriers. They don^t make racing drivers like that any more 0 o e

Everyone else was too busy trying to be like Action Men toys with square jaws, bulging muscles and neat hair.

Formula people think that they are the 1best at everything and know all the answers but there are many lessons which the sport could learn from its American counterparts. In the televising of CART racing, for example, they have tried hard to humanise the drivers with insert panels which sometimes appear when a car is

free replacement if it used in a fire, which would seem to indicate that this rarely happens or that when it does occur the people cannot claim because the yellow plastic hoods have melted onto their heads...

The outstanding idea, however, was the blow-up companion to ’protect’ single women drivers, complete with rather fetching saltand-pepper hair and a rugged look to scare away the bad guys. I must get one and see if they work with the monkey men ... ■

(4 19Jm 1998

SURER TOURING

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l Jones and Richards split qualifying and race honours l McLean robbed of maiden win by Safety Car 9 Jones’ Drive-Thru penalty negated by same Safety Car © McConville and McLean stopped by race two engine failures 9 Punctures cost Hills a likely podium finish ® Troy and Ron Searle take Independent honours Report by PHIL BRANAGAN JIM Richards had to win at Eastern Creek to maintain his hopes of winning the BOC Gases Super Touring Champio nship and he did - hut so did Brad Jones.

The Volvo driver and the Audi team leader arrived in Sydney locked together on points and after a pole posi tion, a win and a second each they left the same way.

But they left leading the series after erstwhile points leader Cameron McConville stopped in race two with a blown engine.

Maybe the man who lost the most at the Creek was Cameron McLean. The Queenslander had the first race well and truly won until a Safety Car allowed Richards to close up and move past to take the win.

McLean failed to get off the line in the second race when

his engine exploded at the start.

Independents honours were shared by the Searle cousins, Ron taking overall top points on the day and Troy taking third outright in race two. But for two punctures though it would have been Peter Hills pre vailing in the second race, the Mondeo running third for the most part of the 21lap journey.

Entry and Qualifying Three years is a long and, time in motor racing give or take a month or two, that was how long it had been since the last Super Touring race at Eastern Creek.

Memories of that day related most to the tyre killing heat, the abrasive Sydney layout turning feral in most unseasonal near-30 winter heat. degree

THE WAY THINGS ARE...

Jonesjust held off Richards at the end of the second race. After chasing the Audi down Jim was 0.1s shy at the flag.

(Photo by John Morris/Mpix)

THE WAY THEY SHOULD HAVE BEEN...

That blurry car in the lead is McLean, who lost a two second lead when the Safety Car came out. The BMW driver served a warning that he can win races almost anywhere from now on.

Everyone was looking for a little relief this time around.

They got it on Thursday, with an almost rained out day and Friday proved inconclusive though McLean’s Dimmer did (Photo by Dirk Klynsmith) prophetically top the sheets.

Missing from the scene SPRINT RACE... were several notables. The The obvious weakness of Starion Peugeot 406 had not the Volvo is its lack of start recovered from its gearbox ing prowess (bottom). Only woes of Phillip Island, while 100m off the line the S40 the Robson/Bradshaw BMW has already lost major was also MIA, as was the ground to the Audis and ex-Diet L)oke/Stef Zelenak McLean’s BMW. car of the mysterious Dallas (Photo by John Morris/Mpix) Chan Pacing which was supposedly to be driven by Bruce Miles. ten-thousandths again.

Saturday dawned fine As the temperature rose and so, obviously, did Jones. so did Richards’ stocks.

After peeling off a lm33.3s Both teams were running on Michelin ‘J’s and the in the morning practice ses sion Jones dropped a little general consensus that cool time in the first qualifying track temperatures suited session for a lm33.616s lap, the Audi and warmer temps good enough for the first suited the Volvo. pole position.

Jim missed the first pole Yes, folks, we’re back to (and matching champi'‘V

onship point) by all of 0.0027s, which translates to about 30mm at the current going rate.

In the afternoon he cer tainly picked up the pace.

On fresh front tyres Jim described the S40 as “THE most perfectly balanced car I have ever driven. When I saw I was three or four kays

faster in turn one, I knew it was there.”

The times certainly backed that up. He came up with a lm33.27s. That’s fast.

How fast? Almost three seconds under Paul Morris’ 1995 lap record. Two sec onds faster than Richards’ own 1995 pole time (set in Ross Palmer’s Mondeo).

Faster than both the 5-litre lap record and pole time for the last 5-litre race on the long Creek circuit, set by Gardner’s Wayne Commodore.

If Jim was happy Brad was less so. He felt that he hadn’t got the best out of self, car or tyres. “There was a low 33, maybe a high 32 there,” he said later.

Worse, in the warmer PM temps, he was on row two with team-mate McConville.

The big mover was McLean. The Greenfields car was going like the clap pers - third in Q1 (only 0.04s off pole) and second in Q2, despite dropping 0.18s between sessions.

The Brisbane driver had taken the time to install a newly rebuilt, blown-up-atCalder engine on Friday night and was impressed with the results. The team was looking like a real con tender.

With two fourths

15

«

Creek

which kept him away from the track on Saturday.

Rolfo had also suffered his woes at Oran Park and his crew spent Saturday night rebuilding his gear box. Both would start at the rear in company with the traditionally RoG-bound Troy Searle.

first win is dose t m

Race 1 (11 laps)

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McConville was looking for ward to his strong suit racing. The Thursday rainout hurt him more than most and he was, like at the Island, feeling the loss of track time keenly.

The ‘front row’ for the rest behind the Big Four was the same for both races - Mark Adderton leading Dwayne Bewley. “Fifth is our first spot,” said Adderton. “We can;t catch these guys.”

Bewley’s only complaint was the number of laps he’d done - too many. “It was my only time on new tyres,” he said. “I did more laps than I wanted to do.”

Alongside Addo in the garage was Graham Dodd.

The ex-Neil Crompton Honda had actually been ready in time for Phillip Island but, wisely, the Kiwi veteran didn’t want his first ever drive of the car to come on the flat out sweeps of the Grand Prix circuit. He has three spins - one extra muddy one in Q2 - on his way to lOth and I2th.

With a 37.6 and 37.75 in either session Ron Searle was commendably consis tent for two sevenths, the Camry pilot praying like blazes for dry weather on Sunday.

“The car feels secure in the dry,” he said, “but if the track is anything but com¬

pletely dry, it’s diabolical.”

Behind was Adam Kaplan’s Hunter Holden Nissan. The Primera was looking resplendent in red and had undergone some thing of a rebuild following the delivery of a swag of spares from Garry Rogers Motorsport in Melbourne.

With two ninths Hills was quite happy in his Ford Mondeo, which was more than Aaron McGill could say. As if combining a FWD Super Tourer with his FWD GTP Suzuki wasn’t tough enough he missed the first session altogether when a broken wire left him with out any fuel pump for the first session and he was only 14th in Q2.

Tweedie was 11th and 10th ahead of the, David Auger Alfa, who had changed his (brand new) wheel bearings in both fronts after they failed in five laps, then he suffered a broken gearbox on Friday afternoon. Justin Matthews and Milton Leslight round ed up the grid.

Or so we though on Saturday. On Sunday two other cars appeared, John Henderson’s Opel Vectra and Carlos Rolfo’.s BMW. After his Oran Park heroics Henderson had been trying to source a rebuilt head for his engine and it was that

he start of hostilities was messy. Bewley’s car broke a driveshaft and looked like missing the race - until Henderson’s engine cut out and he became stuck on a kerb. Dwayne crept around for a (very quick) replacement shaft while the Opel was moved.

There is a theory - agreed to by several notables, including Alan Jones - that the place to start at Eastern Creek is third. Cameron McLean became a devotee of that cult about three sec onds after the lights went green in the first race.

Richards sat there spin ning the front wheels and the Audis both jumped away, but McLean made a great getaway to head all three into the first turn. He already had a small lead by the second corner while, behind the Big.Four, came Ron Searle, Hills, Adderton (about to swoop past the Mondeo), Auger, Dodd, Matthews, Tweedie, Troy Searle, Bewley, Kaplan, Rolfo (who spun at turn two) and McGill, who stalled at the start.

Richo wasn’t going to waste time. At turn nine (now called ‘Criville’s Folly’) he out-braked McConville for third and was about to receive some good news Jones had jumped the start and was going to be blackflagged for a drive-through penalty.

But the black-flag took a while and Brad took a few laps to respond. He had other problems to deal with in the short-term; not only was the Volvo crawling all over his bumper bar but

McLean was surging away, courtesy of a lm33.86s first lap. And Jim was only a tenth slower.

On lap three two bad things happened for Brad; he slipped a wheel onto the grass coming onto the straight and the black-flag appeared. Richards moved into second but McLean was 1.5s up the road, driving superbly and holding the gap comfortably.

Soon it was two seconds.

The BMW was just too quick and, even though he later said that he was hope ful of closing the gap, Richards wasn’t going to realistically kill his car catching McLean while the Audis were behind him.

Then Jones got some good luck, and McLean some baH. Rolfo’s throttle had been cutting out and when it cut on lap five, the BMW spun on the outside of turn five.

It was deemed to be in a dangerous spot and the Volvo Safety car headed out... ... at the same time Jones was heading in for his penalty. While the Audi was doing 60 kays in the pitlane the cars on the track weren’t going much faster.

He resumed fourth, right behind McConville, after losing only one spot, also caused That McLean’s undoing. After three laps he made a good restart but Richards was all over him. Feeling that his tyres were perhaps not quite as sharp as they had been, McLean left a tiny gap at turn six and R'lchards was through after a panel kiss.

The Audis was still right there, Jones predictably moving past McConville on the restart, but McLean was not finished. He tried the outside of Richards at turn two on the final lap, locked the rears and gyrated onto the damp grass.

By the time he got onto the^tar again, the podium spots were all taken.

Continued over page

COUSINS...Troy Searle had his best result of the season in the Roadchill BMW, taking third in race fwo from the rear of the grid.

(Photo by Dirk Klynsmith)

Boxing clever

CAMERON McLean’s garage looked like Mission Control at the Creek.

In terms of hardware the team looked to have taken a major step for ward, utilising the exBMW Motorsport Australia computer con sole(above)for the first time this season.

While the McLean team was playing down the arrival at the track of the gear(which has been in their Brisbane work shop all season) it was significant, not so much for the computers themsleves but for the data potentially contained inside.

At Eastern Creek though the information was a moot point: BMWMA’s only 1997 Eastern Creek test was rained off.

McLean himself was not getting carried away

with the hardware.

We’re still a customer team,”: he pointed out.

“We paid for the car, we pay for parts, we pay for engines.”

While there is no doubt that is true, one of the many parties interest ed in the Greenfields BMW’s progress is Reudi Gmeiner, head of BMW Motorsport’s touring car program. Gmeiner is kept up-to-date after each day’s running and is well aware of how competitive the customer team is.

Also in the team’s garage was an engine box which arrived from Germany containing their newly-rebuilt engine, it was suitably adorned by the team with some other BMW’s drivers names.

For a team which pre pares cars so well, they sure are bad at spelling ‘Winkelhock...

- PHIL BRANAGAN tt

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V

n How many scrutineers does it take to change a light bulb? During the in garage scmtineering ses sion on Satui-day the two Greenfields Mowers cars Cameron McLean’s BMW and Ross Dillon’s Holden Commodore GTP careach received a slip allow ing them to start Super Touring qualifying. Never mind that the Commodore had a fiill interior, “Holden’ badges and a 5-litre V8 in

plain sight...

n Seen at the Creek were 5-litre Tall Guys Steven Johnson and Garth Tander. The two had flown to Sydney for the long weekend to take in a fiiend’s birthday party and were looking slightly worse for wear on Sunday. n Also present was Graham Moore. The for mer Privateers Cup win ner was an interested obsei-ver but admitted to wanting to do “something” for the AMP Bathurst 1000. The Sydney veteran would not be drawn on whether it would be with the Williams-Renault team though, a While regular TOCA 'TV production boss Tim Jai'dine was absent(mak ing the hard yai'ds at Le Mans)Network lO’s sport ing chief David White showed up at the Creek.

The Targa Tasmania regu lar was keeping a close eye on the Commodore Cup races and would be a sure candidate for a guest drive, if any are available... □ Peter Hills and his Knight Racing Team ai'e planning to get their third Ford Mondeo built. The exUSA car, which will be built up as a roller, is, according to Hills, the best-built of the three the team has.

H Keeping an eye on his former mount was Neil Crompton. The ex-Tasman Honda Accord was being driven for the first time by NZer Graham Dodd and ‘Cromley’ was only too keen to give the odd piece of advice about his old car when asked.

■ Monopoly; Richards’ pole was his filth of the season, Jones’ his third.

No-one else has had a fastest qualifying time so fai’ this year.

■ Bob Holden gave Robert D’Ercole a drive in the Faber-Castell BMW duiing mid-week practice.

The former European Formula Ford front-nmner completed a few quiet laps and may be given the change to drive the car later in the season.

■ While Nissan badges ate not especially promi nent on Adam Kaplan’s Hunter Holden-backed Primera, Mark Adderton’s Honda Accord runs a Mitsubishi giille badge in deference to his sponsors.

And they wonder why we media get confused...

-PHILBRANAGAN

Continued from page 15 Richards took an almost-asecond win over Jones and McConville while, behind McLean, Hills (with a really bad flat-spotted rear tyre) and Dodd had a great battle.

Adderton’s recovery to fifth was good (although pre dictable these days) just ahead of Ron Searle.

Hills and Matthews fol lowed ahead of Kaplan, who battled with a broken roll-bar during tbe race. Tweedie was next, surviving a spin with Bewley whose car blew and engine shortly after.

Race 2 (21 laps)

M

cLean’s luck had to change, didn’t it? All he had to do was make a good start, a clean stop (his crew had been doing 9s stops in practice) and keep his nose clean.

The first bit was the hard est. At the red light all the revs rose and, at the green, the Dimmer moved only a foot before pulling off. A conrod had gone through the . engine block and the team’s 200km old engine was blown to hell. As was his race.

McLean walked disconso lately across the track as the race went on without him.

Jones led away from McConville, Richards, Hills, R Searle, Matthews, Tweedie, Dodd, Troy Searle, Adderton (lousy start and contact witb'Kaplan twice in the first half lap), Rolfo and Auger, with Kaplan pitting after a lap to have the Nissan looked at before; / resummg.

As Jones pulled away Richards zoomed by McConville on the straight on lap two for second, with the S40 homing in on the rear of the A4.

McConville wasn’t long for this world. He felt the engine was down-on-power and, on lap seven, the throttle jammed open at turn two.

The engine dropped a cylin der and, after a few corners, he parked to watch his cham pionship lead evaporate.

Adderton started the pit cycle two laps earlier and resumed after a disastrous 32s stop, hampered by a jammed right front wheel nut. As the battled for the lead weaved down the straight to avoid McLean’s Agip, Hills was now third outright, with Ron Searle looking for a way by.

More good/bad luck. Rolfo’s throttle problems had been traced to his gear-shift cut out switch and so bad did it get that the car stopped alto gether on lap six. He got it going again and trundled around to the pits, rolling down the entry on lap 10 just as the Volvo peeled in for Jim’s compulsory stop.

It was close (about 10mm by all accounts) but Richards made it in without hitting the BMW, resuming after a neat 13s stop.

Jones lasted another lap before his stop and the BJR team was spot-on with a superb 9.6s effort. He resumed four seconds in the lead but the Volvo was closmg.

Ron Searle’s hopes of get- r ting Hills were dashed by a tyre. He made it all the way

NEIL’S WHEELS... Dodd debuted the ex-Cromptoh Honda and the car looks to have the speed to upset the order behind the ‘Big Four'. SPRA Y TIME... Richards, Jones and Searle get into it after race two. (Photos by oirk KiynsmimandJohn Moms/Mpix)

around on tbe deflating left-j rear but, when the team tried to change it the Camry’s suspension wouldn’t droop enough to allow them the change it in less than 30s.

Then it was Hills’ turn to have a tyre go. After his stop he was still third and he held his spot by the newer tyre let go and he struggled in on lap 12. Four laps later the tyre went flat and he struggled in for another. That promoted the stealthy Troy Searle to third.

The battle up front wasn’t over. By lap 16 Richards had the gap down to a second and^ there were spots of rain around the track. Jones’ advantage wasn’t all it should have been; as leader it was up to him to set the pace and, though they slowed by five seconds a lap, Richards was staying under his wing.

But an Audi can be a wide car. Jones wasn’t giving in and fought Richards off with everything he had, the S40 having straight-line speed but the Audi having the line.

He surged out of the final corner and the two went to the line 0.1013s apart - half a car’s length.

The thoroughly delighted Troy Searle was a lap down in third from Matthews, Ron Searle and Kaplan, who sur vived not only more contact (this time with Auger, whose front bumper was knocked askew) but a tyre which went flat in the pit exit after his stop.

Hills was sixth after another tyre went down while McGill, Tweedie and Auger were the only other finishers.

Rolfo stopped past the pit exit on lap 10.

So Jones and Richards enter the second half of the series locked on points in the lead. The score after eight races is Audi 6, Volvo 2f Rest of the World 0.

Silver cars have won all the races in the first half of the year. If there’s any justice in motor racing, a yellow one will win one soon.

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BOG Oases Super Touring Championship Race 1 (11 laps) Pos Driver Jim Richards

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

Eastern Creek, f^SW June 6/7 1998

Team/Car

Race time

Volvo Australia Volvo S-40

24:41.5883

Brad Jones

Audi Sport Australia A4 Quattro Cameron MoConvilie Audi Sport Australia A4 Quattro Greenfields/RedEx BMW 320i Cameron McLean Attitude Honda Accord Mark Adderton Ron Searle Transtar Express Toyota Camry Peter Hills Knight Racing Ford Mondeo Justin. Matthews Faber-Castell BMW318I Hunter Holden Nissan Primera Adam; Kaplan Robert Tweedie IBC Vauxhali Cavalier BBC BMW 318i Caries Rolfo Aaron McGill Knight Racing Ford Mondeo

24:42.5750 24:44.4645 24:47.7364 24:57.6457 24:58.4962 25:07.6156 25:11.1298 25:17.3364 25:35.9678 25:38.0512 ■25:54.5922

DNF Dwayne Bewley DNF Graham Dodd

Fastway Couriers Peugeot 405 Rite Tec Honda Accord

DNF David Auger DNF Troy Searle DNF John Henderson

Olympus Cameras Alfa Romeo 155 Roadchill Express BMW 318i Opel Vectra aap Toyota Carina GTl

DNS Milton Leslight

Race 2 (21 laps)

9 laps 8 laps 7 laps 4 laps

Pos Driver

Team/Car

Race time

1 2

Brad Jones Jim Richards

34:09.0624 34:09.1637

3 4 5

Troy Searle Justin Matthews Ron Searle

Audi Sport Australia A4 Quattro Volvo Australia Volvo S-40 Roadchill BMW 318i Faber-Castell BMW 318i

6 7 8 9

Adam Kaplan Peter Hiils Aaron McGill Robert Tweedie

Transtar Express Toyota Camry ' Hunter Holden Nissan Primera Knight Racing Ford Mondeo Knight Racing Ford Mondeo IBC Vauxhali Cavalier

10 David'Auger DNF Carlos Rolfo DNF Mark Adderton

Olympus Cameras Alfa Romeo 155 BBC BMW318i Attitude Honda Accord

DNF Cameron McConville DNF Graham Dodd DNF Cameron McLean

Audi Sport Australia A4 Quattro Rite Tec Honda Accord Greenfields/RedEx BMW 320i

DNS Milton Leslight DNS Dwayne Bewley DNS John Henderson

aap Toyota Carina GTl Fastway Couriers Peugeot 405 Opel Vectra

20 laps 20 laps 20 laps 20 laps 19 laps 19 laps 19 laps 19 laps 7 laps 6 laps 5 laps 5 laps 0 laps

F/lap

1:33.9613 1:34.2292 1:34.8907 1:33.8642 1:37.3813 1:37.7721 1:38.8833 1:39.8689 1:38.7079 1:38.5291 1:43.6071 1:39.5642 1:38.2956 1:38.2301 1:39.5782 1:39.4873

F/lap

On Qua! 2 2 3 2 3 3 3 8 3 3 4 2 4 3 4 4

1:33.6193 1:33.6166 1:34.1480 1:33.6551 1:37.3043 1:37.6022 1:38.1559 1:40.5001 1:37.7285 1:38.9999 No time No time 1:37.4231 1:38.9687 1:39.8718 No time No time 1:42.4632

On Qual

1:34.6237 12 1:33.2741 1:34.4397 13 1:34.1379 1:39.7487 10 No time 1:40.1187 8 1:39.9175 1:37.9860 4 1:37.7571 1:37.8038 4 1:37.7795 1:38.2011 4 1:38.3436 1:39.8516 5 1:41.1538 1:39.2512 5 1:38.9168 1:42.8345 3 1:39.4013 1:44.5381 6 No time 1:37.6533 4 1:36.8519 1:35.3351 4 1:34.4859 1:38.6601 5 1:39.7725 1:33.8302 No time 1:37.4300 No time

Grid 2 1 4 3 5 7 9 13 8 11

6 10 12

14

Grid 1 3

13 7 8 9 14 10 11 5 4 12 2 6

Drivers Championship points; Richards and Jones 95, McConville 87. McLean 58, Adderton 42, Hills 30, Holden/SheumacWMatIhews 23, Tweedie 22, T and R Searle 21, Auger and Ka,olan 11. Henderson 8, Pickett/Shaw 6, McGill 3, Robson/Bradshaw 2, Bewley 1.

Manufacturers Championship points: Audi 111, Volvo 102.

Independents Championship points: McLean 98. Adderton 80, Hills 58. Tweedie 47, Holden/Sheumack/Matthews 47. R Searle 40, T Searle 38, Augsr 26. Kaplan 23, Pickett/Shaw 20. Henderson 15. Robson/Bradshaw 8, McGill 7, Bewley 4, Newman and Rotfo 3.

Teams Championship points; Audi Sport Australia 96, Knight Racing 80.

WJune W98

By STEVE NORMOYLE IT doesn’t stop very well and it crucifies its tyres, but nothing comes close to Garry Waldon’s Dodge Viper when the road is straight. As had been the case at Phillip Island, the 8-litre VIO had t.oo much muscle around Eastern Creek during the fourth round of the GT-P Champion ship.

But Waldon did not have things all his own way. The Viper went unchallenged in the first race, but in the second it was overhauled early on by Domenic Beninca’s Porsche.

Behind them Peter Fitzgerald pro vided much of the Class A entertain ment as the Falken Tyres Porsche driver fought Rodney Forbes’s Porsche in the first race and then Neil Crompton’s Fen-ari in the sec ond, in what the defending champ described as the most fimstrating race of his life.

Germany 1, USA 1 at Creek

SIXES and TENS ... Beninca and Waldon shared the GTE wins at the Creek.

(Photo by Dirk Klynsmith)

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Qualifying

Fitzgerald might not have got the result he was hoping for, hut at least he made the staiT. It was more than could he said of Paul StokeU, whose Lotus Elise suffered extensive rear end damage after it snapped out of shape and sped into the wall at the end of the main straight.

On Friday it had been Ric Shaw’s tmm, the Class D Toyota MR2 gyrat ing in the middle of the sweeper before grinding to a halt along the wall on the inside of the circuit.

Waldon was another to encounter the concrete wall, although the Viper escaped with minor damage.

Waldon had been on a flyer trying to gr-ab pole position, but he was beat en in both sessions. Neil Crompton, making his second appearance in the John Bowe Ferrari F355, was fastest for race one at lm39.098s, while Beninca gabbed pole for race two at lm38.946s.

Beninca, running Michelins for the first time, was third quickest for race one, while fourth fastest Fitzgerald was disappointed afterhaving been quickest on Fi-iday. The Falken. Tyres Porsche would start race two from third, with Crompton fourth.

For Rodney Forbes, Fr-iday was a wasted day due to a loose sway barmount. In the circumstances he was not unhappy to be a shade slower than Fitzgerald, taking fifth on the grid for both races.

Alfredo Costanzo was a disap pointing sixth fastest for race one, a turbo failure preventing the Maserati from reproducing the speed it had shown at Phillip Island.

The problem left Costanzo without a time in race two.

He was joined at the rear of the class by Terry Bosnjak, making his debut in a Mazda RX7 SP. In testing the car had matched the quickest laps set at the recent Oran Park round, hut at Eastern Creek it was plagued by a fuel mixture problem.

Race 1 (12 laps) “If I’m not two seconds in fi-ont after two laps,” Waldon said before the start, “then I’m in trouble.”

He need not have woi-ried. Off the fine the VIO did its thing gnd carried Waldon to turn two well in advance of the rest. It was just as well.

Behind the Dodge there was chaos. Crompton and Beninca had spun after they pair had clashed, Crompton locking a brake as he tried to slip inside the Porsche. Both drivers accepted it as a racing inci dent; each of them facing massive recovery drives from the rear.

Costanzo was also delayed by the melee, although that was the least of the Maserati driver’s problems. A failing diff was making for lots of wheelspin. “You wouldn’t believe it,” said Costanzo later, “it’s wheelspin-

17

ning even in the sweeper!”

By lap two Waldon was the best part of two seconds clear of Fitzgerald, who was more than occu pied keeping Forbes behind him.

Chris Smith in the second Ferrari was a secure fourth but by lap five trailed the two Porsches by almost the length of the straight. Costanzo was a lonely fifth from Ross Almond’s Lancer Evo V, soon to be taken by the storming Beninca.

Crompton’s progress was not so spectacular. In the end he was lucky to finish at all. The Ferrari’s steering had been deranged in the lap one incident and Crompton was str,uggling to get the thing to turn at all.

As the race neared the end the Viper had little left in the way of brakes and tyres, but the lack of pressure from behind had allowed Waldon to drive cleanly and conserv-

atively. His winning margin was just under two seconds.

Fitzgerald held on for second, Forhes squandering an''Opportunity to pass down the straight when he got alongside in turn 12, only to pluck fourth gear instead of second.

Beninca had recovered to a pointssaving fourth at the end, heading Costanzo, Almond and Dean Canto’s Suharu WRX, who took first in Class B. Michael Simpson was an easy Class D winner in his BMW 323i, while Mark Cohen’s Commodore VS V8 took Class Commodore. Nigel Stones once again was dominant in

Class E.

Race 2 (12 Saps) Fitzgerald, stricken during the weekend by a bout of bi;onchitis.

■'i'

reckoned that Forbes would be the driver to 'beat in race two. But Forbes didn’t even take the start, due to damage sustained during a clash in an earlier Porsche Cup race.

Also non-starting was Bosnjak, whose engine problems had seen him drop out in race one.

Bjqt Beninca was there, and he was intent on making the most of his pole position. The earlier race had proven that the untried Michelins could last a race distance, and so he was ready to go at the Viper right from the start.

Waldon won the start in his usual fashion, but this time the big red beast did not get away. Beninca slot ted into second spot, the black car shadowing Waldon through the opening lap.

Crompton had out-gunned Fitzgerald off the line but the pair

began to fall away from Beninca, with Fitzgerald piling on the pressm-e. Smith couldn’t stay with them but was well clear of Almond.

It only took Beninca three laps to make his move. A better run out of Tuim 5 saw the Porsche take the lead into Turn 6. The remaining six corners allowed Beninca to open a sufficient lead to hold off the VIO onslaught down the straight. From there he was never challenged.

Not so Crompton as .Fitzgerald probed around the rear of the Ferrari. There was contact on lap nine as Crompton got off the throttle when baulked in traffic, the close following Porsche tagging the red car’s left rear. For two laps the Ferrari burned a Michelin on the damaged fibreglass, but the tyre held together and Neil claimed a deserved third place.

Smith’s Ferrari was fifth from Almond, while Peter Boylan (and Murray Carter waged a race-long war over seventh and victory in Class B. Carter won but both drivers were elated after a hard but fair fight.

Simpson was again unbeatable in Class D, while Cohen made it two from two in Class Commodore, Stones likewise in Class E. Waldon emerged with the series points lead, but by a solitary point from Beninca. With Fitzgerald lurk ing a further seven points adrift, the championship remains a three-way battle with four rounds to run.

Pointscore Waldon 96; Beninca 95; Fitzgerald 88;Bowe 44;Almond 33;Forbes 32;Crompton 29.

IHarburg dodges the chaos

JULIAN Harburg emerged on top after races seven and eight of the Australian Porsche Cup at Eastern Creek. But even Harburg admitted it was no way to win a motor race.

Finishing third in the opening encounter, Harburg was deemed the winner of the second race, which was declai-ed after only three laps due to a crash involving Martin Wagg.

The race was stopped while Wagg, suffei-ing some severe neck strains, was extracted from his car.

The race had already been stopped once. The first stoppage came when Geoff Morgan’s new RSCS made heavy contact with the wall moments after the start.

Morgan had taken' pole for both races, with Rodney Forbes lining up alongside in both events in his GT-P RSCS - stripped of 150k^ (spare wheel, GT-P weight penalty etc) for Porsche Cup racing. Setting low lm38s times as opposed to Forbes’ high 38 and mid 39, Morgan looked set for an easy day.

But Peter Bradbury had other ideas. In the opening encounter it took Bradbury some time to get clear of Forbes, Max Dunn, Greg Keene and Harburg, but once into second place he took the fight to Morgan. The pair ran low lm38s as Morgan, suffering the effects of the flu and a knee injury, pushed hard to maintain a gap of around a second over the 10-lap dis tance.

Behind them the battle raged. Forbes ended up a spinner at Turn 2, the GT-P car fi rstly getting out of shape and then coping a nudge from Harburg.

That left Harburg to defend third place from Dunn and Keene, but the latter spun and bogged at turn 11 on lap six.

Dunn finally found a hole in Harburg’s defences and went by into third place, only to retire two laps later with a broken throttle

cable.

■i

SON OF A GUN... Second generation Porsche Cup racer Julian Harburg delivered at Eastern (Photo by Dirk Klynsmith) Creek and took home the honours from a fairly eventful weekend.

By then the impressive Forbes had recovered to catch the gi-oup, but he was unable to fi nd a way around Harburg, who held on to third place. Wagg was fi fth and closing fast at the end, while Colin Ivory was sixth, suffering a power loss on account of an overheating prob lem in his 911 RSR. Morgan’s start in race one hadn’t been gi-eat, but it was even worse in the second race. As Harburg swept into the lead, Forbes and Morgan made contact, with Morgan spearing left and into the concrete wall near the end of pitlane, the front of the Vodafone crushed.

Forbes was also out of action, though with far less damage, while the luckless Keene pulled off the grid before the restart.

Bradbury was also in trouble, his gearbox breaking on the warm-up lap to leave him

without first and second gear.

Harburg again won the jump, with Wagg slotting in for second ahead of Dunn, Ivory and Stannard.

The front three fought hard during the opening two laps, with Dunn making his move on Wagg out of Turn 2 on lap five. Side by side through Turn 3, the slightest of touches nudged Wagg into the slippery out- ; field and into the wall.

The race was red flagged next lap. Dunn passing Harbm-g for the lead in a deft display around the outside in the sweeper. But posi- . tions were declared one lap prior, leaving Harburg first fi-om Wagg, Dunn and Ivory.

Points after round 4: Bradburj’ 115, Morgan 111, Wagg 94, Dunn 91.5, McRae 85, J Harburg 77.

- STEVE NORMOYLE

18

LE IVIANS

Porsche takes Le Mans as Mercedes challenge fizzes

By MIKE KABLE

at Le Mans

SCOTSMAN Allan McNish spearheaded a 1-2 result for Porsche in the Le Mans 24-Hour enduro on Jxme 67, accomplishing a third straight win for the German marque that brought its overall tally to 16 victories, after overcom ing a tremendous challenge from Toyota in the French classic.

Porsche’s triumph, in its 50th anniversary year, followed a car-breaking race of fluctuating fortunes - watched by more than 250,000 spectators - in the best traditions of Le Mans, with only 23 of the 45 starters being classified as finishers.

The early casualties includ ed the two new AMG Mercedes-Benz CLK-LM V8 coupes which were the prerace favourites after Bernd Schneider claimed pole posi tion in the car- he was to have co-driven with Mark Webber and Klaus Ludwig.

The two Silver Arrows were sidelined by the same mechanical gremlin - a broken gear wheel di-iving the oil pump and sei-vo steeling system.

Schneider, running second to Martin Bnmdle’s Toyota GT One, was forced out after log ging only 19 laps, while Le Mans rookie Webber was reaching for his helmet to take over the wheel at the car’s third refuelling stop.

The failure, just 72 minutes after the start, reduced Webber to the role of a dis mayed spectator.

“I’m shocked and disappoint ed,” Webber said afterwards as he, Schneider, Ludwig and Mercedes-Benz Motorsport chief Norbert Haug consoled each other.

‘Tm very sorry for the AMG crew and our drivers,” Haug said. “They have worked faultlessly and ai-e not responsible . for the retirements. We never experienced this problem dur ing the 10,000km of testing

The second Mercedes-Benz CLK-LM, allocated to JeanMarc Gounon, Christophe Bouchut and Riccardo Zonta, coasted to a halt in pit lane at the two-hour mark.

BMW also had a luckless Le Mans, withdrawing both its new Williams-built V12 sportsprototype cars for safety rea sons, following front wheel bearing failures in the opening stages and the risk of more to come.

McNish and his French co-

drivers, Laurent Aiello and Stephane Ortelli, took cornmand in their works-entered GT 198 with less than 90 minutes remaining when the leading Toyota GT One driven by Belgium’s Thierry Boutsen, Germany’s Ralf KeUeners and Britain’s Geoff Lees was crip pled by a recurrence of the transmission troubles that plagued Toyota Team Europe’s impressive new trio of V8 twinturbo cars throughout the'race.

Boutsen, one of35 former FI drivers in the field, was more than a minute ahead of McNish and looking set to score a first-up victory for Toyota when his car ground to a halt at the Ford chicane leading to the start-finish straight,

He was unable to restart the stricken Toyota, which had been delayed earlier by two stops in which the gearbox innards were replaced.

Boutsen’s car became Toyota’s front-runner after that we did.

Brundle crashed himselfout of David Brabham saved the contention soon after the 14day for Australia with a fine hour mark at 3am on Sunday seventh outright in the Ford- morning, when rain lashed the powered Panoz GTR-1 that he l track, shared with Andy Wallace and Up to then, Brundle - co Jamie Davies. driving with Emmanuel They had minor problems at Collard and Eric Helaiy - had various stages of the race, but been the pacesetter, taking pressed on to finish 16 laps the fight to the Porsches in a astern of the winning Poi-sche, see-sawing battle for supremawhich covered 351 laps of the cy that saw the Japanese and 13.6km circuit that translated German cars constotly swapto an overall distance of ping the lead.

4783.781km and an average Brundle’s only consolation was that he set the fastest speed of 199.324km/h.

Wayne Gardner’s long- race lap, at 3m41.809s - an awaited Le Mans debut in an average speed of 220.812km/h.

Porsche had to come from American-built, Frenchentered Ford V8-powered Riley behind after losing time with & Scott that the 1987 500cc its two works-entered cars world motorcycle champion while a water leak and accishared with the car’s owner dent damage were rectified.

The Boutsen-KeUeners-Lees Philippe Gauche and former two-wheel rival Didier de Toyota had held a four-lap Radigues, was marred by a advantage soon after the 163am engine failure. hour mark, leaving McNish

SWEET VICTORY... Allan McNish (below) celebrates wildly on the podium with his Porsche teammates after their stun ning victory at Le Mans in the works Porsche GT 198(above). On the first lap (below right), the pole-sitting Mercedes jumped away to lead - briefly - the Toyota of Martin Brundle. Next is the factory BMW prototype, the second Mercedes, (Photos by Words 8 Pictures and Altsport) then the Porsches and the other two Toyotas, which almost won the race.

with no alternative but to mount a flat-out charge with the hope of making up the lost ground.

The ball bounced Porsche’s way two hours later, when Lees had to make a second unscheduled stop after an unsuccessful struggle with the Toyota’s gearbox.

But the TTE mechanics excelled themselves with an 11-minute stop that put Boutsen back in the race only 33.8s behind McNish, who lost the lead at his next pit stop.

Toyota appeared to have the race in the proverbial bag until Boutsen’s sudden exit.

Nissan’s latest twin-turbo V8 R390 GTl coupes cam paigned by TWR” were never in outright contention. What they lacked in sheer speed, however, they certainly made up in reliability, to give the Japanese company its bestever Le Mans result.

All four R390s which start ed finished in the top 10, with the all-Japanese crew of veteran 50-year-old Kazuyoshi Hoshino, Aguri

Continued Page 20

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LE MANS

19Jm 1998

DIKE

pXo,

A tale of three Aus It’s beSn a long time since Australia has expressed such a keen interest in the 24 Hours of Le Mans, but with three of its very own competing in arguably the world’s most famous motorsport event, there was plenty to be excited about this year.

And it was notjust any old three drivers, either! In Wayne Gardner, we had a former world 500cc motorcycle world champion, in David Brabham the country’s iast Grand Prix driver and in Mark Webber, a youngster hotly tipped to become the next. ‘‘Our boys” were racing for very different level teams.

On one hand, you had Gardner in a genuine owner/driver privateer team running in the prototype class, while Brabham and Webber were pitched together in a real David and Goliath GT1 battle, with Panoz going head-tohead with the might of Mercedes.

ANN NEAL was there to report on their progress: David Brabham Car # 45- Panoz GT-R1 Class; GT1 Qualified 11th Finished 7th "mr^here has been a growing con: fidence in the Panoz camp ever since the start of the FIA GT Championship and recent excellent showings gave the Visteon Panoz Racing Team plenty of reason to feel confident approaching Le Mans.

Rather than the DAMS Panoz he normally shares with Eric Bernard in the FIA GT Chamoionship, David joined Britons Andy Wallace and Jamie Davies in the US-based Panoz Racing Team entry for Le Mans. If you’ve seen pictures of the Anglo-American built Panoz and think it looks an awe some beast of a car (aptly dubbed a Corvette Stingray on steroids by Radio Le Mansi), you should hear the deep, throaty roar of its frontmounted Ford V8 engine. David reported that the noise is-just as loud inside the car, too!

Brabham, first across the line in class at Le Mans in 1993, took responsibility for qualifying the Panoz GTR-1 and set a best time of 3m40.730s on the first day of qualifying to emerge eighth fastest.

The times got quicker the next day and the Panoz dropped three

places to 11th on the grid, but 32 year-old Brabham wasn’t overly concerned: “Getting into the top 10 on the first day was quite good for TOP TEN FINISH... David Brabham’s Panoz}an well for most of the race and gave him an excellent result. us,” he commented, “On the sec ond day we concentrated on race Once back in the race, the Mike Kable and I joined them for a pits, which is really like saying I’ve raced around the car park at Le set-up and didn’t really care about Panoz was able to circulate with pre-race chat.

As ever, Wayne had bags of Mans!” being bumped down. We’re not the relative ease and after 18 hours fastest car out there and knew we had climbed into eighth place, enthusiasm for the task ahead of Cache’s US-built car had only were never going to get pole posi- However, the car gained an extra him but was also realistic. “I know been raced once before and was tion, so we didn’t see the point of position with 80 minutes of the race I’ve got no chance of winning, but I still a little bit under-prepared when trying. Instead, we are very com- / remaining when the leading Toyota just want to say I’ve raced at Le it arrived at Le Mans. The odd fortable with our car for the race - retired with gearbox problems. The Mans and get the miles under my problem with brakes and an oil the gearbox is working well and the Panoz completed 335 laps corn- belt. And, if we finish the race, we pump leakage kept Wayne out of could be looking at a top 10 finish, “ the cockpit until the final session on new engine seems fine.” pared to the winner’s 351.

Wednesday night and it wasn’t “Our car ran really well all week- he enthused. rabham was at the wheel of the end, which enabled us to drive a “Originally I tried to get into the something he was looking forward car for the 2pm start on good, solid race,” said Brabham. race with Toyota as I’m racing for to.

I had to learn the car and the Saturday and drove the first double “The only problem we had was an them in Japan, but they only want stint, but pitted earlier than planned electrical one, but there were no ed people with Le Mans experience track both at the same time and in on lap eight after the Panoz had mechanical dramas whatsoever. or with Formula 1 status. So Didier the dark ... There’s nothing like dropped back to 18th position as Maybe if we hadn’t lost 35 minutes, DeRadigues, who was also keen to doing it all in one hit! The head David struggled to find grip. “It’s a we'd have been on course for third race at Le Mans, found out about lights were facing up into the trees problem we have with the car when or fourth place.” the Riley and Scott option with looking for possums when I eventu a track is slippery,” he explained Philippe Cache, who owns the car, ally got out there! after his first stint.

“I got around in a 4m10s within Wayne Gardner and was looking for strong drivers After that, the Panoz ran at a Car # 21 - Riley and Scott Mk3 with money to help with the team, six laps but had GT2 cars passing strong and consistent pace which I was able to provide from me like I was standing still. I had Coca-Cola.” throughout the first 10 hours and Class: Prototypes been told to try and keep up with had moved as high as ninth before Qualified 26th the ones with the yellow headlights has shifted his base (GT2 cars). I nearly killed myself an electrical problem forced Davies Retired (engine) mid-race to Monaco for the north- trying to keep up. I told Didier after to pit the car just after midnight. A malfunctioning problem with the ompared to Panoz and ern summer and is commuting wards and he asked me which Mercedes, there were a lot between Europe and Japan. He GT2s I had been following. When I rear lights led to the team replacing the rear bodywork, but the problem fewer people in evidence at was testing in Japan last week and told him the Dodge Vipers, he persisted and was eventually the Solution F team’s hospitality arrived at Le Mans on the Monday laughed and said I should have traced to the wiring loom. Repairs area, in fact just Wayne, Toni and before the race. “I’ve raced here been looking for the Porsches!” were made and the car returned to their baby Remy! “Welcome to before on a bike, but only on the Gardner improved the next day the track 35 minutes later.

Team Happy!” laughed Gardner as Bugatti track out the back of the to a 3m54s and he was the quicki

B

c

WE

Porsche wins Le Mans as Mercedes fizzes Team Oreca’s second Masami Kageyama was 10th on 319 laps.

Viper, driven by Olivier Suzuki and Masahiko The privately-entered Beretta, Pedro Lamy and Kageyama accomplishing a Fen-ari 333 of Wayne Taylor, Tommy Archer, was four laps podium finish with their Eric Van de Poele and Fennin astern after losing time in pit third overall place on 347 Velez was a clear-cut winner stops to repair a cracked exliaust header and a broken laps. of the Prototype category, cov :ent The R390s were split by ering 335 laps, way ahead of gear selector. the British-entered McLaren l runners-up Riccardo Agusfa, “We did not have a \rr¥if FI GTR driven by Steve Almo Coppelli and Xavier moment’s problem with our O’Rourke, Tim Sugden and Pompidou in their Kremer car, nothing,” an ecstjitic Bell Californian Bill Auberlen, Porsche, which logged 314 said later. “We set out to con fourth on 343 laps. laps to take eighth place in serve the car and the team John Nielsen, Frank the outright classification. just checked the oil and Lagorcq and Michael Krumm Justin Bell - son of five- water, filled the tank and brought their R390 into fifth times Le Mans winner Derek changed the tyres. It is a place, followed by their team - David Donohue and Luca quite fantastic result, the one 'rAmates Erik Comas, Jan Drudi were similarly unop- we all dreamed about.” hammers and Andrea posed in'the GT2 category, The surviving Toyota GT Montermini. Both cars logged with 317 laps to the credit of One of Ukyo Katayama, 342 laps, while the remaining their 8-litre VIO Chrysler Toshio Suzuki and Keichi Nissan of Takuya Kurosawa, Viper, which ran faultlessly Tsuchiya was ninth on 326 so CLOSE... Toyota developed its GT racer specifically for Le Mans and very nearly laps. n (Photo by Allsport) pulled it off, leading until little over an hour from the finish.

Satoshi Motoyama and throughout to fill 11th place.

Continued from Page 18

»

LE MANS

sies est driverjn the team in daylight hours.

With each driver on a triple stint, Gache started the race from 26th and after the first hour had moved into 22nd. The car continued to make steady progress and rose as high as 14th.

However, things went sadly wrong at the start of Gardner’s third stint when, after stopping for fuel, he caught himself out on full tanks and spun at Indianapolis, the same place he had spun on Wednesday night. He managed to get back to the pits and, although there wasn’t any serious damage done to the car, the team lost five laps remov ing the gravel.

The car slumped to 31st place and just before half distance the Ford engine expired in hands of Gache after completing 155 laps.

“It was a shame,” said Gardner, “but at least I’ve got some Le Mans experience and the plan is to come back again next year. This year was just a bit of fun, but of course I’d love to be in the same shoes as Mark and love to get to the top in GT racing. I want to win another world championship, but this time on four wheels. There’s not many who have won a world title on two and four wheels, but that’s what I’m aiming for. I know the big picture and what I want - the pieces of the jigsaw are all there and now 1 have to start putting them into the right places.”

Mark Webber Car # 35- Mercedes CLK LM Cictss: GT1 Qualified 1st Retired (engine) after 1 hour here can be no faulting the level of preparation and amount of testing that went into Mercedes’ first assault on Le Mans for almost a decade. A large entourage, including a fitness train er, physio, doctor, caterers, film crew, marketing and media people, not to mention the race team per sonnel, were on hand to provide the necessary support. And, to underline the importance of the event to Mercedes, motorsport chief Herbert Haug opted for France rather than Montreal and the Canadian Grand Prix.

Le Mans '98 had a dream start for Mercedes, with the

19June 1998

END OF THE ROAD... With Mark Webber ready in the pits to get behind the wheel, Bernd Schneider parked the leading Mercedes-Benz on the front straight with a blown engine caused by a steering pump failure. (Photo by Aiisport)

it m

1 m I

)

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Schneider/Webber/Ludwig car, dri- so by the marshals, returning to his ven by Schneider, setting the pit on foot, The cause for the engine failure fastest time over two days of quali fying - held in two sessions on was traced to a steering pump Wednesday and Thursdays problem, and the very same probevenings - to claim pole position lem was to strike car #36 just half with a time of 3m35.544s, a second an hour later. The garage shutters faster than Martiri Brundle’s Toyota, quickly came down to signal the Webber cortipleted 12 laps of end of Mercedes’ Le Mans effort for the 13.6km track in qualifying but, 1998. while Bernd ran the sticky tyres and here was utter disbelief and dis light fuel load, Mark concentrated on race-set and set a personal bbst appointment in the Mercedes time of 3m45.594 on his final lap in camp at what had happened. In a the dark at midnight Thursday. He simple press statement, Herbert was the quickest driver on the track Haug said; “Both cars retired with at the time and his lap compared engine failures which were the favourably to Schneider’s best of a result of broken steering servo high-44 in the same set-up in day pump drives. We never experi light hours. enced such a problem during However, Webber’s qualifying 10,000km of testing we did. I’m laps were to be his only experience very sorry for the AMG crew and of Le Mans - at least for this year. our drivers. They have worked The #35 Mercedes, driven by faultlessly and are not responsible Schneider, led at the start before for the retirements.” being passed by the first two Webber left the track without Toyotas, but the Silver Arrow’s completing a race mile. “Haturally good fuel efficiency enabled it to I’m disappointed that I didn’t get to run a very competitive strategy, race at Le Mans, but more than that with a longer first stint than its I’m gutted for the whole team. I rivals. The Toyotas pitted on laps know just how hard everyone has nine and 10, but the Mercedes worked for this weekend, the hours stayed out until lap 12. they’ve spent away from their fami However, any hopes of fairytale lies, and simply the huge effort win for Mercedes on its return to Le that’s gone into the race.

Mans were dashed on lap 19, just “Our pre-event testing program one and a quarter hours into the had run so well and Bernd had race, when Schneider slowed as he done such a good job in qualifying drove past the pits and cruised to a that we really thought we stood a halt in the pit road exit. He tried to good chance of finishing strongly. 1 roll the lifeless car back down pit (jon’t think any words can explain lane but was prevented from doing how disappointed we are.

.

T

(

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED... Wayne Gardner wanted the experience of racing at Le Mans in order to get onto the Toyota factory team and win a world title on four wheels...

(Photo by Words and Pictures)

1998 Le Mans 24 Hours Sr.

21

Pos

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Drivers

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Bell/Donahue/Drudi

2 3 4 5 6 7

GT2 GT2 GT2 GT2 GT2 GT2 GT2

Dogde Viper Dodge Viper Porsche 91 I GT2 Porsche 91 I GT2

Beretta/Lam)^/Archer Hurtgen/Ligonnet/Nearn Nourry/Perrier/Ricci Turner/Ayles/Hugenholtz Graham/Poulain/Maury-Laribiere Amorim/Gomes/Mello-Breyner

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Deep inside the

The new VT Commodore makes its public debut at Calder Park this weekend. Our Technical Editor, TONY GLYNN, takes you behind the scenes for this exclusive story on what the car is really about: of inter-team co-operation After an imprecedented display between the Holden Racing Team and Perkins Engineering, Holden’s all-new VT Commodore V8 Supercar successfully made its muchanticipated debut on Monday,the out of the box performance of the longer, wider and stiffer four-door sedans proving to be immediately on a par with the current VS. Both teams deadheated in the con struction phase, with HRT,the prime mover in the homologation process, beginning its testing program in less than ideal circumstances at Calder Park, while Larry Perkins headed north to Winton.

“Under the umbrella of Holden Motorsport, HRT and myself have gotten together and discussed in a sensible manner the construction of these cars,” Perkins said, “and I’m really very happy about the way that co-operation has gone.

“The assistance I received from HRT to get my own car finished on the same day as them is a measure of that level ofco-operation.”

Interestingly, under the perfor mance constraints goveiming the suc cessful homologation of the new model, the VT package is obliged to

be no faster than the existing VS Commodore.

A rather bemused Perkins viewed that particular item on the political agenda as one designed to hamstring the VTs on-track potential and clear ly to act as a sop to the vociferous Ford teams now out of contention in the Touring Car Championship. r “One of the amazing facets of the racing industry is the paranoia surroimding the launch of the new VT Commodore and,if you listen to some ofthe Ford guys and even some ofthe CAMS people, somehow they thought a Formula 1 car was going to pop out of HRT’s and my own workshop,” said Perkins.

“But, after all the dust has settled, it really is only a bodyshell change, as we still employ t^e same engine, gearbox, driveline and brakes, etc. A chassis change fiould never make a Formula 1 car out ofa sedan.

“Now, while that view may be hard to understand, it does give you a clear insight into their rmderstandjng of racing, which is really, obviously, very limited.

“And that’s probably why, without sounding too out of school, the ontrack success is very much favouring Holden at the moment.

“The reason for that level of suc cess is pretty straightforward and is primarily due to the fact that the Holden teams actually have their act together.

Jeff Grech,team manager for HRT, regarded the VT as something more than a mere evolution of the VS, as the significantly different dimensions of the latest production Commodore required intensive for-

ATTENTION TO DETAIL:

Some of the features of the Mobil Holden Racing Team VT: The bananashape rear wing (above), the rear sus pension and brakes (above right) and all the plumbing In the boot(right).

(Photos by Tony Glynn)

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mative design work to successfully adapt the less accommodating bodyshell to suit the demands of a competition environment.

“The design of the VT was a clean sheet of paper exercise for us, but we were faced with constrictions in which we were in agreement with TEGA,” Grech explained.

“With the new car being longer, wider, possessing different aerody namics, carrying over componentry from the older model and possessing on paper the same speed, it became a difficult formula - that’s why it’s taken so long to get the car onto the track.

“You would usually do something like this in half the time; but, with these constrictions and the ongoing negotiations between aU the Holden competitors and TEGA,it’s been very time-consuming.

“HRT and Perkins Engineering were probably the prime movers, along with Gibson Motorsport and Holden Motorsport’s John Stevenson, who has been guided in his homolo gation submission by all of us and TEGA. “It’s early days yet and it’s been quite a challenge, but I believe the move from the VS to the VT will work out to an even equation.”

A casual glance at both the HRT and Perkins cars reveals a markedly different approach to the cage design, the former sporting an abundance of crome-moly tubing in the latest evo lution of its trademark protective structure, the complexity of which is rather overpowering when compared with Perkins’ understated product.

“Other builders ofrace cars,includ ing HRT,go to lengths to build elabo rate roU cages, while we favour the conservative side,” Perkins said.

“It’s really a matter of choice and they’re obviously happy with theirs,

while I’m happy with mine - we think we’re at the optimum of our chassis stiffness and we still don’t know the difference between our chassis stiffness and that ofHRT! “Even though v^e have good co operation with HRT, I still haven’t actually sighted their car, even in the construction stage.”

It is immediately apparent that HRT has maintained its design momentum, the team consistently producing immensely complex and rigid structures as a matter of form over the last few seasons, with their latest approach culminating in the startlingly different VT engineering tour de force.

“The VT is a very strong road car and its rigidity is up 30 percent over the VS. Now, when you dial that into the finite analysis, that figure carries over and you then consider your roUcage design with due regard for that enhanced stiffiiess,” Grech said.

“While altering the basic car for racing purposes, we deleted some panels and altered the wheel arches, losing some 5 percent stiffness dming the race conversion; but the final piece was the roll-cage, which made up the difference.

“One of the criteria of the whole design focused on weight and we were very careful with our cage design and the material we used, bearing in mind the fact that we wanted the driver protected by a safety capsule in aU areas ofimpact.

“Our design achieves both our aims and meets the FIA. regulations about size, side impacts, etc.”

As the raw VT bodyshell is some 67kg heavier than the VS unit, a seri ous weight-shedding program was initiated in consultation with TEGA. One of the more significant panels ultimately to be deleted was the

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VT Commodore i

V

sandwich panel between the inner considered to be less than compatible. and outer sfils - the so-called ‘third The end result of the efforts by panel’ - which was a stiffening HRT’s Peter Schaefer and Richard Hollway was a modestly restyled, requirement to meet the US passen wider VS variant front air dam that ger car safety regulations when Holden was contemplating VT now featured a shorter undertray, but which retained the key air con Commodore exports.

Ironically, ater the removal of the trol features ofthe VS imderbody.

The rear wing, still mounted on third panel was officially sanctioned and the VT homologation papers twin uprights (but now wider were up for scrutiny, it inadvertently spaced), lost 100 mm of its overall transpired fiiat the Ford teams had length, Wt retained its VS chord secunofficially been removing the . tion and gurney height, albeit in a Falcon’s third panel as a matter of banana-shaped configuration that course! conformed handsomely to the con tours ofthe VT rear panelwork.

A basic, but intensive research and Despite the radically different approaches to cage design, both development program on Holden’s teams’ VTs make the minimum class Lang Lang test track with a road weight of 1350 kg. However, the going VT sporting the VS rear wing weight distribution is no longer as produced what was deemed to be a satisfactory outcome imder the cir favourable as on the VS, the VT now carrying more weight on the front cumstances, even though it was clear wheels. to all parties that the competition VT was obviously going to suffer a signif The aerodynamics of the VT were clearly an issue as the VS front air icant reduction in rear downforce when compared to the effective VS dam and rear wing shape were ; required to be carried over to the VT configuration.

The new car’s steei>ly-raked nose in yet another attempt by the regula tory bodies to maintain some level of reduced under-bonnet clearances sig nificantly, to the detriment of the performance parity with the Ford. shape of the aU-important engine air Bearing in mind the increased front track of some 100 mm and the box (or plenum), so HRT and Perkins swoopy rear-end treatment on the Continued next page VT, the VS aerodynamic aids were

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DIFFERENT APPROACHES... There is a huge difference between the complex roll cage in the HRT (Photos by Tony Glynn) Commodore (left) and the spartan Perkins machine (right). determined a 28mm reduction in engine height from VS to VT was needed.

Rather than develop new mani folds to attempt to live with the cramped conditions, and bearing in mind the fact that the Ford block is shorter than its Chevrolet counter part, the sensible, cost-effective deci sion was made to adopt the Ford crankshaft centreline measurement as the new datum for VT engine location for build parity.

That move meant that variations in the fuel/air delivery systems nonnally employed on the five-litre units in the existing VS fleet gener ally could happily be accommodated by the VT, provided the production under-bormet support structme was removed.

“We did have the option of going back to the old bonnet scoop approach, which some people agreed with, but marketing considerations fr )->n a standard, road-going perspectivi, really ruled that solution out, as no-one wants to see scoops any more,” said Grech.

“With the ribbing removed from the bonnet and using the Ford crankshaft centreline, alterations to the air box were minimal, though there’s still not very much room under there to play with.” l Carrying the existing 17-inch diameter, 10-inch wide rims over to the VT required modifications to the inner guard area of the front chassis rails.

Au tomot i ve

The result enabled the VS strut suspension units to function correctly and achieve the necessary steering lock.

“Considering the existing amount of modifications we used to do up till this model Commodore, it appeared that we simply couldn’t put a MacPherson strut under the VT,” said Perkins.

“We’ve almost doubled the time in our chassis build with the VT that we would normally take and a fair bit of that time was in the front sus pension to accommodate the carry over strut.

“But we did accommodate it and the outcome is fine. It’s still not the double wishbone we would like. We will probably put that on next yearbut we agreed to have carry-over at this stage, so that’s where we stand.

“While trying to accommodate the existing componentry proved to be time-consuming and diSicult initial ly, ultimately this will prove to be a cheaper car, which is extremely good news for the industry.”

Duplicating the Ford approach, the topexisting of the radiator support panelling was cut to allow the VT’s complete engine to swing forward to facilitate quick removal and replacement, which will save about half an hour. This could prove vital in the hurly-burly of the threerace SATCC format.

'The VS rear suspension top arms were closer together than the lowerarms, but the VT now sports equally

spaced top and lower trailing arms to locate the wider live axle, the arm length increased significantly thanks to the boxed suspension mounting points now being located furtber for ward in the passenger compartment - but the Commodore arms' are still shorter than those fitted to the Ford.

“There was a gain with the shorter arms on power down, but you lose that advantage in mid-corner,” Grech explained.

“The rear-end treatment is a compromise and as yet is really imtested, but the main reason for the loca tion points was to produce something structurally sound.”

Summing up, Perkins noted the pluses and minuses with the new VT: “The biggest gain is the wider track, while the biggest non-gains are the carry-over of the aerodynam ic aids and the shrinkage of the rear wing, which equates to pretty enor mous losses. “’The weight is the same, though we’ve lost a few percentage points due to the bigger frontal area of the car - at the same time, we’ve picked up a few percentage points as it’s a sleeker car.

“But the biggest gain to our indus try comes from running the latest and greatest of the manufacturer’s products- and, to seek their support, you don’t have to be a Rhodes Scholar to work out that you have to race the VT. “That’s really what this has all been about.” n

Comme r c i a l

Making it legal

THE homologation process has agree on every mod and I think been quite different with the VT, it’s a welcome relief to our indus being done almost without the try that Holden has demonstrated how it should be done. involvement of CAMS. “You know, this homologation And that is the way it ought to be, claims Larry Perkins. process is half off the rails, as “Every component on this car CAMS and some CAMS office has been made with the unani bearers think they’re running it on mous tick-off of the TEGA their agenda, but the TEGA Technical Committee before it Technical Committee reckons that we’re running our own cate was produced,” said Perkins.

'That’s been a lengthy process gory. What we agreed to is what and sometimes a tiresome we’ve done.

“Now, CAMS under Greg process that has been very dis ruptive for the Holden Racing Swann had no trouble accepting where they had a right to interfere Team, who were doing the prima or not and he’s sorted a lot of that ry mods.

“But the Holden competitors out so that there are no misun l agreed to homologate with the full derstandings.

“But there is no room for knowledge of the Ford competi tors and that resulted in a very CAMS to have an opinion on how drawn-out process occurring that things should be designed - it’s between the TEGA Technical had never been followed before.

“There have also been things Group and its own members.

“While there has been room we had to change because it’s a VT. for improvement in the way “We had to have new fuel CAMS rubber-stamps things, we tanks, new diff housings, new tail- are getting onto the home track to shafts, new exhaust pipes, new improving the way the bureaucra steering column arrangements, cy works. etc - there was a lot of new stuff, “What I’m waiting for now is to even though we tried to use make sure that when the newcarry-over componentry, but we model Ford is homologated, it undergoes exactly the same couldn’t carry everything over.

“Nonetheless, the end result is exhaustive process we’ve had to a very tidy race car and there can put ourselves through - and, for be no dispute from the other party example, they will have to run - everyone, even Dick Johnson, exactly the same wing chord sec had to put their hands up and tion as they now run.” n

Ma r i ne

I ndus t r i a l

CANADIAN Gi»

. 19June im

25

Sweet and sour S<huey He has done it again. In Canada, Michael Schumacher once more displayed his genius and his flawed character, writes JOE SAWARD:

M

ICHAEL Schumacher took a brilliant victory in the Canadian Grand Prix in Montreal on June 7 but his charac ter flaws were once again on dis play as he shamefully drove HeinzHarald Frentzen off the track.

The FIA stewards eventually decided that he should be given a 10-second stop-go penalty, but the move was worthy of a black flag.

The crowd booed him and yet, after the race, Michael was as ■pious as a puffed-up cardinal, say ing he had made a mistake and tried to deflect attention by accus ing Damon Hill of dangerous driving.

It was as blatantly ridiculous as when President Jacques Chirac condemned India for nuclear test ing.

Michael Schumacher is a bril liant racer, but a flawed character.

They will write that on his tomb stone. They may be doing it sooner than he thinks if he goes on driving in this fashion ...

Most thenewly-married paddock expected thatofthe Mika Hakkinen would be the dominant force in Montreal but in the dying moments of qualifying David Coulthard gave notice that he is not going to sit back and let Mika walk all over him this year.

David looked threatening throughout qualifying and in the very last minutes of the session took the risk that he would get a clear run. It worked and Hakkinen was given a lesson.

When we look back at this moment at the end of the year we may say that it was the point at which Coulthard threw caution to the wind. He has nothing to lose.

He is behind in the World Championship and needs to catch up. That is what it looked like; whether it happens we must wait and see.

“Our two cars are the same,” explained David, “and, although I

CHOP SCHUEY... The brilliant German continues to run into peopie, but once again survived to win in Canada. (Photo by Nigel Snowdon)

P R!\ : ^A

FiSi DELIGHT... Giancarlo Fisichella enjoys his moment on the podium with the two Ferrari drivers. (Photo by Race Access) wouldn’t say we have found the perfect set-up for this circuit yet, we have got some of the problems solved. Pole position was down to whoever got the tidier lap and today that was me.

That was the official line, but the Scot looked like a man who had just booted his opponent heavily and enjoyed doing it.

Hakkinen’s practice had been littered with little incidents, but there was nothing really dramatic to report. He aborted a couple of his qualifying runs but still managed to get three good attempts as the temperatures were so cool that the tyres lasted much longer. It »■

was such that several of the Goodyear runners found it was bet ter to do two warming-up laps before going for a fast lap.

There is no doubt that the latest Goodyear tyres are an improve ment but even with that McLaren still have the advantage it has enjoyed all year. Montreal has always been a track where the grids are squeezed up, so the fact

BIG MISTAKE ... Jacques Villeneuve had another home Grand Prix he would want to forget. Trying to get past the Benetton of Fisichella for second place, he locked up and slid off the road.

(Photo by Nigel Snowdon)

that the cars were only a few tenths ahead of Michael Schumacher’s Fen-ari is not as sig nificant as it might appear.

The Ferraris have suddenly made a leap forward and out on the track at Montreal it was interest ing to hear the Ferraris and the Saubers coming out of the corners making strange popping sounds as the engines misfired, just like they used to do in the days of traction control.

This is not to suggest that Ferrari and Sauber is doing any thing wrong - although many jumped to this conclusion. What it means is that teams are exploring the limits of the engine regulations but that there is no consistent limit because in order to discover if something is legal one must ask the FIA. If you do not ask you can not do it, but the governing body does not tell teams what their rivals are doing - and so life has become very complicated.

The buzzword at the moment is multiple-mapping of engines. This means that a driver can use differ ent engine maps in the course of a single lap by pressing a button. On the straights he can have a full blown 780bhp engine but in the corners this can suddenly become a nice easy-to-handle 400bhp unit.

There is misfiring, but it is legal...

On the face of it, however, this made little difference to the positiens of the grid in Montreal as

Michael Schumacher was in his traditional third place behind the two McLarens.

Eddie Irvine was back in eighth. around 1.2s behind Michael, which was his worst qualifying performance of the year. This was largely due to the fact that Eddie spun off on Saturday morning and lost a lot of set-up time. The qualifying setup was not very good and he complained of a serious lack of traction.

He tried Schumacher’s settings but did not like the understeer.

Fourth on the grid was another good showing from Giancarlo Fisichella in his Benetton, the Italian once again getting the better of Alexander Wurz.

Wurz was not very happy with his 11th position on the grid, near ly a second slower than his Benetton teammate. This was pri marily the result of the Austrian hitting a wall in the early part of the Saturday morning session and then suffering an engine failure soon afterwards.

Fifth fastest was a better effort fi'om Jordan after a series of very poor races. This was in part due to the improved Goodyear tyres but also thanks to a new qualifying engine from Mugen Honda.

The two Jordan drivers went completely different ways on set-up and it was Ralf Schumacher who emerged ahead of Damon Hill by half a second. This meant that Damon was back in 10th on the gi-id.

Much had been expected of Williams before the event thanks to the hype after good testing with the new rear end at Monza. The car was better and the tyres were better, but the team was in much the same place on the grid as it has been all year with Jacques Villeneuve sixth and Heinz-Harald Frentzen seventh.

Of course, the cars were not pop popping like the Ferraris and Saubers ...

Villeneuve felt he would have done better if he had not been side lined with an hydi-aulic problem on

Continued on page 28

The hottest drag race of the year & the coolest conditions.

But that didn't stop Bill Curry and the Pennzoil Racing team.

Congratulations Bill on a fabulous Top Bike victory at the prestigious 1998 Winternationals. Your win certainly gave us a warm, fuzzy feeling!

Bill Curry - 1998 Winternationals Top Bike Champion

The hottest drag race of the year & the coolest conditions.

But that didn't stop Robin Kirby and the Pennzoil Racing team.

Congratulations Robin on a fabulous Top Fuel victory at the prestigious 1998 Winternationals. Your win certainly gave us a warm,fuzzy feeling!

Robin Kirby - 1998 Winternationals Top Fuel Champion

2S

0.

%

z LONG FACES... David Coulthard took pole from Hakkinen, but both McLarens were out early.

HANGIN'IT OUT... Frentzen gives the difficult Williams-Mecachrome everything, but it was not enough to be competitive.

ROOM FOR ONE ON TOP... Jarno Trulli came together with Jean Alesi not once but twice before completing even one lap of the Canadian GP. The first incident was partly responsible for stopping the race, but then they collided again at the restart. (Photo by Nigel Snowdon)

- -c,*- n -

Friday which cost him 40 minutes of running.

Frentzen also had troubles and had to qualify in the T-car because of gearbox traumas.

Ninth on the grid behind the two Williams cars and Irvine’s Ferrari was Jean Alesi in his Sauber and the Frenchman had hoped for more, having been third fastest on Friday afternoon.

The problem at Sauber was understeer as usual. The car just does not like going around corners.

Johnny Herbert was 12th and was fed up at having lost inost of the morning session on Saturday because of a clutch problem.

Behind Hill, Wurz and Herbert was'Rubens Bairichello in the first of the two Stewart-Fords and 13th on the grid was not as good a result as the team had hoped for after Barrichello’s eighth place on Friday.

The major cause for this was an electrical failure early in the session which meant that Rubens lost out on one qualifying run and could not switch to the spare car as it was already being used by Jan Magnussen.

Magnussen was not having much fun because the team was unable to give him the same car as Barrichello, who had a longer wheelbase version of the SF2. This

according to Salo, was that the engineers had gone the wrong way on set-up. Diniz made the point that the team was suffering from a lack of engine power, which is quite tme.

The two Minardis were perform ing much as expected with Nakano using his experience to again outqualify new boy Esteban Tuero.

Nakano was 18th ;and Tuero 21st, the pair split by half a second.

meant that Jan had to continue his struggle with the knife-edge han dling and on Saturday morning he lost control and crashed quite Jieavily and had to take to the spare car for qualifying. He ended up^a disastrous 20th on the grid, over 1.5s behind Rubens.

RaC© — 69 lapS

The two Prost-Peugeots were struggling a little in 14th and 15th places, partly because of the' good performance of the Goodyear run ners and partly because the team does not yet have qualifying engines - these will arrive at Magny-Cours. Both drivers said that they had trouble getting heat into their tyres and so could not push the cars with any confidence.

The good news for the team was that there were no mechanical problems for a change.

Tora Takagi was an impressive ' 16th in his Tyrrell, despite the fact that he had lost most of the morn ing session after he spun and

stalled.

Ricardo Rosset was where we have come to expect him to be last on the grid, 1.5s behind Takagi.

The Arrows boys seemed to be .

strugglmg a little in qualifying although in race trim Mika Salo looked very quick. The problem.

f

During Saturday night there was a sprinkle of rain over the Montreal area and the track was slightly damp in the morning, which meant that the warm-up was half-wet and half-dry.

Frentzen was fastest, ahead of the two McLarens.

At the start Coulthard got away well from pole while Michael Schumacher was also quick off his marks and grabbed second place from Hakkinen as they dived into the first corner.

Fisichella was fourth but behind them there was a fair amount of chaos which can be traced back to Ralf Schumacher (once again) fail ing to get away from the line. The Jordan driver’s stall meant there was some congestion as the rest 6f the top 10 arrived at the first cor ner.

Frentzen, Hill and Alesi were side-by-side with no room to go around the corner and Wurz was steaming down the inside, presumably adjusting the car stereo and not watching what was happening on the road ahead.

The Austrian ran into Alesi, was launched over the Sauber and rolled across the road. As a result Jean, Trulli and Herbert all ended up in the sandtrap with him.

Race control took the wise deci sion to stop the race and Alesi, Wiuz and Trulli all rushed back to the pits to get into their spare cars.

Herbert ambled in, knowing that there were not enough cars to go around. But when Johnny’s car ■returned dangling from the back of a truck, it da^wned on the team that perhaps Johnny could make the race. Swiss spanners began to fly. He would have to start from the pitlane but it was better than nothing.

The second start was no less chaotic, although both McLarens got off the line well. This time, however, Hakkinen suddenly slowed when his gearbox refused to select second gear. Cars were once again jinking to avoid a' slow-mov ing oj)ject.

Ralf Schumacher had managed to get off the line this time but when he tried to change down for the first corner there was no engine braking. He dived onto the infield to try to avoid hitting the other cars. He sailed across the grass, over the track and then spun.

This caused more chaos in the course of which, amazingly, Trulli and Alesi collided again. The Frost ended up sitting across the back end of the Sauber.

At the same time both Arrows took to the grass, Salo clonking Wurz, while Irvine had someone

run into his left rear tyre, causing a puncture.

This time it was decided that the Safety Car was all that was needed and so the race was neutralised while the mess was cleared up.

The race restarted at the end of the fifth lap with Coulthard hold ing off Schumacher, who was car rying a lot less fuel because he was on a two-stop strategy and Coulthard was planning a one-stop race. David held on.

On lap 14 the Safety Car was called out again after Diniz went off and deposited great lumps of turf all around the track after he had rejoined.

At the restart Coulthard was still ahead but then suddenly the McLaren slowed. A throttle hnkage problem reduced the engine power to half what it should be and David was left to tour around to the pits and parked his car in the McLaren garage.

“There is little consolation in knowing that it would have been another race we could have won as we had the speed and the strate gy,” said Ron Dennis.

With the McLarens out of the way, Michael Schumacher was well-placed to win but suddenly there was another Safety Car after Mika Salo had a huge crash at the back of the track when something broke, probably as a result of his brush with Wurz.

“I turned the car right, which was fine,” he explained, “but when I turned left I went straight into the concrete wall and destroyed the car.”

At the same moment, Herbert who had driven a great comeback from the pitlane start - spun because of a gearbox problem.

Schumacher took the opportuni ty to dive into the pits for new fuel and tyres. It was when he rejoined that Michael’s flawed character reared its ugly head again.

Heinz-Harald was screaming down the straight at speed. He was in fourth place. Schumacher simply drove out of the pitlane, across the track and pushed the Williams dri ver off the road. The crowd - prob ably not even aware of the rivalry that exists between the pair - saw it and booed.

It was an outrageous manoeuvre and incredibly dangerous. For the laps that followed we waited for a black flag to be shown.

The minute ticked by and with each passing lap he closed on Fisichella ahead of him. On lap 34 - 13 laps later(about 20 minutes)the stewards decided that he should have a 10-second stop-go penalty.

Does one have to put a car in a grandstand to be black-flagged?

The manoeuvre was bad enough, but Schumacher’s post-race self justification was sickening. Maybe he had made a mistake, he said, and if he had he was sorry, but he was very angry with Damon HiU, who he felt had driven in a danger ous fashion...

That incident had occun'ed after Michael’s stop-go penalty when he emerged behind HUl, who was inmning second. Michael quickly caught the Jordan driver and they diced briefly.

As Michael dived to pass Hill he suddenly jinked to the right for no reason. Damon’s car did not move.

The jink nearly sent the Ferrari into a spin. But why had he done it?

One can only conclude that Michael thought that Damon was going to do what Michael would have done in Damon’s position (drive straight at him) and reacted.

Damon did not. He has always been a gentleman.

“He has a set of mles all for him self,” Damon said when he heard about Michael’s criticisms. “We were fighting for second place. He’s a talented driver who occasionally is given the benefit of the doubt.

He is treated leniently and that gives him the feehng that he can do what he likes.”

And yet Schumacher was bril liant in Canada as he chased down leader Fisichella, knowing that he had to build himself a gap so that he could stop again and come out ahead.

r

2S

CANADIAN Gf»

FIRST LAP CHAOS... /4s the mid-field group tries to squeeze into turn one after the start, Wurz in the Benetton charges down the inside, locks up, bangs into Alesi and launches into a roll over the Sauber. Luckily for the Austrian, he was not injured in the accident and was able to take the re-start. He was certainly lucky to finish such a day with fourth place in the Grand Prix.

r.-SWSfr nn

n

..

(Photos by Nigel Snowdon and ICN)

It was awesome to watch and Ferrari’s pitwork-was perfect.

Michael came out a few metres ahead of Fisichella and that was that. The race was won.

It is just so sad - such a tragedy - that Michael is so talented and yet such a flawed individual...

Ferrari people don’t care about this, of course. A win is a win and they do not come very often. The FIA people do not care because it will enliven the World Championship. But the crowd cared...

Ferrari’s success was backed up by a lucky third place for Irvine, who recovered from his pit stop and benefited from all the retire ments. It was a good solid job and deserves credit.

Schumacher’s brilliance was to the expense of Fisichella, who had driven a good race.

The Benetton driver took the lead after Schumacher pitted and held on until he had to stop on lap 44.

He tried to match Michael’s lap times in those crucial laps but it -was impossible. The race was lost.

Ferhaps if he had not had a prob lem with third gear getting stuck a couple of times it would have been different.

Giancarlo is still young hnd enthusiastic enough to describe a second place as “fantastic” and good on him.

Wurz also did a good job after his rather silly move at the first start.

After pitting for quick repairs

after the second start, he shadowed Irvine all the way to the flag to col lect two points from a race which began with him bouncing upside down through a sand trap ...

Fifth and sixth places went to the two Stewarts, which was a bonus for the beleaguered team.

Barrichello’s two-stop strategy helped him in the early laps but lost its value because of the Safety Cars while Magnussen deserved a bit of luck because his FI career to date has been decidedly short of that commodity.

Jan was chased all the way to the flag by the Minardi of Shinji Nakano, which was a good result for the Japanese driver.

His teammate Tuero was also going well until Villeneuve pulled across in front of him and wiped off the Minardi’s nose. Tuero pit ted, rejoined, but retired after 53 laps with electrical failure.

Rosset was classified eighth, having managed to pick his way through all the early chaos, while Takagi retired on the first lap with an electrical problem, thus avoid ing the need to have an accident to enter retirement.

Ninth went to Diniz in the Arrows, who lost all his time try ing to single-handedly establish a Canadian turf-cutting industry, while Sale’s demolition company made it an unhappy weekend for Tom Walkinshaw.

Villeneuve was eventually clas sified 10th in his home race, but finished six laps behind.

He had driven a sensible race

until the third pace car, when he found himself in second place behind Fisichella. Hoping to take advantage of the Safety Car, Jacques made what can only be described as an insane move which worked - up to a point. He did get past the Benetton but then he was going too fast and went off across the sandtrap and shot across the track onto the grass.

By the time he had rejoined he was down with the Minardis, which is why he tangled with Tuero.

It could have been a good day for Frost were it not for other cars running into Trulli and Fanis’s Feugeot engine seizing on lap 39 and pitching him into a spin. He was running fourth at the time and would probably have finished on the podium.

After the race there was, not surprisingly, a protest from Williams - a team which still understands the basics of the sport - but this was thrown out by the FIA stewards, who are clearly men who like a bit of self-abuse.

Their decision, brought massive criticism down on their heads, on the entire body of stewards and on the FIA. When he was elected FIA Fresident a few years ago. Max Mosley explained that he was inspired to do so because of what he thought were blatant miscar riages of justice on the part of the governing body.

Max might like to take a quick peek over his shoulder ... n

Canadian Grand Prix World Championship, round 6 Montreal, June 7th 1998 -69 laps 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Michael Schumacher, Ferrari F300, 1 h40m57,355s Giancarlo Fisichella, Benetton-Mecachrome B198,1h41m14,017s Eddie Irvine, Ferrari F300, 1h41m57,414s Alexander Wurz, Benetton-Mecachrome B198, 1h42m00,587s Rubens Barrichello, Stewart-Ford SF2,1h42m18,868s Jan Magnussen, Stewart-Ford SF2,68 laps Shinji Nakano, Minardi-Ford M198,68 laps Ricardo Rosset, Tyrrell-Ford 026, 68 laps Pedro Diniz, Arrows At 9, 68 laps Jacques Villeneuve, Williams-Mecachrome FW20,63 laps

Fastest Lap: M. Schumacher, lap 48, 1m19,379s Lap Leaders: Lap 1-18 Coulthard; Lap 19 Schumacher; Lap 20-43 Fisichella: Lap 44-69 Schumacher Retirements: Lap 0 Tora Takagi, Tyrrell-Ford 026, clutch Lap 0 Jarno Trulli, Prost-Peugeot AP01, accident Lap 0 Jean Alesi, Sauber-Petronas Cl 7, accident Lap 0 Ralf Schumacher, Jordan-Mugen-Honda 198, accident Lap 0 Mika Hakkinen, McLaren-Mercedes MP4/13, gearbox Lap 18 Mika Salo, Arrows A19, steering broke/crashed Lap 18 Johnny Herbert, Sauber-Petronas Cl 7, spun/gearbox failed Lap 18 David Coulthard, McLaren-Mercedes MP4/13, throttle system Lap 20 Heinz-Harald Frentzen, Williams-Mecachrome FW20, accident Lap 39 Olivier Panis, Prost-Peugeot AP01, engine seized Lap 42 Damon Hill, Jordan-Mugen-Honda 198, electrical Lap 53 Esteban Tuero, Minardi-Ford Ml 98, engine World Championship Standings after 6 rounds: 1 Hakkinen 46; 2 M.Schumacher 34; 3 Coulthard 29; 4 Irvine 19; 5 Fisichella 13; 6 Wurz 12; 7 Frentzen and Villeneuve 8; 9 Barrichello 4; 10 Salo and Alesi 3; 12 Herbert, Magnussen and Diniz 1 Constructors’ Championship points: 1 McLaren-Mercedes 75; 2 Ferrari 53; 3 Benetton-Mecachrome 25; 4 Williams-Mecachrome 16; 5 Stewart 5;6 Arrows and Sauber-Petronas 4

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32 Terry Labonte won a very con troversial Pontiac Excitement 400 at Richmond on June 6, after a finish that saw Jeff Gordon ■planted in the wall in the race’s final stages and Labonte and Dale Jarrett trad ing paint after the flag.

The race was "anything but excit ing until the final 30 laps, when all hell broke loose.

On lap 371, Rusty Wallace was leading (from 22nd starting slot!), with Jeff Gordon, who he had been racing with for several laps, to his ' outside.

What happened next, no-one will really know, but Wallace bumped Gordon’s left rear, sending ‘The Kid’ into a spin and,.ultimately, hard into the wall.

Whether Wallace slipped up the track unintentionally, or spun him on purpose, you can’t tell by video replay, but Gordon did bump Wallace at Bristol on the final lap ■ last year, Jeff taking the win.

The incident was considered by many to have been a payback, espe cially as Gordon got cheeky the pre vious week at Dover, bumping both Wallace and Mark Martin aside during the race while leading.

“It was just a racing accident,” said Wallace.

“We are not taking action, because we feel this was just a rac ing incident,” remarked NASCAR’s Mike Helton.

However, Gordon had more to say on the turn two incident, after finishing 37th and losing his points lead to boot.

“It’s pretty obvious. Somebody can’t stand to be passed I guess. I finally get in front of him and he just drives in the side of me, spins me out. That’s about it,” he said.

Gordon won the pole, eclipsing his old track record of 124.757 mph with a 125.558 mph speed.

Rich Bickle was the surprising outside front row sitter - it was surprising to NASCAR, too, as they stripped the engine on the Gale Yarborough Ford after qualifying.

Other surprises in qualifying were Sterling Marlin (thh'd and the

Terry takes Rkhmond but ‘incidents’ spoil Jarrett and Gordon’s day

only other to beat Gordon’s old time), Kenny Wallace (fifth) and Jeff Green (sixth in the First Union SABCO car, taking over from .

Morgan Shepherd).

Wallace and Gordon battled hard unto the incident on lap 371, leav ing Wallace to gather up his side ways Taurus and Labonte to take the lead.

On the next restart, Jarrett con tinued to head Ken Schrader and Labonte. Ward Burton then spun exiting turn two without damage and the race stayed under the green flag.

But, on lap 394, when Kevin Lapage, Derrike Cope and Mike Skinner hit the wall also in turn two, the caution flag uncoiled again Much to the delight of the fans, NASCAR waved the red flag for a track clean up so the race wouldn’t end under the caution flag which, with five laps to run, most certainly would have happened.

So, with four laps remaining, Jarrett again headed Schrader, Labonte and Wallace.

Crew chief Andy Graves has to be congratulated for the move to take four tyres, as this gave Labonte tht! stronger horse and he punted under Jarrett into turn three and nipped underneath for the lead.

Benson, though, hit the wall after cutting a tyre, driving his car in the higher groove with sparks shower ing into the air - NASCAR was forced to wave the final yellow flag, along with the white, to end the race under the caution.

Wallace, like many others, wasn’t taking any chances and he raced Labonte back to the chequered flag - but it was to no avail, as the result was given on lap 399 after

r.

KEV MAKES HIS MARK ... Kevin Schwantz had a bad day at Charlotte on May 23 in the Busch Grand National race.

After the second caution, Schwantz found himself on the tail end of the lead lap at the restart. While trying to keep race leader and eventual winner Mark Martin behind him, Martin clearly bumped Schwantz into a spin and the World Champ was - MARTIN D CLARK planted firmly in the tri-oval wall.

much video deliberation by NASCAR. A hot under the collar Jarrett took a couple of sideswipes at Labonte on the cool down lap.

“I got run over going into turn three; it’s OK, I’ll remember that.

We finished second, but I just think we should have won the race,” Jarrett said.

Labonte countered: “I got into the #88. I know he’s mad at me, but I hope he understands I didn’t do it on purpose.”

Jarrett has since cooled down, but could payback happen at Bristol?

Final positions: T Labonte (Chevy), R Wallace (Ford), Jarrett (Ford), Schrader (Chevy), Martin

I

ndications are that Jeff Gordon and crew chief Ray Evernham are having their differences of opinion'recently, with Gordon apparently intentionally missing the conffoversial Charlotte practice against Evernham s wishes.

Hendrick team-mate Terry Labonte piloted the car in that session, when Gordon apparently overslept Labonte cut a tyre and Slapped the right side against the wall.

Gordon still went on to win the Charlotte Coke 600.

Gordon was also to enter six Busch Series events in 1999, in a team he and Evernham would co own - this plan has recently been put on hold.

D

avid Green will no longer drive the CAT Chevrolet. The writ ing had been on the wall for some time, but the news was made offi cial on June 10 by Buzz McCall, owner of American Equipment Racing.

Hut Stricklin, recently released from Stavola Brothers Racing, will be the interim driver at Michigan and Pocono.

Sears Point and Daytona are up in the air, as Stricklin is not a seasoned circuit driver for Sears Point and he previously signed a contract to drive a second Andy Petree Chevrolet at Daytona on July 4.

Richard Childress Racing announced a major shake-up on June 8.

Larry McReynolds, crew chief for Dale Earnhardt, has been moved over to the second Childress team to undertake the same duties tor Mike Skinner in the Lowes-sponsored Monte Carlo.

The move came following the deepest valley in Earnhardt’s sto ried career. ..

McReynolds has been replaced

by Kevin Hamlin, Skinner's crew chief and someone considered for the position vacated by now team owner Andy Petree in late 1996.

Bobby Hutchens, the team engineer and previous co-crew chief, will come on board to try and end another winless streak, that stood at 59 prior to the Daytona 500 in February and is in jeopardy of climbing again.

Earnhardt was lapped five times at Dover and twice at Richmond recently.

(Ford), Mayfield (Ford), J Burton (Ford), Marlin (Chevy), Nemechek (Chevy), B Labonte (Pontiac), Points standings: Mayfield 1868, R Wallace 1843, Gordon 1822, Martin 1815, Jarrett 1815, T Labonte 1755, B Labonte 1641, J Burton 1573, Schrader 1570, Spencer 1530.

- MARTIN D CLARK

tacted the team, so Bickle is con tinuing his testing at Michigan and Daytona with the operation.

N

His qualifying has also taken a tumble, with only two top 25 quali fications and four provisional starts following Richmond, for a 21.75 finishing average.

Hamlin previously worked with Rick Mast at Precision Products Racing and McReynolds, who came from Robert Yates Racing, has 23 visits to victory lane.

T

ravis Carter, owner of the No Bull Winston car driven by Jimmy Spencer, is looking for sponsorship for a second team in 1999. This year, the team has shared information with the Wood Brothers.

H

ow important are the provi sional starting slots NASCAR issues to teams each week in qualifying if they are not up to speed? Well, only Jeff Gordon, Rusty Wallace, Dale Jarrett and John Andretti have not used the slots this year.

Triad missing from Motorsports the Richmondwas event, after the team was informed on the Wednesday before the race that it would not be competing. Whether the team will cut back further on the remaining schedule is not known.

Jeff Burton anda Roush Racing have signed contract with sponsor Exide through the year 2001.

Tyler Motorsports has hired Phil Jet Hammer as its crew chief when it returns to racing at Indianapolis with Darrell Waltrip in August.

Hammer previously worked with Hendrick Motorsports as a chassis specialist before moving onto a Busch team.

R

ich Bickle looks set to continue to drive the Gale Yarbrough Fords past the Daytona July 5 event - Greg Sacks, who injured his neck at Texas, has not con-

ASCAR Busch Series driver Matt Kenseth looks set to move up to Winston Cup next year - Kenseth, who stormed onto the BGN series midway through last year, currently rides second in points to veteran Mike McLaughlin.

Kenseth has formed a relation ship with Mark Martin and has been doing some testing for Roush Racing, even entering a Roush car at Talladega in April, although he did not make the race.

It appears that Kenseth will be driving a Roush/Wood Brothers Ford next year in the Cup series, although the team will still operate from it’s base at Reiser Enterprises.

Following strong showing at Dover thea previous week, the Stavola Brothers Chevrolet failed to make the cut in qualifying for Richmond. Busch Series standout Buckshot Jones was again the pilot after an eighth-placed result at Dover, but the youngster was unable to get the car up to speed, the seventh race this year the team has missed.

Kevin Lapage in the unspon sored LJ Racing Chevrolet was the other to go home, while Jimmy Spencer, Rick Mast, Dale Earnhardt, Bobby Hamilton, Darrell Waltrip, Geoff Bodine and Derrike Cope were the provisional starters by points standings.

D

avid Green was subbed in Richmond by Kevin Lapage Green practised and qualified the car and knew nothing of the change until the afternoon of the race.

Green broke his shoulder in a Busch Series wreck at Charlotte in 1996 and apparently bruised the same shoulder in a Dover wreck the previous week.

However, he had not felt the bruising was a problem, unlike CAT team owner Buzz McCall, who told Green he would be subbed after an examination in the team’s haulier by Dr Jerry Punch, the ESPN analyst.

Green was checked out by his doctor the following Monday and was cleared to drive after complet ing a full physical.

mm

1 998 WINSTON CUP SERIES RESULTS

LujlLm. Current Points After Round 14

Miller Lite 400 - Michigan. June 14th, 1998.

I.

Mark Martin, #6 Valvoline Ford Taurus

2.

3.

4.

Dale Jarrett, #88 Quality Care Ford Taurus Jeff Gordon, #24 DuPont Chev Monte Carlo Jeff Burton, #99 Exide Batteries Ford Taurus

5.

6.

Jeremy Mayfield, #12 Mobil I Ford Taurus Bill Elliott, #94 McDonald's Ford Taurus

7.

8.

9.

Bobby Labonte,#l8 Interstate Batteries PondacGrandPrix Ward Burton, #22 MBNA America Pontiac Grand Prix Joe Nemechek, #42 BellSouth Chev Monte Carlo

10. Wally Dallenbach Jr, #50 Budweiser Chev Monte Carlo

II. Jimmy Spencer, #23 Winston/No Bull Ford Taurus

12. Darrell Waltrip, # I Pennzoil Chev Monte Carlo 13. Kenny Irwin Jr, #28 Texaco Havoline Ford Taurus 14. Ernie Irvan, #36 Skittles Pontiac Grand Prix 15. Dale Earnhardt, #3 GM Goodwrench Chev Monte Carlo 16. Chad Little, #97 John Deere Ford Taurus 17. Rusty Wallace, #2 Miller Lite Ford Taurus 18. Sterling Marlin, #40 Coors Light Chev Monte Carlo 19. Terry Labonte, #5 Kellogg's Chev Monte Carlo 20. John Andretti, #43 STP Pontiac Grand Prix

I. 2.

3.

4.

Jeremy Nayfield Rusty Wallace Jeff Gordon Mark Martin

S.

Dale Jarrett

6.

7.

8.

9.

Terry Labonte Bobby Labonte Jeff Burton Ken Schrader

10. Jimmy Spencer

1868 1843 1822 1815 1815 1775 1641 1573 1570 1530

33

19June 1998

From the

RALLY OF INDONESIA CANCELLED n The political unrest in the Republic of Indonesia has forced the I- 2—^-r§ J if il 7^ FIA to cancel that coun try’s round of the World

By Peter Whitt^tt Rally Championship, Edccr -.AbiJaiian RalVioort Nr-.'.': which was scheduled for the clubrooms of the NECC Septeipber 18-20.

In a vote by fax, the World at Tarrawingee, just east of Wangaratta, where the first Motor Sport Council with car is due back at 10pm. drew the event from the cal Anyone contemplating endar due to the current situ entering the event is urged ation and because of the diffi to get an entry in quickly, as culty of transporting materi placings are filling fast. The al for the competing teams.

The FIA stressed that this entry fee is a nominal $100.

Supplementary Regs and decision will not prejudice the candidature of the Rally entry forms are available of Indonesia for the 1999 from the director on 03 57221250 or fax 03 57215590.

World Rally Championship.

It was not possible to WHEELER GETS replace Indonesia with the TERMINATED reserve event (the China Rally on June 19), because it was too late for the teams competing to prepare for the event.

The 1998 WRC calendar now comprises only 13 events. Following the Neste Rally Finland on August 23, teams will have a seven week break before tackling the Sanremo Rally on October 12.

HUGE INTEREST IN KELLY COUNTRY ■ Entries continue to roll in for the North Eastern Car Club’s “Kelly Country Trial,” which is being held on Saturday, July 11.

Under the direction of Peter Whitten, the 300 kilo metre event is a completely new event on the calendar and will feature a total of nine sections, ranging in length from 5kms to 50kms.

While the theme of the trial is navigational, drivers will be catered for with some brilliant drivers’ sections over a variety of excel lent quality roads, some of which have never seen a rally car before.

To be run through tradi tional Ned Kelly bushranger country around Glenrowan in North Eastern Victoria, the “Kelly Country” will be totally competitive, with no transport stages at all.

Starting at Glenrowan (on the Hume Freeway, just two hours north of Melbourne) at 4pm on July 11, the Kelly Country Trial will finish at

■ Mitsubishi Ralliart Europe development engineer Greg Wheeler has left the company after a second, albeit short, stint with the team which lasted only a few months.

A South African who has also worked for Ford and Renault, Wheeler was responsible for much of the work on the new Laiicer Evo 5, but is believed to have been fi red for qu'estioning how the team was being run.

“As of Friday (May 29), Greg Wheeler’s employment was terminated,” team manager Phil Short said in the English weekly. Motoring News.

“It was due to internal communication difficulties.

Obviously, we’re apprecia tive of the work he did to bring the Evo 5 to fhiition in a very short time.”

NISSAN RETURN TO WRC IN 1999 ■ Nissan is believed to be considering entering 11 rounds of the World Rally Championship in 1999, in an eHort to -win the Formula 2 champi

onship.

Reigning British Champ Mark Higgins, a long-time Nissan driver, is said to be the driver which the pro gram will be focused around.

It is also thought the program could be a precursor to a Nissan World Rally Car in the year 2000.

“We don’t know what

VIC: Stuckey Tyre Service Ph: (03) 9386 5331 Fax: (03) 9383 2514 SA: The Mag Wheel Centre Ph: (08) 8269 4100 Fax: (08) 8269 7805 NSW: Stuckey Tyre Service Ph: (02) 9676 8655 Fax: (02) 9676 5300 QLD: Road & Race Spare Parts Ph: (07) 3279 1533 Fax: (07) 3376 5804 WA: Kostera's Tyre Service Ph: (09) 293 3500 Fax: (09) 293 1355 TAS: Bob's Speed Shop Ph: (03) 6273 7555 Fax: (03) 6273 7666

WINNER - NSW & VICTORIAN RALLY CHAMPIONSHIPS - DUNLOP SP84-R

Europe and Japan will decide, but I think the potential is there to win the larly SEAT and F2 titlewith next year, particuPeugeot looking to WRCars,” stated Nissan Motorsport Europe boss Dave Wliittock.

Nissan has not competed in the World Rally Championship since abandoning it’s Pulsar GTiR pro gram in the early 1990s.

McRae again!

Subaru now leads both titles -■<1

/

1.

y

ANOTHER McRAE VICTORY n Alister McRae won the Scottish Rally for the second year running, but this time he did not win at aU ...

The Scottish Rally was run as a doubleheader event.

McRae’s victory for Volkswagen came after he had been beaten into second place by Gwyndaf Evans’s SEAT on the first day’s event and into third place by the Ronaults of Martin Rowe and Tapio Laukkanen on the second!

After a series of poor results earlier in the year, McRae is now lying fourth in the British national championship, with another two lesser-scoring events, run this time on asphalt roads, still to follow.

Final results (combined heats) 1 Alister McRae/ David Senior VW Golf 2h02m41s 2 Martin Rowe/ Derek Ringer Renault Maxi Megane 2.02.42 3 Gwyndaf Evans/ Howard Davies SEAT Ibiza Kit Car 2.03.11 4 Jarmo Kytolehto/ Arto Kapanen Vauxhall Astra Kit Car 2.05.36 5 Marko Ipatti/ Kari Kajula Mitsubishi Lancer 2.07.41 6 Tapio Laukkanen/ Tapio Jarvi Renault Maxi Megane 2.07.51 Pointscore Manufacturers: 1. SEAT 177; 2. Renault 172; 3. VW 132.5; =4.

Ford and Vauxhall 127.

Drivers; 1. Rowe 143; 2. Evans 139; 3. Wearden 102; 4. McRae 99; 5. Laukkanen 87.

iC/iiUS

M

¥ t

s:-'

-

STIFF LUCK... A loose fuse upset proceedings forAuriol when victory was within reach.

The final three stages of the 1998 Acropolis Rally saw a host of aspirants fall by the wayside and Scotland’s Colin McRae take -victory.

Didier Auriol saw his 15sec lead evaporate on stage 16 when his Toyota’s engine stopped inexplicably for 30 seconds, allowing Colin McRae to go ahead - the problem was only a loose fuse, but by the time the Corolla was going again Auriol had lost his chance of victory.

Before the final day’s stages, only 15 seconds seperated McRae, Auriol, his Toyota team-mate, Carlos Sainz and Ford’s Juha Kankkunen.

But Sainz dropped out of contention with power steer ing failure and, when Kankkunen’s Escort punc tured twice on the second stage of the day, it was down to a two-horse race.

Subaru’s number two, Piero Liatti, went off the road and damaged the steer ing, but he managed to limp to service - he then dropped out of the points.

On the previous test, Richard Burns’ Mitsubishi, which had led the rally after the first day, had sustained suspension damage and was forced out.

He had been flying and had got to within seven sec onds of Kankkunen before the breakage, which hap pened in ruts on a straight road.

Going into the last test 27 kilometres in length Auriol was 19 seconds down on McRae, but the Scot held on to win, with Kankkunen a strong third.

World Champion Tommi Makinen retired his Lancer after the very first stage, when it suffered electrical problems.

Ford driver Bruno Thiry, who led the event after the first few stages, retired mid way through the first day with yet another engine fail ure - his third for the year.

Finland’s Harri Rovanpera won the Formula 2 category for SEAT, ahead of team mate Oriol Gomez, to

Toyota Corolla WRC 4:29:20.0 6 P. LiattiT’. Pons Subam Impreza WRC 4:37:18.0 7 R. Madeira/N. da Silva Toyota Corolla WRC 4:39:01.8 8 L. Kirkos/J. Stavropoulos Ford Escort WRC 4:40:33.5 9 JP. Richelmi/F. Delorme Subaru Impreza 4:41:42.5 10 V. Isik/I. Dokumcu Toyota Celica 4:43:38.3

strengthen his grip on the F2 Championship.

Aussie Wayne Bell was an unfortunate retirement just two kilometres into the first stage, when his works Hyundai Coupe kit car suf fered gearbox failure, the team’s third in two days.

Hyundai’s hopes were boosted when Kenneth Eriksson was the quickest F2 car on the opening stage, but his Coupe retired on stage 5 with electrical woes.

The Group N category was won by regular pacesetter and reigning champion Gustavo Trelles in a Mitsubishi, but only after long-time leader Manfred Stohl retired his similar car after running off the road on a road section and causing too much damage to continue.

McRae now leads the World Championship by five points from Sainz, while Subaru has regained the lead - by two points - from Toyota in the Makes series.

The next round is the Rally of New Zealand at the end of next month.

Final Results Acropolis RaUy 1 C. McRae/N. Grist Subara Impreza WRC 4h26m31.6s 2 D. Auriol/D. Giraudet Toyota Corolla WRC 4:26:51.6 3 J. Kankk\men/J. Repo Ford Escort WRC 4:27:15.9 4 C. Sainz/L. Moya Toyota Corolla WRC 4:28:09.3 5 F. Loix/S. Smeets

Pointscore Drivers: 1. McRae 36, 2 .

Sainz 31, 3. Makinen and Kankkunen 24, 5. Auriol and Bums 21.

Manufacturers: 1. Subaru 49, 2. Toyota 47, 3.

Mitsubishi 45, 4. Ford 33.

1 2

3

Group N G Trelles/M Christie Mitbsubishi Lancer 4:54:35.6 HAl-Wahaibi/ T Hanyman Mitsubishi Lancer 4:57:58.7 L Climent/A Romani Proton Wira 5:08:58.9

FIA Teams Cup R. Madeira/N. da Silva Toyota Corolla WRC 4:39:01.8 2. V. Isik/I. Dokumcu Toyota Celica 4:43:38.3 3. F. Dor/D. Breton Subaru Impreza WRC 4:46:59.1 - PETER WHI'TTEN 1.

VICTORIOUS... McRae and Grist celebrate another win. * K

'5 Ai^PPOLL^/

Hit.-

I tlO I

r

mica

Australia’s biggest ever drag race with a record 521 entries received Mikres claims second Top Fuel Chan^pionship 9 Gratz wins another big event in spectacular style crashes out on solo pass Cowin, Glenwright, Hawke also crash out / Phillips claims another win and another title

By GERALD McDORNAN last While year’s Winternationals event at Willowbank is remembered as being one of the finest ever held in this country, this year’s 31st running of Australia’s second oldest and second most presti gious event - while still having some fine performances, some great racing and a number of spectacular and memorable moments - will be remembered as an event that just didn’t quite reach the lofty heights that many had hoped for.

That’s not to say it wasn’t a great event; far from it - but, when an event grows in size by around 25% in one jump,it isn’t hard to imagine that there will be growing pains thatjust can’t be avoided.

In fact, it was probably great practice for next year’s event, which is sure to be bigger again.

Entries for the Winternationals grew from 1997’s total of 403 to an amazing 521 this year, with 512 vehicles actually gracing the track while attempting to qualify for their respective fields.

The extra numbers obviously multiplied the usual problems, though, especially in the area of oildowns. Unlike last year’s event, where oildowns were almost non existent, this year’s Winters seemed to draw the liquid gold out of the sumps and transmissions that skimmed its surface like a

magnet attracts metal.

It seemed that just when things were starting to get up and run ning, another delay would happen and put a slight damper on the event. Enough of the downers, now.

Every Group One category, excepting Pro Stock Motorcycle, had at least a full field, with most being well over-subscribed - and the qualifying sessions for all cate gories where field sizes were restricted was fierce.

In Top Fuel, eight cars fronted for competition and, like Pro Stock, the championship was alive coming into the final round and, with plen ty of drama provided through an accident and a temporary change in proceedings, the bracket turned out to be quite interesting, despite a fairly ordinary show.

Darren DiFilippo resumed his position.in the seat of the family’s fueller after his father, Charlie, had stunned everyone at the Nationals with his performance.

Darren didn’t let the side down, taking out the top qualifying spot and setting low et for the weekend with his 4.96/274 charge on the first day. The run was enough for the team to then sit out the rest of qualifying, watch the action and size up the competition.

Graeme Cowin and Glenn Mikres were locked in a great points battle heading into the event and it was hoped that it would go right down to the wire.

Unfortunately, someone forgot to tell wheel manufacturer Cragar, though, as a new rim on Cowin’s Shell Rocketship broke on his last qualifying pass and sent the veter an racer on a wild, wall-riding nm.

Thankfully, Cowin emerged unhurt (except in his wallet).

Continued next page

WON THE BATTLE... Robin Kirby, top, took out his second consecutive win at Willowbank, backing up his February effort with a Winternationals victory, as well as setting top speed with a 283 mph blast.

WELCOME BACK... The leg endary Jim Read returned to com petition for the first time since last year’s Winternationals, centre, this time with the backing of Wynn’s.

SAYAAAARRGGHH... Nino Cavallo’s A/MS Charger, left, was not only tough, qualifying third with a 9.55/132, but it was also spectacular.

(Phoibs by John Bosher and Marshall Cass)

n It was an interesting first qualifying session for Top Fuel at this year’s event, with each and every team “busting a gut” to be first into the staging lanes and onto the track.

It seems the opportunity of taking the $20,000 bonus offered by team owner Santo Rapisarda for the first-ever 300 mph run, combined with the near-perfect conditions, was enough to get the teams racing just as hard to back their cars out of the pit area as they do on the race track.

Tricky conditions all weekend kept the barrier from being bro ken yet again (how long has this been going on now!?), with Robin Kirby’s well-short 283.91 charge in the Pennzoil Top Fuel car being the fastest pass of the weekend. n Darren DiFilippo’s n top qualifying 4.966/274.22 charge was the Melbourne racer’s first visit into the four second zone, making him the eighth Top Fuel racer in Australia to crack through the five second barrier.

Darren’s run also made him and his father, Charlie, the sec ond father/son combo to have run into the fours, with Graeme Cowin and son Andrew both hav ing recorded four second ets.

The 4.96 by DiFilippo held up for the low et of the event and was the only four second run of the weekend.

Despite having a tenth of a sec ond on the field from qualifying, DiFilippo couldn’t advance past the semi-finals, a broken reverser halting his campaign. n Great to see Australia’s greatest drag racer Jim Read and his family team back at the track with their familiar red fueller. With the generous backing of Wynn’s, Read quickly showed that, despite the event being just his third in a year and a half, he and the crew hadn’t lost their way down the track.

Read qualified with an off the trailer 5.13/224 and had Glenn Mikres covered in the first round of racing before a blower belt went astray, allowing the American to sneak past and claim the round win and Australian title.

Hopefully, all the attention that Read claimed for himself and his sponsors will convince Wynn’s that he is deseiwing of a long-term contract. n Obviously, Read’s return had the fans excited, with the veteran selling a significant number of limited edition tshirts he had prepared for the event. The great looking design, featuring his car and the of his 10 years Winternationals victories, was close to a total sellout and hot property for any true racing fan. n Romeo Capitanio’s return to Top Fuel, beginning with a surprise non-qualifydng effort at the ’97 Nationals at Calder, saw the ’91 Australian Top

Continued next page

i: Du(K

sM

^9June 1998

35

Continued from page 34 Fuel Champion not only make the field at each subsequent event, but also the final round each time.

Unfortunately for the popular Sidchrome Proto-backed driver, the excellent run of appearances in the later rounds of the events came to an end in the first round at the Winternationals.

After qualifying second with a solid 5.06/262, Capitanio looked to have the goods for another strong showing, but a broken rear-end pinion ended any chances he and crew chief brother Johnny had of taking out the event, TeiTy Sainty pedalling his way to a 6.81/216 win over the Sidchrome Proto machine.

although he had a nervous wait until the first round to see whether or not Mikres could get past Jim Head and take away the title.

Prior to the beginning of elimina tions, though, came the drama of the field, which had been set after being reseeded fi'om an eight car to seven car field, despite the fact that Cowin hadn’t formally withdrawn from the event.

What that served purpose to do was rearrange the pairings for the first round, the result pleasing some, but not others, including Cowin.

Cowin’s championship was over if he was out of the field; but, if he was still in as he was entitled to be and had Mikres been knocked out in the first round. Cowin would

A KICK IN THE REAR...

That’s what Peter Gratz felt when his Valvoline I.

Chevy, above, and its rear end, right, departed.

Despite the damage, Gratz claimed another major event win. (Photos

by John Bosher and Marshall Cass) claim his second title.

X

I

A quick word to senior ANDRA personnel by eventual winner Robin Kirby, who was to benefit from a solo with an

thought this was unfair and, just moments before the first round,

eight car field due to Cowin’s absence, had the seeding reversed to the original eight car field.

Naturally, the DiFilippo Family Team, led by father Charlie

fired in a protest, complete with $100 cash, to try and get the field changed back again and a bye run

TT]

against Les Donnon. n Can anyone stop Gary Phillips? The legendary it Klappa” went into the

Despite the serious injuries and major fright that he got from,the shooting, Mick didn’t forget how to make copious amounts of power, with his and partner Roy Smith’s Sainty-powered fueller smoking the tyres on every attempt at making a nm.

Top Fuel Championship for the second year in a row with his first round victory over Jim Read.

With new wiring in the car.

Read managed a 6.26 best, just short of the 6.24 bump spot which sat with Mark Brew.

n With Graeme Cowin not

n Australia’s Top Fuel competitors are apparently close to organising their own management group, which will see them being able to offer the tracks interested in running a round of the series confirmed entries well in advance of the dates.

Eliminations- Round One W. Darren DiFilippo, Vic. ...

L. Roy Smith, Qld W. Terry Sainty, NSW L. Romeo Capitanio, Vic W. Robin Kirby, Vic L. Graeme Cowin, NSW W. Glenn Mikres, USA L. Jim Read, NSW Semi-Finals W. Glenn Mikres, USA. L. Darren DiFilippo, Vic, W. Robin Kirby, Vic. ..

L. Terry Sainty, NSW. .

Final W. Robin Kirby, Vic. L. Glenn Mikres, USA.

.4.966 .5.068 .5.128 .5,134 .5.148 .5.633 . .7.940 14.061

274,22 262.39 283.91 224.22 271.74 165,99 109.65 57.49

.502 .715 .493 ,673 .648 .Broke .453 .460

5.174 12.368 6.813 13.886 5.180

213.57 ●42.29 216.24 51,10 278.64

5.333 5.994

263.62 162.45

.682

48.12

..591 .513

13.444 Broke 5.612 10.737

210.38 60.47

.691 .558

6.584 12.874

200.09 49.28

Qualifying ,5.820 239.11 1. Gary Phillips, Qld.(Uyehara/482) .5.829 243.90 2. David Glenwright, Qld.(Meyer/463) .. .5.857 238.73 3. Steve Harker, Qld.('97 Avenger/526) . .5.886 236.22 4. Wayne Newby, NSW.(Meyer/469) .. . .5.913 244.30 5. Steve Reed, Qld.('93 Oldsmobile/540) .5.945 230.18 6. Paul Shackelton, Qld.(Meyer/470) ... .5.960 240.51 7. David Hawke, SA.(Meyer/463) .6.243 199.20 8. Mark Brew, Qld.(Lowe/388) DNQ: Steve Read (6.261/218.02), Dean Oakey (6.285/227.51), Harold Campbell (7.241/174.01) ^Eliminations - Round One W. Gary Phillips, Qld L. Mark Brew, Qld W. David Hawke, SA. , L. David Glenwright, Qld W. Paul Shackelton, Qld. ...

L, Steve Harker, Qld W. Steve Reed, Qld L. Wayne Newby, NSW

.548 .. .5.980 237.47 .444 . . .6.169 222.77 .524 .. .7.046 130.70 . . . .Disqualified .452 . ..5.992 226.93 .560 . . .5.980 231,48 .519 ...5.881 241.03 .462 . . .6.275 180.00'

Semi-Finals W. Gary Phillips, Qld. ..

L. Steve Reed. Qld W. Paul Shackelton, Qld. L. David Hawke, SA. . . .

.511 . . .5.891 238.73 .549 . . .6.187 221.89 .540 .. .6.358 208.62 . . . .Disqualified

Final W. Gary Phillips, Qld. .

L. Paul Shackelton, Qld.

.575 . . .5.999 236.22 .462 . . .6.389 218.87

Phillips’s win, again, at this year’s event was also his sixth Winternats title.

being able to front for elimina tions following his qualifying ride along the barriers, Glenn Mikres claimed the Australian

Top Fuel Champions includes Cowin, Romeo Capitanio, Santo Rapisarda, Larry Ormsby and John Maher.

Qualifying 1. Darren DiFilippo, Vic.(Hadman/TFX 496) 2. Romeo Capitanio, Vic.(Hadman/TFX 496 3. Robin Kirby, Vic.(Swindahl/KB 496) ....

4. Jim Read, NSW.(Uyehara/KB 511) . ...

5. Glenn Mikres, USA. (McKinney/KB 496) 6, Graeme Cowin, NSW. (Uyehara/KB 496) 7. Terry Sainty, NSW.(Sainty/Sainty 498) . , 8. Roy Smith, Qld,(Hansen/Sainty 498)

Winternats having already secured another Top Alcohol title for new sponsor Lucas Oil Products, along with a third straight Nationals title earlier in the season.

n Despite not qualifying for » Top Alcohol, “Pommie Steve Read appeared to he a little happier with his efforts in his 1993 championship-winning dragster. The “Pom” had been plagued by a mysterious prob lem, affecting his efforts on 17 straight runs and keeping him out of the action for consider able time.

more than pne championship.

The honour roll of Australian

TOP ALCOHOL

Thunderbird Pro Stocker, provid ed the first redlight against Joe Polito in the first round with a

Winternationals, with the vet

Next to the legendary Read, Mikres is now the winningest Top Fuel driver, as no other competitor other than those two have claimed

TOP FUEL

Craig Hastead, at the wheel of his Cragar Performance

eran crew chief recovering from being shot in the face only two weeks before the event.

Continued next page

NOT QUITE EXCESSIVE ... Mark Gedye top qualified in Top Bike and went to the final round. (Photo by Nix Pix)

points, with only two redlights being recorded in elimina tions.

n It was great to see Mick Atholwood at the

Atholwood, who took an opportu nity on the p.a. to publicly thank everyone for their calls and let ters.

Lio

there being less pressure at the event in the battle for

.393 reaction time, while Pro Stock Motorcycle racer Denis Ackland recorded the other, a .377rt in the Pro Bike final

The response to the incident from fans and teams around Australia and overseas stunned

V

By Gerald McDor

n US chassis builder Bob Meyer was one of the first to inspect the crashed dragsters of David Glenwright and David Hawke following the completion of the event.

Meyer, who built both drag sters, believed that the Glenwright car mighn’t require too much work to make it like new again and he could do all the work required, after a short trip home, here in Australia - although he needed to take a longer look at Hawke’s before he could comment, n Victor Bray and Murray Anderson thought they’d come

It is understood that many of the teams will be meeting at

up with the next stage of injec tor hat development for Bray’s tilt at the Winternats,

Graeme Cowin’s impressive new Rocket Industries facility at the end of this month to vote on the

although you would never have known it if you’d been there.

proposal.

For a week prior to the event, Anderson, who debuted a revolu

n 'The Winternats was Graeme Cowin’s crew chief Steve

tionary unit on George Clasby’s Skyline at the Winternats four years ago, worked on a new sheetmetal injector hat that rose around three inches higher than the standard uniti^but was also

Monday’s last event with the team before the talented young tuner heads stateside to further his career.

Munday led the team to two fine runner-up spots in the last two championships, along with tuning the Shell Rocketship to Australia’s

placed six inches further forward - well over the bjower belt/pulley,

quickest-ever run, a 4.81 second blast at last year’s Winternats.

It is believed that instead of

Unfortunately, Anderson built the unit a little too light and, on its initial startup on Bray’s

appointing a crew chief, the Shell Rocketship team will now undertake timing decisions as a group.

Castrol Chev the night prior to the event, it was sucked almost insideout "like a crushed Coke can!”

Thankfully, everyone found it

n Maybe the fact that four out of the six Group One

amusing, including Bray and a very tired Anderson.

Championships had already been decided was a factor in

Continued next page

giving it better access tq_ crucial undisturbed air.

3S

19 Jm 1998

DRAG RACING

!Ms^s?msss9.

at the wheel of a borrowed race car for only the second event - and with an entirely new combination.

By Gerald MeDor Continued froni page 35 n Peter Gratz’s spectacular win in Top Doorslanuner with the Valvoline ’57 Chevy was the fifth gold Christmas tree event the Gold Coast driver has won out of the seven that have been offered to the class since its inception.

Gratz has won both the Nationals and Winternationals twice, along with the last Grand Finals event, where a gold tree was offered for the first time.

It amazes some to learn that Gratz’s arch rival Victor Bray, who has won all three of the Australian Top Doorslammer Championships that have been held, has yet to win a gold Christmas tree event.

The winners of the other two gold Christmas tree events were Peter I^apiris (’97 Nationals) and Shane Elcoate (’97 Premier State Nationals).

S While on the subject of gold ANDRA Christmas trees and Top Doorslammer, it is worth noting that Murray Anderson has been involved with every car that has ever won a gold tree in the class.

Anderson built Gratz’s and Bray’s cars, carried out major work on Kapiris’s Statesman and built the rear-end for Elcoate’s Willys.

Five of the eight cars qualified for this year’s Winters in Top Doorslammer were built by Anderson, with Elcoate’s car also making the field and Andrew Searle’s Customline, which is a direct copy of Bray’s Michael King-driven Customline.

H Peter Kapiris elected to miss competiting at the Winternats as his Nationals-winning Statesman was on the market and he had a potential buyer for it.

While in attendance, Kapiris said he was hopeful of selling the car and, if the expected new owner confirmed the purchase, Kapiris would be placing an immediate order with Murray Anderson for a new Studebaker. n Confusing comment heard on the track p.a. system during the event ... “The Pro Stock engines are about 5.5 litres, but even though they’re small er than a 5 litre V8 touring 99 car’s engine, they go faster

Huh?

n Is the Pro Stock Owners Association close to signing their own sponsor? After hav ing “purchased” the rights for the series, the PSOA have been searching for support to offer their members and tracks in an effort to boost the appeal of their strong bracket.

Whispers around the pit area had telecommunications giant ^ Primus, who has withdrawn from its V8 Bathurst deal, signing on for the series and the presence of company representatives seemed to have the whispers spot on. n Peter Ridgeway’s win in Pro Stock was stunning, consider ing the Melbourne racer was

With the engine from American Don Whitmer’s NHRA C/Altered national record-setting car between the rails, Ridgeway ran nothing but 7.7-second elapsed times all weekend, impressing many, including visiting US racer Randy Daniels.

The event is expected to be the last by Ridgeway in Bruno Cugnetto’s spare car, with his crashed Olds expected to be com pletely repaired in time for next season. n Triple Australian Pro Stock Champion Hans Van Dyk was an interested spectator at this year’s Winternationals, with the veteran racer looking healthy and strong following a recent illness.

As this issue of Motorsport News hits the newsstands around Australia, Van Dyk, whose tongue was also back to its sharp self at the Winters, is taking delivery of a Jerry Haas-built ’96 Chev Camaro, which he has acquired from Sydney’s Des Cumow.

Despite the toughness of the competition at the Winternats, Van Dyk is expecting to be back in among the front runners when he debuts his new car later this year.

THE REAL DEAL 1... Greg Leahy absolutely dominated Competition Eliminator with his B/Altered roadster, above. Leahy easily ran sixtenths under the index and set the national record on his way to a win.

THE WHEEL DEAL 2... Graeme Cowin's hopes of a second Top Fuel Championship went when this new wheel, left, broke, sending the Shell Rocketship on a wild. wall-riding pass. Thankfully, Cowin emerged unhurt from the accident.

n Melbourne Competition Eliminator racers Wayne Cartledge and Rod Rainford both turned up at the Winternats, trying to take / through to the semi-finals. advantage of a soft C/Altered The DiFilippo’s protest was index, with leased altereds turned down and the field was then instead of their more familiar finally set.

C/Dragsters.

Unfortunately for Cowin, Mikres Cartledge’s engine/trans was had luck on his side in the-.first slotted between the chassis rails of round of racing when, in a desper Eric Goudswaard’s Raceglides ate bid to peg back the storming altered, while Rainford’s combo Wynn’s entry, a blower belt depart was nestled into John Polglaise’s ed Read’s car and allowed the similar car.

American, who had to pedal not far Rainford’s deal was believed to off the startline, the opportunity to be just for the Winternationals, sneak by for the win and the cham while Cartledge has reportedly pionship. leased Goudswaai'd’s car for a full Mikres was joined in the semis season. by opponent DiFilippo, who defeat ed a tyre-smoking Smith, Sainty n Adelaide Comp racer who downed a rear end-breaking Rebekah Stewart was the first Capitanio - and Kirby, who was Australian racer to fi"ont with still smiling after finally not having a “Bruce Sarver” style helmet to I'un Cowin in the first round of visor at the Winternats. the series.

The visor was, from the outside, emblazoned with her Rebel Ford Hard luck hit DiFilippo^ in his pairing against Mikres with the sponsor logo, although from the reverser breaking, allowing the inside it look as though it was only American to solo on a clutch-throw slightly tinted. ing win, while Kirby accounted for Sarver debuted the new visors, Sainty to advance to his second which carry a screen much like the public buses with adverts up over the windows, during last year’s NHRA series.

The Stock Super Championship was decided in the first round of eliminations, with the two leading points scorers, Perth’s Geoff Chaisty and Melbourne’s Graeme Cooper,running off together.

Cooper, who defeated Chaisty in the final round at the Nationals in March, did what he needed to do on the tree, leaving on Chaisty by nearly a tenth and a half, but the Sandgropei-’s super tough G/Gas Commodore had just enough to run Cooper down.

Chaisty’s win gave him the series, along with also giving the West Australian division its sec ond Super Stock Champion in the past two years, Steve Flynn hav ing won last year.

Continued next page

(Photos by Marshall Cass and John Bosher)

final at Willowbank in as many races.

In the final round, Mikres, who had been plagued by tyre-shake all weekend, again struck troubles and pedalled off the line.

The Santos Crane car again appeared to throw the clutch out of it, with sparks flying from under neath the car, while Kirby, who also had tyre-shaking problems, pedalled his way down to the win and his first ANDRA gold Christmas tree.

Pro Stock was highlighted by a fabulous qualifying battle by the 15 cars that turned up to get into the eight car field and a great champi onship battle that, literally, went right down to the wire.

Finally, at the end of qualifying, Australian drag racing had its quickest-ever Pro Stock field, with a bump spot of 7.865 seconds held

by Kym Petterwood.

The event itself, which saw six cars run into the once unheard of 7.7-second zone, really belonged to

TOP DOORSLAMMER Qualifying .6.334 ...224.22 1. Victor Bray. Qld.('57 Chev/511) .... .6.383 ...200,27 2. Shane Elcoate, Qld. {'41 Willys/526) . .6.406 . . .222.22 3. Peter Gratz, Qld.('57 Chev/511) .... ,6.528 .. .208.62 4. Andrew Searle, Qld.(’57 Customline) .6.641 ...218.98 5 Michael King, Qld. {’57 Customllne) . .6.795 . . ,207.47 6. Les Winter, Qld.('55 Chev/504) .... .6.807 . . .172.94 7. Ben Gatt, NSW.{'92 Falcon/540) ... .6.840 . . .195.65 8. Dave Koop, SA.('55 Chev/526) ....

DNQ: Robert Broadbent (6.911/179.43), Lui Raschella (6.932/186.96), Steve Stanic (7.450/172.94), Gary Corfield (7.520/167.35).

Eliminations - Round One W. Vietpr Bray, Qld L. Dave Koop, SA W. Ben Gatt, NSW L. Shane Elcoate, Qld..., W. Peter Gratz, Qld L. Les Winter, Qld W. Andrew Searle, Qld..

L. Michael King, Qld

.476 ,601 .563 .539 ...478 ,.507 .480 .477

6.304 11.728 6.848 9.114 6.513 6,784 6.538 8.149

227.85 72.96 179.21 136.45 216.24 206.80 205.01 183.83

Semi-Finals W. Andrew Searle, Qld..

L. Victor Bray, Qld W. Peter Gratz, Qld L. Ben Gatt, NSW

.502 .401 .518 .499

6.480 6.617 5.712 16.789

206.90 221.89 217.71 47.93

.459

Broke Broke

Final W. Peter Gratz, Qld L. Andrew Searle, Qld...

Melbourne’s Peter Ridgeway at the wheel of the VPW Olds Cutlass.

Ridgeway’s slowest run of the weekend was 7.79 seconds and he dominated, despite each and eveiy run being so close.

The former Australian Champion also gained a life-time friend in Rob Tucker who, after being downed in the first round of eliminations by Robert Quattrochi, had to wait for Ridgeway to defeat rival Joe Pohto in the final round to claim his first title with the Performance Wholesale Olds.

Polito, who needed to win the event for the championship, started off on the right foot in the final, pulling a near-perfect .401 reaction time, but his Dynomax Ford side stepped on a shift and he slowed (?) to a 7.87, well behind Ridgeway’s 7.74/173.54.

Top Alcohol and Top Doorslammer both saw the results go the same way as they did at the Nationals, with Gai-y Phillips and Peter Gratz taking the wins, but the action in

PRO STOCK Qualifying .7.729 174.69 1. Peter Ridgeway, Vic,(Olds Cutlass/347) 174,08 .7.768 2. BrunoCugnetto, Vic.(Olds Cutlass/331) 174.35 .7.787 3. Joe Polito. NSW.(Ford Probe/337) 172.61 .7.789 4. Rob Tucker, Qld.(Olds Cutlass/363) ’.

174,08 .7.790 5. Robert Quattrochi, SA.(Chev Beretta'3520 ..

172.74 .7.797 6. Craig Hastead, Qld.(Ford Thunderbird/336) .

173.88 .7.844 7. Jon Andriopoulous, NSW,(Chev Lumina/347) 171.69 ,7.865 8. Kym Petterwood. Qld.(Pontiac TransAm/329) DNQ:Tony Wedock(7.893'169.24), John O'Keamey(7.95& 16924), Gerry Parente (7.991/169.17), Mike Reilly (8.097/166.05), Gavin Handley (8.252/162.69), Mark Marchetf(8.380/164.47), Wayne Daley(9.578/147.35) Eliminations - Round One .421 7.797 173.28 W. Robert Quattrochi, SA. .440 9.337 92.90 L. Rob Tucker, Qld 7.751 .518 175.03 W. Peter Ridgeway, Vic. ..

171.49 7.825 .465 L. Kym Petterwood, Qld. ..

7.791 173.95 .442 W. Bruno Cugnetto, Vic...

173.21 7.836 .485 L. Jon Andriopoulous, NSW. 7.790 172.55 .467 W. Joe Polito, NSW 7.832 171.95 .393 L. Craig Hastead, Qld Semi-Finals W. Joe Polito, NSW. ...

L. Bruno Cugnetto. Vic. .

W. Peter Ridgeway, Vic. L. Robert Quattrochi. SA.

.499 ,546 .460 .435

7.747 16.659 7.723 7.752

173.54 42.98 175.03 174.15

Final W. Peter Ridgeway, Vic. L. Joe Polito. NSW. ...

.455 .401

7.748 7.870

173.54 172.41

37

WlNTERNATIONALS

l^(pO®[7Sg)(I)D^^9

Continued from page 36 n Perth’s Mick Seargent took out the Australian Comp Bike Championship, adding to the title that he won two years ago. The much travelled racer capped off a gi’eat year by win ning the Winternats event itself, having earlier won the Nationals at Calder in March.

%

3

n How good is Group Three racer Juan ^udnig? Well, if you consider that he’s won 12 gold ANDRA Christmas trees over the last five years, then you must start to believe that he’s probably one of the best bracket racers we have ever seen.

L WINGS OF AN EAGLE... Outgoing Australian Competition Eliminator Champion Wayne Cartledge performed some neat wheels-up launches in his leased C/Altered, above. Cartledge fell in the first round.

SPIRIT OF LOUIE... Glenn Mikres, below left, with the help of crew chief Ray Ward and Tim Findlay (in car) won his second and Santo and Louie Rapisarda’s third Australian Top Fuel Championship.

(Photos by Marshall Cass and John Bosher)

both classes provided more highlights than you would ever wish for.

While Phillips was carrying on in his normal workmanlike manner.

Top Fuel Bike W. Bill Curty, Vic. (Weldwell/Suzuki) L, Mark Gedye, SA. (Harley) Pro Stock Motorcycle W. Les Donnon, SA. (Suzuki/1327) .

L. Denis Ackland, Vic. (Suzuki/1327) Competition W. Greg Leahy, Old. (B/A) L. John Sting, Old, (A/D) Super stock W. Ian Johns, WA. (A/G) L. Graeme Walker, NSW. (B/G) Competition Bike W. Mick Seargent, WA. (A/AB) L. Daniel Peatey, Qld. (C/CB) Modified W. Allan While, NSW L, David Mullins, Qld Super Sedan \fJ. Juan Kudnig, Qld L. Kevin Bradley, Qld Super Street W. Gavin Hamilton, Qld L. Ross Munster, Qld Modified Bike W. Dale Mason, Qld L. Marty Searl, Qld Junior Dragster W. Kelly Bettes, Vic L. Brendan Maggs, Vic Super Gas W. David Gauldie, Qld L. Colin Griffin, Vic

finally defeating the impressive Paul Shackelton in thp final round, David Glenwright and Dave Hawke were having meetings with the 592 477

7.226 9,902

195.06 85.29

422 377

7.742 9.442

168.98 93.71

.7.96 ,7,21

.464 .464

7.561 14.670

174.49 84,62

.7.84 .8.69

.592 .341

7.831 8.665

171.76 159.07

.8.76 .8.20

.493 .477

8.543 8.122

153.01 160.49

.8.98 ,8.74

.409 .441

g’.ool 8.737

139.97 153.06

.9.81 .9.70

.438 .533

9.893 10,392

123.46 132.74

.11.10 .12.04

.402 .423

11.139 12.023

121.43 109,89

.9.85 10.35

.533 .600

9.882 10.273

128.94 129.20

.10.25 ,11.30

.544 .371

10.325 11.454

61.43 53,60

.9.90 .9.90

.416 .423

9.864 9,862

Willowbank walls, Hawke more seriously than Glenwright.

Glenwright’s Romac car tagged the wall in his first round against, ironically, Hawke - Hawke also touched the wall, but not bad enough to stop him returning for the next round.

The South Australian’s troubles worsened in the semi-finals, with his car getting out of shape and finally tipping over before skidding upside-down downtrack for a con siderable distance.

Hawke was cut from the car, but was released from hospital the fol lowing day after precautionary obsei-vation.

In Top Doorslammer, Gratz couldn’t believe his luck when his final round foe Andrew Searle, who had defeated the now triple Australian Champion Victor Bray in the semis, was signalled to shut off with an oil leak.

After staging the car, Gratz stormed from the line only to be hit with massive tyre shake.

Massive is an understatement, as the force of the shake tore the rearend out of the Valvoline Chevy, sending a powerless Gratz spinning out of control and into the walls!

Sensational, to say the least.

In the other Group One cate gories, Bill Curry took the event win in Top Bike with his Pennzoil machine, winning over the Harley of Mark Gedye, with Jeff Smith a well-deserved claiming Australian Championship aboard his Jeffs Cycle Salvage Harley.

In Pro Stock Motorcycle, Les Donndri claimed the double, win ning both the event and series aboard the Castrol Suzuki. Donnon downed the ICI Autocolor Suzuki of Denis Ackland in the final round.

The Group Two categories were interesting, to say the least, with many stunning performances being belted out over the three days of the event.

Competition Eliminator belonged to Queensland’s Greg Leahy; Leahy’s B/A Roadster, complete with its Grumpy Jenkins big block Chev, easily running six tenths under the national index.

Leahy took the event win, while Victorian Rod Rainford claimed the championship title with his leased C/Altered.

Super Stock belonged to the West again with, this year, Ian Johns taking out the event win with his A/G Falcon and Nationals runnerup Geoff Chaisty taking out the . Championship.

In Comp Bike, Mick Seargent also took out a double, winning both the event and his second Australian Championship.

Fifteen national records were also set at the event although, like the Nationals, prevailing winds on race day actually prevented more from actually being set.

Kudnig not only took out this year’s Super Sedan bracket at the Winternats, but he also won the Australian title, adding that to the three he won in Super Street before making the step up in class last year. n j Kudnig has won the much sought-after trophies by winning four Australian Championships, three Nationals three Winternationals, a Grand Finals and a Premier State Nationals.

Not a bad effort, huh? n Colin Griffin’s runner-up spot in Super Gas itvith his High Energy Oil Pans Celica was the second nmner-up spot in a row for the Melbourne racer at the Winternationals.

After claiming the event title a few years back, Griffin hasn’t been able to get past his final round foes again - this time, Brisbane racer David Gauldie, who was down on his luck a couple of years ago following two soul-destroying accidents, took the title.

A nice consolation for Nationalswinning Griffin, though, was the fact that, with such a strong Winternats result, he had claimed his first Australian title.

■ Melbourne Junior Dragster racer Kelly Bettes not only took out her first-ever Winternatioffals event over Brendan Maggs, but the daughter 6f long-time drag racing devotees Steve and Jenny Bettes also won the first-ever Australian Junior Dragster Championship on offer.

Both Kelly and Brendan, who have lost out to older brothers in the final round at the Nationals (Kelly to brother Scott in ’97 and Brendan to brother Jason this year), were fighting for the honour of the first championship when they met in the final round, the winner taking both titles.

It has been fairly tough for the Bettes family of late, with the unfortunate ending of their Raceway Park venture, but Kelly’s event and Championship victory with her Shell/Rocket junior dig,ger brightened up their pit area for a long time into the following morning. , ' ■ What does an ANDRA Championship mean other than the prestige of having your name listed in the record books and receiving a trophy?

Well, not much according to some winners, with many rac ers in the pits grumbling about the cost of chasing a title and the lack of rewards at the end of the rainbow.

Look for some to propose that all title winners should receive free competitor entry into all ANDRA championship events, similar to what the NHRA does with their sportsman champions.

%

By Gerald MeDo Free entry mightn’t mean a lot, but it will hardly cost the promot ers, won’t cost iWDRA a cent and will promote a great lot of goodwill with the racers.

It is worth noting that Willowbank Raceway actually gives their track champions free entry for the following season, so it is nothing really new in Australia.

Most who heal’d about the pro posal believed it to be one of merit and one which should be accepted. n The lead-up to the Winternats, headed by the local council’s Ipswich Events Corportaion, again proved to be a great success.

The highlight was the annual Ipswich Motor Sports Dinner, held at the Ipswich Civic Centre on the Wednesday preceeding the race.

Over 200 guests attended the dinner, which saw Gary Phillips named Willowbank “Drag Racer of the Year,” defeating Victor Bray and Rob Tucker for the honour.

Phillips also later claimed the Queensland Times’ “Motor Sports Person of the Year” award.

Also taking place prior to the event was,the annual billy cart bash, with a record number of kids taking to the streets in their home-made machines.

The kids race has turned:^into one of the highlights of the week leading up to the Winternats and is just as hotly contested as the actual event itself.

H Big rumour doing the rounds at the Winternats was that ANDRA is looking at join ing the “promoters club” by leasing the Eastern Creek facility firom the ARDC for the Premier State Nationals in October.

Understandably upset at the lack of quarter-mile action hap pening in the country’s largest city, it is believed ANDRA,follow ing a proposal put together by Marketing Consultant Vic Wood, is preparing to lay it all on the line to run the event and showcase the sport in the harbour city.

It is a common held belief that without racing in Sydney, the sport will head back to the strug gling days ofthe late eighties. n How good is Willowbank’s new scruitineering complex?

Well, the track processed over 400 racers by mid-day Friday of the event, with most racers commenting that the facility allowed things to progress quickly and smoothly. ●With eight lanes into the bays and two sets of scales for Groups One and Two, it presented the rac ers with an extremely well organ ised set-up resulting in minimal delays.

Obviously at a cost close to a quarter of a million dollars, the place is the Taj Mahal of scruiti K neering bays!

■ Interesting sign seen at most of the food outlets at the Winternationals - “Water $1.80, Cordial - $1.40!”

Obviously, the offending cordial wasn’t one of the most popular flavours, although we weren’t game to find out what it actually was!

3S

DRAG RACING

19June 1998

brand-new technology for the company. It is a really exciting Winternationals as Our preparation forwas thefine, Konica time for us, as the product is for we got everything as right as we day to day car users and not possibly could - I even got plenty designed for racing applications, of early nights leading up to the but some of the properties that it race meeting. has can be utlised in the motor The car was performing well, racing industry. the first five runs proving that it We hope to use some of the will run hard and fast and our technology in our race engines. that we are applying on them. elapsed times and speeds were But preventative maintenance better than the rest of the field uring the off-season, we’re but, when it really mattered in the on a regular basis will detect any planning to go over to the US semi-finals, it just spun the problems with the rear-ends and and join up with Scotty Cannon, other components. wheels.

Our Top Doorslammers are the with the idea of attending several The track was good all week quickest in the world and they IHRA race meets and several end and on Saturday during quali exhibition shows. require ongoing development. fying it was near-on perfect.

It looks like my former young It is cold-weather sensitive Henry Ford didn’t make an EL and, with the cooler conditions Falcon, he first made his Model T team-mate, Troy Critchley, has plus the wind, those big breaks and over the decades the EL. got himself a drive in Johnny after the accidents and the oil- Falcon evolved from his original Rocca’s ’49 Mercury at some of the IHRA match-racing and small downs tended to harm the overall concept and that is what is hap er meets, so it’s good to see him performance for all the Group One pening with our cars.

The Murray Anderson rear- achieving one of his goals to race racers that have more power than ends that Scotty, Peter, myself in the US. the other competitors.

Rocca is extremely busy with and others are using are the first Hey! We all race on the same track and there are no excuses - of a new model and you have to his traffic light business and pians I’m guilty of going out there and expect cracks and problems as to concentrate only on the big we all develop more advanced events, allowing Troy to run the trying to go too fast every time. balance of their IHRA racing proI swore that I wouldn’t do it at units in our quest to win races.

All the other teams will definite gram. that meet, but when the time Scotty is leading the IHRA came I figured that the final would ly gain from what we’re ali devel take a 6.20-second run to win it oping, but it’s a shame that Peter series in his new Murray and 1 wanted to make sure I knew had to pay such a big price for Anderson-built Studebaker by a how to do one under those track such a small problem. country mile, so it would be'great and weather conditions.

His car shook so bad on Friday to be with him at several of the With these brackets, you can that it broke the gearbox and meets when they are close maybe some damage was done together - it all depends on the slow the car down a tad in compe tition and more often than not then. monetary exchange rate on how It was shaking pretty bad when long we stay in the US. you’ll win them - but I don’t know The poor if that is the way exchange rate to go for me.

I believe if is currently killing the you’re in a Group One Group One racers, as all bracket you should run hard our major com and work out ponents are sourced from how to go quick US suppliers and fast now, and just about not in years to come when everything has got 30% dearer everyone else is in recent times. going faster If the man when the racing agement of gets tough. I’ll be one of the drag racing in Austral ia ones that knows doesn’t handle how to perform this properly at the pointy end. with regard to weak STATESIDE TOUR... Victor is lookingfor supportersfor 1999 trip.(NLx Fix) the Australian dol he Pro Stock was a bloody good in broke, but I wouldn’t have lar, I believe they could crush our bracket out there at the thought that it was bad enough to form of racing, as our purchases Winternationals, with' seventeen do what it did. are all linked to the money marMaybe his last run, where he ket. guys racing hard and tough to As consumers of American attempted to go fast, was the make an eight-car field.

Something like seven cars ran straw that broke the camel’s back. products in Australia, we are the 7.70-second times down one lane When you run consistently in losers in this instance - if the dol and it shows that they really the 6.30/225 bracket you tend to lar doesn’t bounce back, we’re all deserved to hold their heads high think that the car is okay - and going to be in trouble, especially all weekend. then it goes and spins the tyres, the Nitro guys, who virtually break Congratulations to all of them, or shakes tyres and breaks some parts on every pass down the quarter-mile. they did a real good job by run thing. I guess that’s racing. ning fast and reliable and provid I know when'you’re racing you Maybe some engineering busi ed a good show for everyone - I have to learn to lose before you nesses will now start to manufac would like to see Top win, but I feel sorry for Peter, as ture race components locally.

Doorslammer get to the stage he has a broken car once again where the majority of us reliably and he has to spend more money run 6.20s.

I’vemy been thinking repairing it when he could be out Recently, about taking ’57 Chevrolet to the US in 1999 to contest sev on the track putting on a show. realise that these Doorslammers eral of the IHRA meets when they are one of the hardest classes in ext month. I’ll be at Darwin’s are close together. the world to run hard and fast all Hidden Valley for the Touring It’s just an idea of mine at pre the time - only Scotty Cannon Car Championship round at the sent, where we participate at five and several others in the US, new track, which I’m looking for or six meets, racing or running along with Peter Gratz, Shane ward to as we haven’t been in that match-races and possibly putting in some exhibition runs at an Elcoate and myself, can seem to area of Australia before. get them to run quick and fast on We’ll be arriving several days NHRA event. a regular basis. before the race meeting for some I would only go over there to Maybe the track wasn’t good promotional appearances, before race if I had a contingent of, say, enough for the Top Doorslammers running several exhibition forty Aussie fans coming over with to run a 6.20 pass on the Sunday. burnouts during the course of the us for the trip.

Gratz shook the brains out of event.

We could all travel together, his thing in the final before the I hope the spectators look for visit the tracks and attractions and rear-end broke out of it; but these our transporter, as I’m looking for show the Yanks what we’re ali things happen when you attempt ward to meeting them, as well as about, as I’ll be on a mission to to go quick - welcome to the 6.20 signing plenty of autographs. run hard and beat them at their zone, mate. own game.

Where his chassis broke, I I wonder if there are any have also broken mine before we Castrol me participat ing in also theirhave national launch of expressions of interest from any reinforced it - cracks will appear the new GTX Magnetic Oil, which fans that would like to spend a in the chassis, due to the loads is a revolutionary lubricant that is month touring with us in ’99?

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Randy Daniels (left) and Bruno Cugnefto (Brisbane Motorsport Photograpby)-'

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Randy teams up with Bruno...

NHRA Pro Stock Truck racer Randy Daniels teamed up with Bruno Cugnetto’s Victorian Wholesale Performance Oldsmobile Cutlass team for the ’98 Koniqa Winternationals.

Daniels, who hails from New Bern, North Carolina, raced the Oldsmobile in the NHRA’s C/A class (running the same racing specifications as the Australian small-block Pro Stock regulations) with great success for several sea sons, before selling the car to Cugnetio late last year.

It was initially planned that Daniels would attend the Australian debut of the car at the ’98 TAC Nationals at Calder Park Raceway, but his busy schedule prevented him from flying down under for the event.

Daniels competed at the recent NHRA Route 66 Nationals in Chicago in his Chevrolet S-10 Pro Stock Truck, recording a 7.08/172.19 pass before being elimi nated in the second round of racing.

“Randy shook the Oldsmobile down for me before it was shipped back to Melbourne by taking it into the winner’s circle at the IHRA meeting conducted at Darlington International Raceway,” said Cugnetto.

“He made it through to the semi finals at the inaugural Mateo Tools Supernationals raced at Houston Raceway in Texas.

“It was obvious that the index format in the US is more important than winning a race and Daniels backed-off early to record a 7.69, rather than running under the class index in the VPW machine.

“The car runs a 331 cubic inch Chevrolet powerplant developing in excess of 820 horsepower and has recorded an elapsed time of 7.68 seconds with a best terminal speed of 175.5 mph.

“The VPW crew wants to learn as much as we can about the car while Randy is here to assist us,” added Cugnetto.

- GRANT NICHOLAS

raps with Eddie

Winternationals Top Fuel win ner Robin Kirby and his broth er, Peter, spent three days with Top Fuel champion Eddie Hill prior to the running of the Konica-backed event.

Both Kirby and Hill run with cor porate support from Pennzoil, the number one lubricants manufactur er in the US and, over recent months, they have communicated on several ocassions - Kirby there fore decided to head to Chicago to meet Hill while catching-up with several race component suppliers.

“We had an interesting few days with Eddie and his crew-chief, Dan Olson, as they prepared to run a string of 4.60-second passes on the new track,” said Kirby. “It was great to be at the event, as Eddie was the first racer to run a 4.6 down the new track during Friday’s qualifying sessions.”

Kirby flew straight back into Brisbane early on June 5 for the first round of Top Fuel qualifying at the ’98 Konica Winternationals at Willowbank Raceway later in the day.

“Last time we competed at the southern Queensland track in late February, we won the Australian Top Fuel Championship series round, so we were rather keen to score back to back victories on the Wintemats weekend.

“We had increased the fuel pump volume and I’d gained a few other tweaks from Chicago that helped

our performance on Simday night and we definitely required more fuel going into the engine in the cooler night conditions,” Kirby explained.

“I planned to nm the car vvdthout hurting any parts, but my main objective was to win the event.”

- GRANT NICHOLAS Robin Kirby.(John Bosher pic)

39 Motorcycle category to the level of success it enjoys now.

“We plan to focus our efforts on Team Winston’s driver Angelle Seeling,” Bryce added.

Another Pedregon makes victory lane

By Gerald MeDor n “It’s difficult to say good-bye and I have spent many weeks pondering this decision, but I felt the time was right to move on and explore other opportu nities and maintain my own identity.” - John Myers One of the longest and most pro ductive relationships in NHRA Winston Drag Racing has ended with the announcement that triple NHRA Winston Pro Stock Motorcycle champion John Myers has left the Star Racing team.

Myers won a total of 33 NHRA national events and appeared in 56 final rounds as a member of the Star team.'

Two on the trotfor King Kenny

I

i/yWheet Vmtiques

Myers drove Star-prepared motorcycles to championships in 1990,1992 and 1995.

He was runner-up six times in the championship race and is cm-rently ranked fourth in the 1998 NHRA Winston standings.

“I was shocked when John called me with his decision to resign from the Star Racing team, but I respect his decision and we all wish him well,” said George Bryce.

“John was great for our team and great for our sport.

“He was a model champion and he helped bring the Pro Stock

53 \

GENETIC CODE... Frank Jr is the latest success story for the Pedregon family. (David Ostaszewskipic) The eldest son of infamous drag Lee and Chuck Etchells to advance racing pioneer “Flamin’ Frank” to the final, downed Skuza with a Pedregon, Frank Junior, tyre-smoking 5.24/279, Skuza’s became the latest family mem Dodge crossing the centre line and ber to win a professional Funny disqualifying him from the duel.

Car crown when he took Jim Points leader John Force lost to Dunn’s unsponsored Dodge Skuza in the semis, but opened his Avenger to the title at the points lead over Etchells, who lost Pontiac Excitement Nationals, in the second round. held at Columbus, Ohio, on the In keeping the family theme weekend. going, Jeg Coughlin took out his The eldest Pedregon, in his rook third Pro Stock victory in front of a ie season in the Funny Car ranks, parochial home crowd, taking the joins brothers Cruz (1992 Winston final in a 7.02/196 to 7.06/195 race Fu’nny Car Champion) and Tony with defending Winston Champion (1996/97 Winston Funny Car Jim Yates.

Championship runner-up) as a win Coughlin almost got to have a ner in the professional category, double celebration, with the former with each of the Pedregons now Winston Sportsman Champion also also having scored a major win this making the final round in Super year.

Stock, before falling to Dan “It hasn’t sunk in yet. I’m grate Fletcher in an extremely close final ful we even have a ride this year. I round. don’t mind getting chewed out by Coughlin gave that loss part of Jim Dunn, now that I’ve got a win the credit for his wiii in Pro Stock, for him,” Pedregon said after taking saying, “I had a little blood running the win over Dean Skuza in the out of my mouth after the final of final round.

Super Stock and getting beat. We It was a great field for Pedregon felt confident having lane choice to win over, as well, with the bump going into the final over Yates. Our spot sitting at a new record low of whole team did an excellent job giv 5.126 seconds, held down by ing me a great race car.”

Coughlin’s win moved him into Australian tourist Cory Lee. For his efforts in tuning second place in the Winston points, 174 points behind leader Warren Pedregon to the win, veteran team owner and crew chief Dunn was Johnson, who suffered a shock first round loss. named as crew chief of the race.

Johnson’s early loss also allowed In the final round, Pedregon, who Yates to gain 71 points in the had qualified eighth with a championship and narrowed the 5.06/296 and defeated A1 Hofmann,

gap between the two most recent Winston champions to 189 points.

In Top Fuel, Kenny Bernstein backed up from his win at the new Joliet race two weekends ago, win ning over Bob Vandergriff in the final round with a 4.68/310 to 4.70/297 victory.

Afterwards, Bernstein compared the win to that two weeks ago in Joliet: “Any time you win, if you have any competitive bones in you, whenever you win at an3fthing you do, it’s enjoyable and the latest one

is good,” King Kenny said. “The one before that is okay, but this is the one now.”

Current Winston points leader Cory McClenathan lost in the sec ond round, allowing Joe Amato to close the margin to just 19 points in the chase for the championship.

The win also vaulted Bernstein from sixth to fourth in the chase, just 188 points behind, In Pro Stock Bike, Matt Hines continued to.'dominate the field with his Vance&Hines Suzuki,

n Further to our article last week regarding Bob Jane’s decision to drop ANDRA sanc tioning and insurance from its street meetings, figures this week supplied by Jane show that the costs mentioned in the article were short of the total figure paid.

The article stated that the sanc tion fees paid by Jane for street meetings at Calder Park and Adelaide International Raceway were “approximately $375.”

The full and correct figure is $545 per meeting, for the first eight meetings.

Each subsequent meeting is free of charge.

Due to insurance costs not being disclosed to the author by any source, the article failed to men tion that Jane also pays a number of insurance premiums totalling $520 per meeting, along with an Australian Drag Racing Promoters Association levy of $50 per meeting and a further ANDRA levy of $100 per event for the first eight events.

The $5 paid to ANDRA for each participant goes to their Injured Drivers Fund.

Jane also told MN that both Calder Park and Adelaide had submitted their dates to ANDRA for the coming season, contrary to the article, but they weren’t firm dates and couldn’t be confiraied as correct until the end of June. defeating his father’s long-time arch-rival, David Schultz, in the final round, 7.34/178 to 7.48/170.

The win extended reigning cham pion Hines’ points lead over secondplaced Angelle Seeling, the Winston-backed rider losing in the second round of eliminations.

The next race on the NHRA Winston tour will be the second annual Craftsman Nationals at the Madison, Illinois, facility in two weeks time.

- GERALD McDORNAN

LEAFIN'LIZARDS... Interesting graphics adorn flanks of Kenny Bernstein’s Top Fueller. (David Ostaszewski)

●4v;

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1998 NHRA CHAMPIONSHIP DRAG RACING SERIES - POINTS TO JUNE 15TH, 1998.

PErt'-

I. 2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

1998 NHRA Top Fuel Championship .785 Cory McClenathan, McDonald’s Joe Amato, Tenneco Automotive . . . .766 Gary Sceizi, Team Winston-No Bull . .654 Kenny Bernstein, Budweiser/Prolong .597 Mike Dunn, Mopar Performance . . . .562 .555 Jim Head, Jim Head Racing Bob Vandergriff, Jerzees America

502

8. Larry Dixon, Miller Lite/MBNA 486 9. Doug Kalitta, Kalitta International . . .451 10. Bruce Sarver, ATSCO Power Steer . .423

1998 NHRA Funny Car Championship ,77 9 I. John Force, Castrol/Mac Tools 2. Chuck Etchells, Kendall/MaMa Rosa . .719 3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

Cruz Pedregon, Interstate Bat/Hot Rod . .648 Ron Capps, Copenhagen/MBNA . . . .647 Tim Wilkerson, JCIT international . . .589 ,573 Tony Pedregon, Castrol Syntec WhitBazemore,Team Winston-No Bull . .506

8. Frank Pedregon, Jim Dunn Racing 9. Dean Skuza, Mateo Tools/Mopar 10. Randy Anderson, Parts America

476 468 .420

1998 NHRA Pro Stock Championship I. Warren Johnson, Goodwrench/Pontiac . .824 2. jeg Coughlin jnr., Jegs Mail Order 650 3. Jim Yates, Peak Anti-Freeze/Splitfire . . .635 4. Mark Osborne, Dick Sherman Racing 560 5. Kurt Johnson, ACDelco/Chevrolet . .550 520 6. Mike Thomas, Pennzoil .440 7. Mike Edwards, JK Racing Pontiac 9.

8.

Tom Martino, Six Flags Thrill Parks . .374 356 Bruce Allen, Outlaw Additives .343 10. Mark Pawuk, Summit Racing

speedway

DLfCo

9X0.

NARC win by Murphy Rkkardsson's German GP

Aussie Peter Murphy has emu lated the feats of Adelaide’s Jamie Cobby some years back by becoming only the second Aussie to win a round of the NorthernvAuto Racing Club fea ture in the USA. .

Murphy, driving for California’s Morrie Williamsjn the Katie’s BJ’s Kountry Kitchen/Mountain View Mortgage Brokers Maxim, led all but two of the 30 laps at the Tulare Thunderbowl after having won the Budweiser Dash for Cash and starting from pole position.

In what was an exciting race, Murphy led fi’om the start, but had his hands full fighting off the con stant challenges of Paul McMahan, NARC points leader and regular Aussie tourist Brent Kaeding and Jason Meyers during the first five frantic laps.

McMahan battled wheel to wheel with Murphy, as Kaeding and Meyers battled two car lengths adrift.

Murphy and McMahan swapped the lead corner by corner, until McMahan escaped in the lead as the pair rocketed out of turn 2 on lap 8.

Mui-phy retook the lead two laps later in the same spot and was still in the lead when the red flag flew for Tommy Tarlton’s roll.

On the restart, Murphy continued to hold off the McMahan-KaedingMeyers trio in a gi-eat battle.

Murphy got his break, however, when they hit lapped traffic on lap 17 and Murphy weaved his way through the slower cars to secure the victory.

“I knew Paul [McMahan] and everybody else were right behind me,” explained Murphy. “I just kept concentrating on what I was doing and hoped for the best.”

Murphy was a proud Aussie as he stood in the Budweiser Black &

White Classic victory lane wearing a race suit adorned the with Australian flag.

“Morrie could have stuck a bunch of good American dri vers in the car,” said the jubilant winner. “Fm just glad that he gave me a chance to drive i/iTn**5Hino and even happi er that I could provide him with a win.”

McMahan’s second place fin ish aboard John Sullivan’s Mountain Impact Shaver Johnboy was his best result of the VICTORY LANE... Peter Murphy.(Brett Swanson pic) season.

Randy Hannagan threw out a 30-lap main - the third this season late challenge to McMahan, but and the 133rd of his stellar NARC had to settle for third in his broth- career - to take the points lead from Tiner for the first time this er’s Gaerte-powered Santomauro.

Kaeding’s fourth place finish season, The first 15 laps were fragment helped extend his points lead to 26 ed by numerous stoppages, with over Randy Tiner - Meyers finished Hannagan, Kaeding and Steve fifth. , After 11 races in^ the 30-race Kent sharing the lead. The final 15 laps, though, were sensational, series, Murphy currently sits 10th.

Murphy was hoping that he had with Kaeding and Kent swapping been the first Aussie to win a the lead five times in three laps NARC feature, but when told that before Kaeding made a break until

Cobby had been the first Murphy ^ lapped traffic played its hand, replied: “Good, then I will be the ' With Kaeding up high on the fu’st Aussie to win two.” wall and Kent down low, the two Consideiing that he has one win cars crossed the line a car length and six other top 10 finishes to his apart- Bobby McMahan was third. credit in the series, that’s not such Muiphy was sixth, but still ahead of the likes of Paul McMahan, a long shot.

The night previous at the Jimmy SiUs and Lee Brewer.

-BRETT SWANSON Thunderbowl, Kaeding had won the

Croft’s Burrowes Memorial Phil Crofts has claimed his second Bunny Bmrowes F500 Memorial after leading home a 21car field at Perth’s Bibra Lake Speedway on Jime 7.

Crofts, who previously won in 1994, started out of posi tion four on the second row, before moving to the front and claiming the much sought-after race.

It capped off a good day for Crofts, who took one sec ond and two thirds after coming from the back of the pack in the qualifying heats.

Defending champion Brian Coombs, a paraplegic racer, started on the pole after earlier taking two heat wins.

He was joined on the front row by Bill Richards and Craig Walton, who both had one heat win each.

The Myalup-based Larry Maiolo Racing outfit -just outside sea side city Bunbury - cleaned up the awards at the Sprintcar Association of WA’s awards night on June 6.

Between team drivers Ron Krikke and Jamie Maiolo, the team featured in 11 awards, a result which reflected the dominant sea son the two drivers enjoyed.

Former double Australian champi on Kilkke had one of his best seasons ever and on the night collected hard ware that honoured the fastest onelap time in a two-lap time trial, the open division feature race champi onship, most open featoe wins, the achievement award and the Bonza Bradford Memorial trophy.

The younger driver in the team, Jamie, who is Larry Maiolo’s son, blitzed all before him in his rookie sprintcar season.

No doubt the biggest highlight for the 17 year-old was winning the State 360ci Championship at Bunbury earlier in the year.

Other heat winners on the day were David Rhodes, Jeff Muir, Paul Pinfold, Bill Broadwood and Bryan Mullings.

In taking out the feature race, Crofts became only the fifth driver to win more than once.

Since 1983, this has been done by Rod Bottrell, Bill Broadwood, Bryan Mullings and Jeff Hancock.

Single wins have gone to Robbie Brown, Peter Vanouwerkerk, Des Ferris, Bill Richards, Gary Venning and Coombs. , The WA F500 Association’s annual general meetihg and election of office bearers for next season is on June 30.

-DARREN O’DEA

n/laiolo Racing scoops WA Sprintcar awards

He was also honoured for most feature race wins, the driver with the most potential, the new achiev er award, rookie of the year and third in the Bonza Bradford Memorial trophy for 360ci cars.

Having served his one year apprenticeship in the budget divi sion, Maiolo has already stepped up into open class company, having competed in a number of headlining events on the West Coast, including the national title and the North West tour.

Other award winners on the night included: Steve Gould (360ci feature race champion and first in Bcnza Bradford Memorial for 360ci cars), Ryan Farrell (open driver with most potential and most improved driver), Ant Kinley

(encouragement and hard luck awards), Shane Krikke (best pre sented car and King of Crash), Steve Coyle (best presented crew), Mark Wells (State title).

Outgoing SAWA president, engine builder and team owner Geoff Kendrick was presented with Life Membership on the night by vice president Pino Priolo.

Association social secretary/lap recorder Sandra Green received the club person of the year award.

Kendrick Race Engines and Albany Fuel Injection claimed the open and 360ci engine builder titles, while Maxim and Gambler were honoured as the leading chas sis manufacturers in the respective divisions.

-DARREN O’DEA

Aussie four falter as Swede wins again

The heat of Germany produced spectators in beachwear, but little glory for the Australian quartet taking part in the German Grand Prix at Pocking on June 6.

The most successful of the four riders was Ryan Sullivan, who was placed equal 12th of the 24 riders, after finishing last in heat 20 when he had a chance of making the semi-finals.

Jason Crump saw his challenge end with a la^t place in heat 10, albeit with some controversy, as Hans Nielsen appeai'ed to virtually run him off the track.

Craig Boyce started well enough by wiiming the very first race ahead of Toni Kasper and Hans Nielsen, Crump taking a tumble and damag ing his already bruised ribs.

To be fkir, the man from Mildura battled back to win heat6 and keep his hopes alive, but the nudge from Nielsen, ignored by British referee Frank Ebdon, ended his chances of progressing further.

A third place for Boyce in heat 7 meant he needed to finish in the first two in heat 9 to stay in the meeting, but a third place behind Nielsen and Mark Loram meant an early exit.

Sullivan and Leigh Adams, who came respectively seventh and eighth in Prague, were among the seeded riders and they did not come into action until heat 11 onwards.

Adams made only third place behind Tony Rickardsson and Peter Karlson in his first ride and that meant he needed to finish first, or second, to stay alive when he came out in heat 15 - but a third place meant his Grand Prix had lasted just two rides.

Sullivan’s third in heat 12 saw him looking at a similar fate, but he returned to the track to vrin heat 16, a fall in heat 20 ending his day.

Rickardsson, the 27 year-old Swedish rider, won his second Grand Prix in succession, after being unbeaten in the only four rides he needed.

Rickardsson, the last individual World Champion under the old for mat after having won the title at Vojens in 1994, is a clear leader after two rounds of the six round series.

The Final was an exact repeat of the last race in Prague, although there was a slightly different finish ing order, as Swede Jimmy Nilsen finished as runner-up in front of Billy Hamill.

Polish rider Tomasz Gollob, hav ing reached the final, failed to fin ish for the second successive Grand

Prix.

There was much controversy about the track and on it.

With temperatures reaching 35 degrees Celsius during the day, track preparation had proved diffi cult and the riders were critical that the watering was not deep enough.

Referee Ebdon was, not for the first time, accused of making incon sistent decisions.

Among some strange decisions, he excluded four-time world cham-

pion Nielsen after a second rerun of the first semi-final in heat 20, although Nielsen looked more sinned against than sinning him self.

But the real mayhem occurred when the erratic, but sometimes brilliant, Gollob clashed with Hamill in heat 17.

How both riders stayed aboard their machines was a miracle and they had to be separated after attempted fisticuffs in the pits at the end of the race.

For World Champion Greg Hancock, it was another night of frustration - in Prague, his GP lasted just two races.

This time, he started earlier and second place in heat 4 saw him on his way. Another second in heat 7 took him into the main section of the draw, but he came last in heat 12 and had work to do.

He rode well into second place behind Nielsen in heat 15 and then won heat 20 to earn a place in the semi-finals.

But two successive lasts, first in his semi-final and then in the con solation final, meant eighth place overall - enough to guarantee seed ing at Vojens, but not good enough to give him a serious total of GP points in his efforts to retain his World title.

Placings and points 1. Tony Rickardsson (Sweden)25 2. Jimmy Nilsen (Sweden) 20 18 3. Billy Hamill(USA) 4. Tomasz Gollob (Poland) 16 5. Henrik Gustafsson(Sweden)15 6. Andy Smith(England) 14 7. Hans Nielsen(Denmark) 12 11 8. Greg Hancock(USA) =9. Peter Karlsson(Sweden) =9. Chris Louis(England) =11. Ryan Sullivan (Australia) 7 =11. Mark Loram (England) 7 =13. Stefan Danno(Sweden) 6 =13. Leigh Adams(Austraha) 6 =15. Armando Castagna (Italy) 5 =15. Zoltan Adoq'an (Hungary) 5 =17. Toni Kasper(Czech Rep) 4 =17. Craig Boyce (Australia) 4 =19. Jason Crump(Austraha) 3 =19. JacekKryzaniak(Poland) 3 2 =21. Gerd Riss(Germany) =21. Robert Barth(Germany) 2 =23. Piotr Protasiewicz(Poland) 1 =23. Sebastian Ulamek(Poland) 1 The top eight riders will be seed ed through to heat 11 and beyond for the Denmark GP at Vojens on June 19.

Overall Standings (after two Grand Prix) Tony Rickardsson 50 pts, Billy Hamill 38, Jimmy Nilsen 38, Tomasz Gollob 32, Chris Louis 23, Henrik Gustafsson 23, Hans Nielsen 20, Stefan Danno 20, Ryan Sullivan 19, Greg Hancock 16, Leigh Adams 16, Andy Smith 16, Mark Loram 13, Zoltan Adoijan 12, Toni Kasper 11, Peter Karlsson 9, Craig Boyce 7, Jason Crump 6, Armando Castagna 6, Gerd Riss 6, Brian Andersen 5, Bo Brhel 5, Jesper Jensen 4, Piotr Protasiewicz 3, Jacek Kryzaniak 3, Robert Barth 2, Sebastian Ulamek 1.

-TONY MILLARD

41

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WILD WEST... Max Dumesny inside Robbie Farr at Karratha, which was won by Warrenne Ekins.(Brad Steele pic)

r

1

Since mytwo-day last column, 1 contest ed the Queensland A Sprintcar Championship event at L *^ 0i Rockhampton in our Valvoline/No Fear J&J, starting off the front row next to David Grose.

He got the jump at the start and ■r; ■ led the feature for a while, before I moved past to win the title, which | was quite pleasing after we expe- I rienced several flat tyres on the ' transporter during the course of the trip - changing truck wheels at then flew back to Sydney for a 1.00 am is not fun. few days, as we didn’t have to be in Port Hedland for the next stage

K I I

THE THING WINS ... Speedcar champion Warrenne Ekins (above) drove the latest Geoff Murphy-designed radical canted engine Sprintcar (below) to victory at Karratha during the Pilbara Sprintweek, the injected V8 Chevy in Ekins’ Alf Barbagallo/PDQ entry laid over at an angle of 45 degrees to achieve greater traction and drive.

(Brad Steele pics)

After that, I thenSean headed to the West to race Carren’s Schnee, complete with a Moose engine, in their Pilbara Sprintweek Series that takes in three different tracks located in the North-West region.

We teamed up with Pino Priolo, who drives Sean’s second car in the 360 class.

of the untii Thursday.

Theseries Port Hedland venue was a bit of a culture shock, They have a monster track up there - it’s approximately 800 metres (half a mile) long and was a little hard to pass on, as the rac ing surface was slick.

The track was massively wide, but if you moved off the pole line / you immediately went backwards,

The first where meeting was was at two which prevented us from running Newman, the track or three cars wide, out in the back blocks, among a We all had good fun and I start whole lot of red dirt. ed on the outside of the front row The township is quite nice and for the A-Mair){ next to Ron Krikke, who went on to win the event. the hospitality was absolutely fan It wasn’t a real eventful race tastic, with everyone genuinely interested in the Sprintcar racing - and I got close to him on several it was probably the biggest thing occasions, but he comfortably to happen in Newman during that went on to claim victory. time of the year.

The track was a little dark, with jumped into the the carsevent, and we headed south long straights and fairly narrow After corners, but you could run high or towards Karratha, dodging or pac low and not be disadvantaged - ing kangaroos along the number One Highway and arriving at we were certain that the specta tors would be provided with some about four in the morning, as we had two nights of racing to foliow good racing.

Robbie Farr and I'started on on their track.

Their track features good rac the front row and he got the lead for a little while - then, a lap or ing lines, allowing us to take the two after a restart, I forged high line, plus I had raced there through to take the feature win previously and that helped me in from Perth’s Ron Krikke. setting up the Schnee for the heats and the feature.

Robbie got taken out by anoth er competitor and the front-end After the completion of the was torn out of his machine. heats, I managed to start on the After the racing, the organisers .outside of the front row again, this put on a barbecue, with a lot of time next to Warrene Ekins in Kev the locals staying back to talk Murphy’s new ’’The Thing” car, about Sprintcar racing - their which has the engine hanging out interest and knowledge was the left side of the chassis - I think it’s tilted to about 45 degrees. impressive.

which is similar to the way the Yanks raced the roadsters at Indy and on their big dirt tracks many years ago.

Warrene was fairly competitive during most nights, but with more drive available at Karratha the car was certainly a lot better, allowing him to gain pole for the main race.

I went into the first turn high and dropped back to fourth spot before I exited the turn. I then worked my way back up to second, but I didn't have enough to nail Warrene before the end of the race.

U

pon my return to Sydney, I have been concentratvg on the wheel business that I have purchased from Eagle One, as well as make preparations for my next tour of the USA, which sees me flying out in about four or five weeks time - among all that. I’m taking my wife, Melinda, to Airlie Beach in North Queensland for a week’s recreation.

We’re now marketing a range of racing wheels for dirt track speedway vehicles that will cer tainly enhance the performance and presentation of the race cars,

I

’m planning to spend four weeks racing in the USA, initially racing a new J&J chassis in the 360 Series in Texas, before heading to Knoxville for the 360 Nationals.

After that meet, we’ll install an open engine in the car, with the view of running in several open races to qualify for the Knoxville Sprintcar Nationals - it will be basically an all-Aussie assauit.

o

n the local NASCAR scene, we’ve stripped down our Valvoline Chevrolet Monte Carlo, checking and updating a few things while John Sidney is work ing on a program to extract some more horsepower for my ’98/99 title chase.

We may be running at Mount Panorama, plus there may be an extra round of the series in Adelaide, so I’m looking forward to seeing the racing calendar in the next couple of weeks.

I

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Chadwick and Reuter top SA awards nights Street Stock driver Brian Chadwick walked away with ten major honours from the Speedway Drivers Association annual prizegiving function held in Adelaide earlier in June.

Chadwick, 33, took his Commodore to eight wins from 11 feature races at his home track.

Speedway City, during the 1997/98 season and topped all pointscores. ●He also'won the Scotcher Race Fuels trophy for Most Outstanding Performances in all car sections.

Best turned out Car and Crew awards went to Bill Miller (Super Sedans), Maris Valodze (Street Stocks), Jason Loveday (F500) and Mike Buxallen (V6 Sprints).

The Formula 500 boys were unable to attend the evening’s fes tivities, due to racing commitments at Swan Hill (see story this page).

In their absence, Brenton Kelly was awarded Most Improved and Best Pointscore in feature races, while Ben Dillon took out Best Pointscore in F500 heat races.

Peter Mason, Trevor Best and Rod Brady won most of the Modified Sedans silverware. Mason snaring top points in both Features

and Heats, Neville Glazbrook was the most successful Division 2 Street Stock driver, while Sedan star Bill Miller was announced as SA’s nominee for the Jacko award for the second time in recent years, this time adding the Jacko to the Speedway Sportsperson of the Year trophy, which he scored for 1997/98.

The all-important SDA No 1 awards went to Steve Murphy (Super Sedans), Ben Dillon (F500) and Steve Agars (V6 Sprints).

The previous weekend saw the Adelaide-based Sprintcar Action Club’s Trophy Function held, with Mark Reuter taking home a healthy number of trophies.

He won the Overall Pointscore award. Most Heat and Feature Wins, Speedway City Highest Pointscore and the Sprint Auto Parts Club Champion jacket.

The Sprintcar Rpokie trophy went to Mt Gambier’s Ray Scott, while Most Improved was SA champ Chas Calandro.

The Encouragement award went to Tony Bartlett and Unluckiest Driver was adjudged to be Darryl Downing, with three big dumps this past season. - DAVID McNABB

MOST IMPROVED ... Chas Calandro, pictured on his way to winning the SA Sprintcar Championship at Speedway City last March, was a winner at the Sprintcar Action Club's trophy night. (Frank Midgley pic)

RUNNER-UP... Darryl V\/illsher (above) came second in the Tuckertime Series to cousin Ken. (Brett Swanson)

Second F500 crown to Ken Willsher

Laang’s Ken Willsher overcame a nine point deficit going into the final round of the Tuckertime Championship series for Formula 500s to take the championship crown, his second in three years, by 28 points after bad luck befell his series rivals on Jiuie 6 at Sonic Speedway, Swan Hill.

“It’s a shame what happened to Darryl and Woody [Woodberry],” stated the new champion. “It’s not the way I wanted to see it happen, because both those guys were run ning my cars [Kenser Chassis]. It would have been good to race it out on the night.”

Going into the final round, which saw 35 top quality cars - including the top six cars from the Australian Title from as far west as Perth and as far south as Tasmania in atten dance - Darryl Willsher had a four point break over Phillip Woodberry, with Ken Willsher a further five points adrift.

Relocated Tasmanian Woodberry didn’t help his cause when he was late arriving at the venue, which meant he didn’t collect 10 bonus points and he would also have to start rear of field in all his heats.

The McDonald’s Warrnambool top six draw saw all drivers coinci dentally start in their qualified posi-

tions, with Ken Willsher on pole from David Swayn, reigning AUS#1 Trevor Harding, Troy Anderson, Paul Campbell and Woodberry.

Prior to the final, the series was far from resolved, with Ken Willsher sitting on 268 points from Darryl (262) and Woodberry (254).

Those 10 points foregone earlier in the night meant that Woodberry would have to finish six spots ahead of Ken Willsher if he was to win the title - a big ask.

It all came down to this and the tension and nerves were obvious as there were a couple of aborted stai-ts.

Finally, they were away, but Darryl Willsher only got as far as turn 4 when he rode a wheel and executed a couple of rolls.

The driver, fortunately, was only shaken, but otherwise unhurt.

It was now down to just Ken Willsher and Woodben-y.

Willsher led away at the green flag from Harding and Woodberry, with Ian Burrows, Swayn and Jason Loveday next.

With the yellows flying for the fi rst caution, Willsher, Burrows, Harding and Woodberry shared the front two rows for the restart.

Willsher made the jump, but another caution negated it and next time around Buitows got the jump

- but his lead lasted only a lap and a half before Willsher retook the lead for good.

Harding retired when a broken exhaust fell down and melted the air filters and Burrows and Woodberry also retired, leaving Campbell in second from Adrian Redpath and Loveday.

But how lucky was Willsher? His car ran out of fuel on the victory lap. As well as taking the series win by 28 points, Willsher also won the Hard Charger award and Harding took out the Visitors award.

Danny Hogan won the Upwright Wing and Ken Willsher, Campbell and Adrian Redpath received the Max Dumesny Motorsport Hoosier Vouchers - this trio also won the Western Auto gift packs.

Final point standings: Ken Willsher 290, Darryl Willsher 262, Woodberry (TAS) 262, Swayn 229, Graham Mollenoyux 187, Loveday (SA) 185, Anderson 179, Tony Piyor (NSW) 169, Kane Cmse (TAS) 156, Ben Dillon (SA) 145.

Tickets are now on sale for the Association’s presentation night, which will be held on July 18 in Wanmambool.

Contact Cheryl Willsher on (03) 55662387.

- BRETT SWANSON

Bigger, better Bacchus Marsh track

Earthworks are about to com mence bn the yet to be named l^acchus Marsh Speedway that will hopefully make it one of the best venues in the country from a driver’s point of view.

While the facility is almost ready to be raced on in its current format, changes about to take place will transform the venue into a bigger, wider and more racy Speedway.

The oval itself is about to be lengthened to have a 540 metre pole line and will be 30 metres wide all the way round.

Spokesman for the project Geoff Trewin, the man behind the stalled Southern City Speedway at Somerton, explained the reasons for the changes.

“We want this facility to become the sort of speedway that drivers will want to race on,” he said. “The length and width will give us good racing for both the fans and the dri vers, which both will appreciate.”

The surface is intended to be a clay/sand mix, but that won’t restrict the racing due to the width of the track.

“It will be a clay mix, not dolomite, with the mix similar to Avalon. To have a pure clay track of that size would be impossible and uneconomical to maintain,” Trewin elaborated.

“We also want to be able to run corporate days, hold practice ses sions, testing and club schools, which would be a lot more difficult and expensive if it was a clay-only track.”

Earthworks are about to com mence - if they haven’t already and the track has a permit for 10

meetings for the upcoming season.

“If the weather holds, then we should have the track ready by about the end of November, which makes it difficult to start planning races, because we don’t want to commit to anything until we’re sure the track will be ready,” Trewin explained.

“Initially, a lot of the buildings and facilities will be portable, but there will be seating for 12,000 peo ple. We are also trying to introduce a new concept in speedway, where we have permanent pit buildings/

garages with full security that can be leased to clubs and racers in which to base their workshops, or clubs - and, at this stage, interest in that has been good.”

Trewin and the property’s owner and founder Roger Leask are hop ing to get the relevant Associations - such as the Sprintcar Racing Association, the Victorian Super Sedan Association, the Victorian Speedcar Drivers Association, etc involved to ensure the success and future of the venue.

-BKE-TT SWANSON

sPEEDw/nr

Finale and series wins

by Leslight

The 1997/98 Coastline Vehicle Transport Super Series drew to a close in disappointing circumstances at Archerfield Speedway on June 6, when John Leslight (American Truck Parts Camaro) was awarded

cushion and was launched high into the air with all four wheels off the ground, The following trio had nowhere to go and a car-crunching collision ensued when Paulger landed atop Marshall,

victory in a crash-marred Super Sedan feature race.

It was a less than satisfactory conclusion to what has been a hardfought and thoroughly entertaining 23-round series that has produced some first class racing and a few controversial moments.

Starting from the outside front row alongside team-mate Rod Gough, Leslight went straight to the front when the green flag flew and was still in command when the race was ended prematurely with just 18 of 30 laps completed.

The four preliminaries were taken out by Jamie McHugh (Miami Smash Repairs Falcon), Ian Marshall (Federal Tyres Commodore), Shane Paulger (Breaka Pontiac) and Ross Brims (Brims Bulk Haulage Camaro), with stewards working overtime as track conditions, over-zealousness and bad luck combined to bring about a series of incidents.

Time trials moved Brims to the top spot, ahead of Nick Girdlestone (Murray’s Race Parts Camaro), Leshght and Gough, who inherited pole position when Brims inverted in the first turn.

With the track blocked' and just four cars still circulating, officials opted to end the event, despite the availability of 25 minutes before the track curfew.

Leslight was declared the victor ahead of Marshall, Gough and Brims, with Paulger banished to the rear as the cause of the incident.

This decision was particularly cruel for Wayne Randall (Ian Boettcher Motors Mazda RX7), Graeme Lehmann (Lehmann Motors Commodore) and Brian Missen (McGrath Toyota Pontiac), who were denied a rare opportunity to snare a podium placing and the subsequent prizemoney that goes with it.

Fifteen cars started the event, but a series of mechanical maladies brought about the demise of McHugh, Des Korn and Staring, while a spin ended Craig McGeorge’s challenge and flat tyres forced both Lau and Kelvin Hamilton (Midas Exhausts Camaro)to retire.

Despite the appearance of over 50 drivers in the series, Leslight was completely dominant and accuMcHugh, having topped qualify- mulated 3886 points with ■wins in ing, backslid through the field 17 of the 23 rounds, ■w hen an erratic lap dropped him to Paulger finished in secortd place the outside of row four. overall with 2871 points, followed The first two attempts to get the

by Gough (2307), McHugh (2260), feature race started were aborted, Marshall (1857) and Starling following spins by Shayne Lau (1786).

(McGrath Toyota Camaro) and A1 Randall (1705), Paul Geary Starling (Byron Towing Pontiac) in (1594), Mick Doblo (1452) and turn one.

Brims completed the top 10.

Once underway, the race ran The B-(Jrade honoffrs went to without incident until lap 15, when Blair Granger (1234), ahead of Girdlestone, having quickly disHamilton (1178) and Corey Brough posed of Gough to secure second (901). position, inadvertently sent the While it was a disappointing end field scattering when he lost power to the series, the concept has been in the back straight on lap 15. an overwhelming success, as eviWith Girdlestone on the grass for denced by the terrific support from the restart, Paulger inherited seccompetitors and spectators - and ond spot and instantly took the the Queensland Super Sedan challenge to Leslight with an inside Association is to be congratulated pass that took him briefly to the on its efforts, front.

Plans are already underway for a Leslight regained the lead immebigger and better program of events diately and Paulger quickly found next season, including the appearhimself under threat from ance of three American drivers in open competition and visits to more Marshall, Gough and Brims. circuits along the east coast.

Two laps later, there was bedlam -CHRIS METCALF in turn 3 when Paulger hit the

Max Dumesny Motorsport

Amtrallan Distributors for

Xoo$irr i i

ing for Scotland in the coming series against England Under21s.

But the Glasgow rider says he is NOT Scottish and hopes to be chosen again by Australia - in his current form, he may be in line for a Test place in the coming Ashes series against England.

But, as things stand, he is racing on a British licence, so would not be eligible to race for his home country.

“If Au stralia wants me, I would certainly take out an Australian licence againi” he said.

Sam Ermolenko, World Champion in 1993, has gained a place in the Overseas Final of the World Championship that could take him towards automatic qualification for next year’s Grand Prix.

The veteran won the American Final at Auburn in California with a 15 point maximum, ahead of Mike Faria, Chris Manchester and Charlie Venegas.

Ermolenko had to decline an invitation to race at Pocking in the German Grand Prix, after the AMA refused to seed him directly through to the Overseas Final.

The bigonGold Bar individual event the Grand Prix circuit at Vojens in Dernmark was won by the Polish star, Tomasz Gollob.

He won a six man final after heading the qualifying heats with 13 points alongside Hans Nielsen.

Chris Louis, Bill Hamill and Toni Kasper all totalled 11 and World Champion Greg Hancock completed a final line-up of Grand Prix riders.

The only Australian rider in the event, Ryan Sullivan, came 11th with just 6 points.

s

The call replays is growing for made s low motion to be available to referees in the Grand Prix series, after Hans Nielsen and Jimmy Nilsen were controver sially excluded from vital races in Germany

by British referee Frank Ebdon.

Former British captain Kelvin Tatum, working as a TV analyst, said: “It would make things far easier for the officials and help the riders when they know that their claims to remair) in a race are fairly considered/

/

A Australian magnificentMick performance by Powell when guesting for Sheffield has hit his parent club Glasgow’s chances of reaching the Premier League Cup semi-finals in Britain, Powell helped Sheffield to a crucial away win at Hull and then did well again in the home leg to put Sheffield in pole position. ahead of his own club and Edinburgh in the battle for the second semi-final slot from their group,

imon Wigg, the British rider and former World Long Track Champion so popular on his many visits to Australia, is likely to be out of action for several weeks.

The Kings Lynn Speedway ace suffered leg injuries wh'ile racing" grasstrack in Germany at Teterow and damaged ligaments in his right leg.

The former Grand Prix man anish rider Jesper Jensen has has commitments this month in been facing a battle against the Overseas Final of the World time to race in the Danish Grand Speedway Championship and in Prix at Vojens. the Semi-finals of the World A hand injury has sidelined the Longtrack and Grasstrack promising youngster and he has Championships in the Czech been absent from his club side, Wolverhampton, for the last four Republic. weeks. ustralia’s Mick Poweli has It is still touch and go as to been the centre of attention whether he makes Vojens or not, over claims that he should be ridhaving missed the German’ GP at

D

A

ately return for club commitments.^ Fellow Dane Brian Andersen" has a similar problem with his injured collarbone and he faces a similar timetable - back for Vojens and then a return for his club, Coventry.

The will be in raca ing top as aAustralians team at Swindon Testimonial meeting for retired Swindon rider Alan Rossiter on July 12.

Craig Boyce, Jason Crump and Leigh Adams will head the chal lenge, with Mark Loram, Chris Louis and Joe Screen heading the British squad.

Australian has beenskipper critical Craig of theBoyce new format of the Grand Prix, after a second successive disappointing meeting at Pocking in Germany. “ I am the three-heat king and I'm fed up,” Boyce said.

“Everything was going well; the bikes were good and I was riding well.

“I made the start in my last race, but it got ruined when Hans Nielsen came underneath me.

“It looks to me in this formula that you have to start trying to hurt people, steaming under them and messing them up. That’s not my style. I hit Greg Hancock tonight and he’s a friend of mine.

“It’s very serious. It has increased the danger factor by heaps and it seems you just have to forget about your mates."

Victorian Lyons has been helping Jason his Swedish League club,. Ornarna, to the top of the League and to an unbeaten record after five matches.

Lyons totalled 12 points in a narrow 49-47 win against Bysarna, who has yet to win a match.

Mark Lemon, with 12, topped the scoring for the losers.

Jason Crump scored 12 for Vargarna in their first win of the season, 50-44, against Smederna, for whom Shane Parker could muster just 7.

Leigh Adams grabbed 10 as Indianerna won by 51 points to 45 at Kaparna.

Indianerna share second place with Rospiggarna, who include World Champion Greg Hancock in their line-up.

Ryan Sullivan is in currently the top Australian the British Elite League averages, with a 9.00 return to lie ninth overall.

Leigh Adams is 13th on 8.15, Jason Lyons shares 14th placing on 8.00 and Craig Boyce(18th), Mark Lemon(19th) and Shane Parker (20th) make it six Australians in the top 20 !

Ironically, there are only five Englishmen in that 20 - Martin Dugard, Joe Screen, Chris Louis, Mark Loram and David Norris.

Ex-world champion Gary Havelock and current Grand Prix man Andy Smith are way down the list of Brits.

1998 WORLD OF OUTLAWS/SKOAL OUTLAW SERIES POINT STANDINGS TO JUNE I5TH, 1998

!. Mark Kinser 2. Sammy Swindell ^ 3. Steve Kinser 4. Stevie Smith 5. Andy Hillenburg For more irrformation on Hoosier Drag and Speedway Tyres call: 6. Johnny Herrera 7. Danny Lasoski NSW: §2 9679 1990 Fax 02 9679 1187 8.

Dale Blaney VSG 03 9331 6477 Fax 03 9331 7444 9. Jeff Swindell SA: 08 8332 0800 Fax 08 8364 0296 | 10. Joe Gaerte

^ ^ RACING T!RE

Pocking, but his club boss, Chris Van Straaten, believes he will just make ii and then he will immedi

Sydney’s Todd Wiltshire is set to resume racing in Britain for; the first time since 1991, when he suffered a serious back injury.

Oxford Cheetahs promoter Steve Purchase has had talks with the former World number three, who would join fellow Australian big name Jason Crump at the Sandy Lane circuit. / Wiltshire’s outstanding form in Germany and in appe'arances at other big meetings in Continental Europe should ensure there is no work permit problem this time, as Wiltshire's first attempt to return at Bradford just over a year ago was ended by the refusal of the Department of Employment to give him a permit.

Wiltshire showed his current form when riding as a late replacement in Poland in the Jan Ciszewski Memorial meeting at the Slaski Stadium in Katowice.

He totalled 14 points in the qualifying event, dropping his only point to four-time World Champion Hans Nielsen in heat 13.

The Aussie finished with 23 points, ahead of the Pole Piotr Swist (18), Peter Karlsson of Sweden (16) and Nielsen, who totalled 14.

In the Polish League, Leigh Adams led Leszno to an impressive away win at Ostrow by 52 points to 37.

Adams totalled 14 points in front of a rowdy crowd of over 10,000 at a meeting that saw the police having to intervene among the crowd on several occasions.

The Leszno club lies third in the table after six matches.

Ryan Sullivan, with 12 points, top-scored for Torun in their home defeat (41-49) against Gorzow.

43

3,922 3,875 3,854 3,800 3,765 3,730 3,638 3,581 3,564 3,535

II. Tyler Walker 12. Greg Hodnett 13. Donny Schatz 14. Jac Haudenschild 15. Craig Doliansky 16. Dion Hindi 17. Lance Blevins 18. Larry Neighbors 19. Brooke Tatnell 20. Randy Kinser

3,518 3,464 3,369 3,049 2,845 2,498 2,231 1,907 1,354 ,162

ELDORA SPEEDWAY-lUNE I4TH A-FEATURE (30 LAPS) I. Sammy Swindell 11. Stevie Smith 12. Mark Kinser 2. Steve Kinser 13. Greg Hodnett 3. Jac Haudenschild 14. Butch Schroeder 4. Andy Hillenburg 15. Donny Schatz 5. Danny Lasoski 16. Randy Kinser 6. Tyler Walker 17. Lance Blevins 7. Johnny Herrera 18. Brooke Tatnell 8. Dale Blaney 19. Joe Gaerte 9. Danny Smith 20. Kevin Gobrecht 10. Jeff Swindell

^4

KARTING

19Jm 1998

Eastern Creek to host Oceania'98 After discussions between Australian FMK co-ordinator Graeme Roberts and world karting heavyweight Ernest Buser at the recent Shell Showa World Cup at Suzuka in Japan, a number of teams at Suzuka showed a great deal of interest in coming to Australia, provided that it did not clash with their existing commitments, Given that the event will be well after the European Championships have concluded and over two months after the World Championships at Ugento in Italy, it seems likely that - budgets permitting -

After a number of aborted attempts to host an Oceania Karting Championship in Australia, Eastern Creek International Karting Raceway in Sydney has stepped in to confirm the venue for the 1998 event, which wiU cater specifically for FMK classes on November 28-29.

After a month of negotiations which, at one point, had all but broken down, Eastern Creek has put all of its corporate weight behind the project in an effort to regain Australia’s former status as a worthy country to hold an international event.

a

full

complement

of

European teams will arrive to contest the event.

Currently, the TihiKart, PCR International, Birel, Top Kart, Tecno, CRG, lAME and Tony Kart teams have expressed genuine interest in attending.

Together with the ever increasing fields of local dri vers within our own Wynn’s Australian Championship series for FMK classes and interest from Japan, Malaysia, New Zealand and the .United States, it appears as though Sydney at the end of November will be the place to be.

- SEAN HENSHELWOOD

BIG BOYS FOR OCEANIA ... Third place-getter In Formula Super A at the recent Suzuka Shell Showa World Karting Cup, Cesare Ballstreri (right) looks set to appear at the 1998 Oceania Championships at Sydney’s Eastern Creek Raceway for the TIbiKart team. Here he joins 1998 Suzuka champion Takao Matsuya (centre) and compatriot Giorgio Pantano, (Sean Henshelwood pic) who placed second at the prestigious event.

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NEW SENSATION... #31 Jason Burns has developed a liking for the podium. (Henshelwood)

ri

1

Since losing reigning Australian Formula A champioft David Clark to the CRG team just days after the opening round of the Wynn’s Australian Karting Championships, Merlin Racing Australia, has expanded its already impressive driver line-up to include multiple Australian champion Mark Winterbottom.

Winterbottom will contin ue his association with Wynn’s Racing, but will cam paign a Merlin chassis with Atomik engine power from the second round of the Eastern Creek International Karting Raceway Formula A Championship at Ipswich Raceway on June 21.

Joining Winterbottom as Merlin pilots will be National’s sensation Reif Corbett, Geelong’s Mark Domaschenz and Queensland speedsters Simon Richardson and Patrick Buckley.

In the KartOz Magazine Intercontinental A class,Brendan May will be hoping to continue on with his fine opening round second place for Merlin.

May will compete along side fellow Atomik-powered reed team-mates Ian Cash, Warrick Spooner and new FMK sensation Jason Bums, who debuted in the class with an excellent eighth place at Bohvar.

In fact, 18 year-old Bums is on somewhat of a wave -

despite having been in kart ing only sixteen short months, he has shown great talent in strong Clubman Light competition in NSW and Queensland, placing on the podium at almost every start.

As the season progresses he will be a driver to watch.

Another driver joining the Merlin/Atomik ranks will be Adelaide’s Chris Prestidge, who finished the opening round just behind Burns at the wheel of his Tony Kart.

Making the Merlin team’s FMK lineup complete will be junior drivers Kyle Johnston and Regan Payne in the Bob Jane T-Marts Junior Intercontinental A class.

- SEAN HENSHELWOOD

Successful Baimsdale Street Grand Prix

The East Gippsland town of Bairasdale once again rang to the sound of twostroke engines when almost 300 drivers con gregated for the annual Street Grand Prix under sunny skies, a stark con trast to the inclement weather of 1997.

Entries included former Australian champions and regular FMK front-runners Nick Agland and Mark "Winterbottom, the latter returning from a broken col larbone sustained at round two of the NSW Toyota Southern Cross Series.

Speculation that this was to be the last Baimsdale Street meeting was put to rest when the Baimsdale Club announced that the meeting would in fact be run next year, with sponsors being sought for continuation in 2000 and beyond.

Results Baimsdale Street Grand Prix Junior National Light 1. Jace Lindstrom 2. Brent Rose 3. Glen Powles

Junior National Heavy 1. Travis Medwin 2. Aaron Rintoul 3. Adam Barnes

Junior Clubman

1. Will Davison 2. Gavin Walker 3. Aaron RintoM

Clubman Super Heavy 1. Murray Edgar 2. Craig Masterton 3. Scott Webb

Senior National 1. Dale Carpenter 2. Lee Uhlhom 3. Darren Whitaker

Clubman O’40s (Division 1) 1. John Gallace 2. Glen Chadwick 3. Vince Palladino

1. Nick Agland 2. Jamie Whincup 3. Lee Uhlhom

Clubman Light

Clubman O’40s (Division 2) 1. Greg Savage 2. Neville Lowe 3. Robert Lord

ARC Spec 100 Light 1. Steve Owen 2. Nick Agland 3. Jamie Whincup

RESA 1. Simon Bishop 2. Barbara Agrimi 3. Calvin Wilkie

Pro Clubman 1. James Sera 2. John Ippolito 3. Matt Wall

1. Paul Sera 2. Darryl Dickie 3. Dick O’Keefe

Piston Port

1. Lee Williamson 2. Greg Woodrow 3. Shaun Lowe

Pro ARC Spec 100

Sportsman 1. Frank Falla 2. JohnRaccosta 3. Paul Bradshaw

Clubman Heavy 1. Adrian Rossetto 2. Matt Adams 3. George Sera

Formula 100 1. Adrian Rossetto 2. Craig Manning 3, Anthony Sutej

ARC Spec 100 Heavy 1. Adrian Rossetto 2. Brett Davidson 3. Greg Savage

200 Clubman 1. David Buschkuehl 2. Graeme Monds 3. Doc Pearson - SEAN HENSHELWOOD

KARTING

»

19June im

45

Wins for Pellicano and Holdforth as Kiwi Crossland takes Superkart title

The Victorian Superkart Reynolds came through for third and Williams was fifth, Championship, incorpo rating the Gold Nugget, behind Gary Haywood. was held at Winton on Williams got the overall June 7, with a good entry win by one point from from Victoria, South Castles and Formosa held on Australia, New South to third.

Wales - and three com lOOcc Non Gearbox petitors making the trip Heavy from Queensland.

The GioVa Jewellery team Gary Pegoraro proved he had Wayne Crossland fly deserved the fastest time by over from New Zealand to winning the first heat com drive the second Kart in the fortably from Ken Knight, 250 International class and who held off the challenge both he and John Pellicano from Doug Brumby, with in the sister kart set the South Australia’s Damian McGinn following Geoff place alight in very wet con ditions during qualifying on Unwin.

Nothing much changed in Saturday.

The Gold Nugget went heat two, although Darren over the border to New South Spencer got on the pace with Wales in the hands of Troy the changes he made and moved up to fourth, dropping Byron.

Unvfin back a place in proba lOOcc Non Gearbox bly his best meeting to date.

The third heat and it was Junior Luke May in the lOOcc the same as the second up Junior class had his first front, but Jason Lee and Rolf Grieve retired after mid-field start ever in this type of rac finishes in the previous ing and threw out a big chal lenge to Lee Barabasz in the races. first two heats.

It was going to take a big Jared Laws and Evan effort to beat Pegoraro and Rogerson couldn’t match the no-one could rise to the chal front pair and had to watch lenge, the result giving him four straight wins and the them all day from behind.

May got the better of title.

Barabasz in the third heat Knight was second again with a good pass through the and Spencer got past esses and set up a great Brumby, but couldn’t take final. the overall third place from May got the start and it him. took Barabasz a few laps to 80cc Gearbox get,past him, but May hung onto him and waited till the National Champion Ross last second to just win by Hansen made the trip from inches on the line, taking the New South Wales, while last overall win from Barabasz, year’s champion Troy Byron who was tied on points - and a handfal of others also came down - and half a Laws came home third. dozen came across from South Australia to take on lOOcc Non Gearbox the locals.

Light Byron and Hansen set the The Light and Heavy ran together, but Gary Pegoraro fastest times and, when th^e (a Heavy)qualified fastest on flag dropped, the pair bolted off into the distance, Saturday in the wet.

Hansen’s kart developing a With the conditions dry miss later in the race.

Sunday, the first comer was Len Aiiano held on tiU an veiy spectacular as the large field jockeyed for space - but, excursion that took off half his nose cone slowed him by the next time around, the light drivers had taken over down.

Paul Ristic and Darren the front half of the ranning.

Dunn were all over each David Williams opened,a other in third and fourth and sizeable lead from Rod Warwick Foletta, starting Prickett, with Darren Formosa and Rodney from the rear, came through to the front half before drop Reynolds having a close tus ping back again. sle for the next place and the Heat two was the same up rest of the field tailing off.

The field bunched a bit front, but Craig Dontas from SA after a DNF came back more for the second heat, as with a fifth. the set-ups were changed to Heat three was the same suit the conditions.

But Williams was still the man to beat, although Ben Castles got closer, with Formosa and Prickett close behind him.

Castles won the third of four heats, with Williams on his bumper and a gap back to Formosa and Prickett, who were still locked together.

The final started with sev eral drivers in with a chance of winning and Castles gave it his best shot by winning the final, although he had to fend off Formosa.

again, except Dontas moved up to third, dropping Ristic back to fifth.

The final was very similar, with Byron taking four wins and wining from Hansen with four seconds, while Ristic just held out Dimn for third, 125cc Gearbox Pete Carter, the Victorianbased National Champion, had another 11 drivers there to try for the Victorian title and qualifying showed they meant business.

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LAID BACK... Peter Gambranis, back after his February Phillip Island crash, was unlucky in 80cc at Winton.(Burns pic) Scott Stockham and Peter Hageman were very close on times in session one, but Stephen Wood from NSW was the quickest in the sec ond session for pole.

After the field settled from the start, Warren Mcllveen, Stockham, Hageman and Carter were in a tight bunch, until Mcllveen dropped back with a rough engine - then the bimch spread a little bit, with no changes.

Some changes to set-ups during the break'saw Carter get a blinder of a start in heat two on Stockham, with all the interest in the next group of Hageman, Wood, Bruce Jolley and Mcllveen, who swapped spots back and forth, with Paul Stebbing (the former 250 driver) mak ing a comeback to racing placed next.

In heat three. Carter took the lead on lap one and L3[^ageman stopped with a broken coil bracket.

McRveen was second, with Wood third.

The final and Stockham and Mcllveen got the jump on Carter, with Stockham pulling a sizeable gap before Mcllveen and Cater reeled him in and got past.

Hageman also got past and on the line was only six inch es away from beating Carter for second.

Carter took the win over all, with Stockham second and Hageman third.

250cc National Michael Crossland came down from NSW and set a very fast lime for the condi tions, but unfortunately a problem put him out of the racing.

The Tapper boys, Roger and Stephen, were down from Queensland, along with David Holdforth from NSW. Holdforth got a good start and looked good, but Tapper took the lead when he drove around the outside at turn one, with Ross Higgins run ning third and Carl Finlay fourth in a spreading field.

Holdforth won the second heat from Tapper and Higgins, with (Jreg King next.

Peter Worrall moved up to fourth in heat three, behind Higgins, while Tapper held Holdforth back in second.

The final was going to decide it and Holdforth took the win from Steve Tapper to

tie on 79 points each, with Higgins third.

Holdforth got the title by winning the final, with Tapper second.

250cc International The small field made up for lack of numbers by the quality of the racing, with John Pellicano and Wayne Crossland from New Zealand - in only his third drive in this class - running as a team and John Coughlan now coming to grips with his kart.

Crossland and Pellicano definitely with no team orders - raced less than cen timetres apart in^'heat one.

until Crossland drove around the outside in the left hand sweeper.

Coughlan was third and Kevin Hartin fourth.

Race two was similar up front, with the pace really on, but Mario Todarello coasted to a stop with no drive when fourth.

Heat three started off sim ilarly, but Coughlan found some more speed between races and was much closer.

Pellicano retired with a stuffed wheel bearing and Coughlan made the move on Crossland for the win, with Kevin Hartin third.

In the final, Coughlan took the lead and looked set to

hold it, until a little end bearing let go and he sat on the side of the track waiting for the right time to cross the line for a finish and valuable points.

Pellicano took over at the front to win from Crossland, with Robert Clinch third and a very rough-sounding Coughlan fourth.

Crossland, though, took the title from Coughlan and Pellicano.

Troy Byron, after the points were fed into a magic formula, got the Gold Nugget and reckoned that after mum got it, his shirts would be ironed for another year!

- GRAEME BURNS

ka®® IMational Classic Bendigo Kart Club Enquiries 03 5443 6065 Vic/SA Challenge South Mallee Kart Club Enquiries 03 5393 0508

Jik|12 Jutyi

Victoria Cup ' ^ Oakieigh Go'Kart Racing Club Enquiries 03 9545 5551 ^ City of Wodonga Titles Albury-Wodonga Kart Club Enquiries 02 6024 5262

Ph (03) 5449 6362 or (03) 9362 1144

4S

Big fields at Winton Histones

By BRIAN REED WITH 128 vintage and clas sic motorcycles and more than 300 cars, good weath er and a hamper crowd, the 1998 Historic Winton had all the ingredients for a top meeting. And the competitors certainly played their part!

Huge fields and top racing entertained the fans over the 2-day, 44-event program.

The Group N and N(c)races were especially popular - with a combined field of 58 cars ranging from Mustangs to Minis the crowd was kept on its toes as the ‘tin-tops’ battled it out around the Winton short circuit.

Because of the numbers, the field was split into two halves based on practice times, and Winton being such a great leveller meant that the more nimble Torana XUIs and Cooper S’s were equal icap in his 1966 Ginetta G4. to the task when lined up Other drivers to impress alongside the thundering were Steve Webb in his potent Mustangs, Trans Am and Elfin 360 Repco sports car, Fred Greeneklee (1956 Charger.

Graham Hunt’s big Trans Cooper) and Sean Whelan Am couldn’t quite get on even (Elfin 700), while Paulaterms with Ian Jones in the Elstrek, having her first drive lap record-holding XU-1, and in the Austin 7 of Cristine later he had to settle for a Ferucci-Jones, mixed it with fast-finishing third. In the the best in the Group J & K handicap behind Greg events.

Nicholls (Ford Mustang) and Michael Hipkins (1926 veteran Ted Brewster (Morris Vauxhall) had a mortgage on Cooper S). the Regularity events, and The ‘slower’ Group N events Ian McDonald made a suc were dominated by Doug cessful debut in his beautiful Juniper’s Holden EH, while Australian-built Ausca sports Rob Priddle scored a good win car. in the Handicap driving his As usual, there were some hard luck stories. Aaron Ford Zephyr Mlc2.'

The diminutive Eagle Imp Lewis had an expensive blow of Keith Simpson never ceases up in his big Elfiri MS7 sports to amaze, and relished the car causing several of the fol tight Winton track to take the lowing cars to spin in his oil, a honours in the Group M & 0 niunber of Group N cars will Racing events. Simpson’s be spending time in the panel efforts were especially note shop after various encounters, worthy considering he beat and unfortunately John Mann home a classy field which was a non-starter after experi included Peter Addison’s encing engine problems on Brabham BT23, Stephen Saturday.

Lunn’s Elfin Mono and Jim The motorcycle races were McConville’s Brabham BT29. just as keenly contested - as commentator said He also scored fastest lap in the the Phil Irving 'Trophy handi “Nobody wants to be last!” cap race which was won by There was a splendid line-up the 1964 KJC Peugeot Special of British bikes including the of Peter Matthews.

Norton Manx of Len Perry There were three interna and the AJS 7R of John, tional entries this year includ Farnsworth, both from New, ing the stunning ex- Nuvolari Zealand, and other great Alfa Romeo 8C-35 of Peter names such as Vincent, BSA, Giddings. Try as he may, Matchless, Triumph, Rudge, Californian-based Giddings JAP and Velocette. wasn’t able to catch Richard A bad pile-up late in the Stanley’s Amilcar AC, but day saw three riders injured. treated the crowd to a fine After some considerable delay demonstration of top class(hi the race resumed, and good ving in the chase. It was a news was the none of the rare opportunity for injuries were serious.

Australians to see and hear The sidecar events provided such a magnificent example plenty of action and the of motor racing history. l lOOOcc Honda of Michael and Other entries from overseas Peter Turner dominated. It were the ex-Mike Hawthorn was interesting to see the 1951 Ferrari V12 sports car development that has taken driven gently by Murray place over the years - some of Richards, and ‘the Tank’ the earlier outfits were primi Bugatti which was making its tive in terms of engineering ^nal appearance in Australia and devoid of streamlining, before returning to the USA. and not surprising this was Jim ‘Stump/ Russell scored reflected in the results. a popular win in the Arthur A big banner opposite the Waite Trophy race in his Ford start/finish line said “Happy V8 Special, and Steven 30th Birthday, Scallywags Byrnes capped off a veiy suc Sox” - a nice way of saying cessful weekend by winning thanks to the major sponsor the Alan Jones Memorial and for the Historic Winton bike taking fastest lap in the hand¬ events.

■>

SEVEN OF THE BEST... Peter Giddings gets down to it in the achingiy gorgeous(and vaiuable) 1935 Aifa 8C. SURELY NOT THE DOLMIO GRIN?... Not likely for the indefatigable Lou Molina, who always has a good time where there are nice cars.

THE DISCO ERA... Sean Whelan’s Elfin 700 and Richard Carter’s March 73B were the quickest cars around the Winton circuit.

(Photos by Neil Hammond)

One rider having his first taste of circuit racing was Darren Chilman from Melbourne. Darren was riding a 500cc 1972 Kawasaki in the all-powers Post Classic events after his father Ian had threatened to sell it because it wasn’t being used. What bet ter way to justify keeping it than to ride it in the Historic Winton meeting!

Ian Chilman and I teamed together to drive his Honda Civic in Class A at the 1976 “Hang Ten” 400 at Sandown, then finished second in class at the Hardie-Ferodo ‘1000’ at Bathurst behind the Datsun of Doug Whiteford and Bill Evans. It seems like only yes terday!

Well done to the A>istin 7 Club and the Benalla Auto Club on a brilliant 22nd Historic Winton meeting. I reckon this was the best one yet.

The next gathering of the Historic cars and bike frater nity at Winton will be the Australian Historic Motorfest on November 7-8. Details and entry forms are now available from the Benalla Auto Club, PO Box 249, Benalla 3672 (phone 03 5766 4235).

The Fabulous Studebaker Boys

BEAUTY IS ONLY SKIN DEEP... but Ugly goes through to the bone. (Photo by Brian Reed) AMERICAN muscle cars dominated the judging of the “Car of the Show” at Shannons Albert Park Classic - a gather ing of racing enthusiasts and car cluhs aroimd the lake on Sunday, June 7.

In spite of the weather, the Albert Park Classic attracted an impressive line-up of ‘goers’ as well as ‘showers,’ and the most impressive, according to the judges, was a rare 1964 Studebaker Avanti belonging to Max Arbrew of Melbourne.

The proud owner imported the Avanti seven years ago from the USA and carried out the conversion and restoration to its present

award winning level. His first success came at the 1997 Studebaker Concours in Brisbane where his car was judged “Best in Class” and also won the People’s Choice award.

About 4,500 Avantis were made, of which only 709 were the 1964 model with rectangu lar headlights. Power output from the R3 engine is around 430bhp.

Between now and Easter next year when the next Studebaker Concours will be held in Perth, Max will be making a trip to England his prize for winning at the Albert Park Classic.

-BRIAN REE D

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19June 1998

47

I

Sedaws/Sports Cars

Commodore Sports Sedan, rolling body with full rose joint suspension, 16x10 wheels, polished alloy cage and interia pan els. Built for mid-mount Chev. Immaculate cond. Priced for

Datsun 1600 PRC rally car. Strong 1800 motor with SU carbies, fully adjustable front end, Bilstein suspension, option 1 5-speed c/r gearbox, 4.6 diff. New 2-pack paint, new steel 6Celica 1988 GT4 turbo. 74,000kms; race suspension; diff lock; new tyres. Drives great. Not for Road Reg but perfect for point cage. C/w driving lights, 12-15 wheels, some with good race or rally. $6,800. Ph:'024957 2905. ra Dunlop Rally tyres, spare motor, 4-speed, tail shafts, carbies, heaps of panels. Class winning vehicle, ready to race. Sell com plete or will separate.$5,300. Ph:03 53341367. 130 '

Commodore Cup, Car No. 8. Professionally-built turn-key car, no expense spared. Platt engine, immaculate condition.

Opportunity to enter competitive National class which includes Bathurst. $23,000. Ph:Ian 039556 5400,0418 395 566. 129 Works Escort RS1S00 BDA. 1977 English factory Boreham-built, Colin Borxi-o.vned, Greg Carr driven, lYK 000.

Winner 1978 ARC, 1978/9 Castrol Internationals. Full restoration.

Factory Cosworth BDG alloy 21 (used by Ari Vatanen), ZF 5 speed, floating 5.1 locker, AP Racing brakes/clutch, Bilsteins.

Historic. Faced sale. Offers. Ph:07 5529 7146

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Suzuki Swift GTi. Black, Koni adjustable suspension, 15 inch alloys with Pirelli tyres, engine mods. Power chip, K&N filter, stainless extractors, Tokico brakes, very tidy interior. 4/99reg. with RWC.$9,500ono. Ph:03 5248 3044

HQ Tbunderdome. Proven winner, record holder, ready to race. Many spares and engines. Assistance given. Will separate or package to suit Urgent sale, all offers considered. Ph: John 03 97423234(BH). IX Nissan March turbo, very quick, reliable car ready to race & win. Must sell, going overseas.$5,000. Ph:03 5827 1256,

Mazda RX3 2E Club Car, Brand new 13B race Bridgeport, IDA Weber, 5-speed, Lockheed calipers/vented discs, Koni/Bilstein suspension, Recaro, CAMS logbook, spares. Title winner and Winton 6 Hour placegetter. $6,950ono. Ph 03 5248 3044. 131

Sports Sedan, 78 Celica, 3.5lt Rover alum, motor, Celica 5 speed gearbox, LS diff, 4 wheel disc brakes, 15x10 Rebel wheels, dual axle. Reg trailer. $6,500ono. Ph:026559 4002. ra AHa Sports Sedan, fully rebuilt 350'Chev, mid mounted, fuel injected, Brodex heads, 9” diff, new tyres, seat and harness. $12,000ono or roller $6,000. Ph:019 331 845. 129 WB Statesman, dual fuel, gunmetai grey paint, 12 slotter wheels, new brakes, new front suspension and ball joints. Fresh 308 turbo 400. Comfortable towing vehicle with all options. $5,600. Ph:0418471 899. .29

Commodore Cup race car,full 1998 spec, ready to race in 1998. Lightweight chassis, engine two races old. No expense spared. Many brand new components. $26,000. Ph: 03 5944 4052 or 03 9706 6440. is Ford Escort SS, red & silver, Windsor Super T10 close ratio.

Falcon diff, fibreglass bonnet, boot and guards. Must sell

Black Beast, 74 GTS De Tomaso Pantera. 490hp, Carillos, Cosworth pistons, Motec injection, Chev crank, Simmons wheels, 17x11 rears, 17x9 fronts, large Harrop brakes, all round roll cage. Ideal Targa/Club car or just touring. In A1 cond. POA. Ph: Tony Jory 0418 130 133,03 63265555. 130 HQ Face car. Very well presented. Sealed engine only 3 meetings old. This car gives you affordable and reliable racing for just $3,800. Ph:03 9850 5566,015 527 854. ix

Escort Twin-Cam, 1972, GTI600 original equipment. Inc block, head, Webers. Air cleaner, spare etc. Rebuilt engine with Cosworth cams; Car in excellent condition. Offers around $10,000. Ph: Paul 088^6883,0417 836 634. 129 FX Holden 48-215, cream, brown interior. Red motor, 12V, 12 months reg, RWC. VGC.$4,300. Ph;03 9417 3225. 129

$7,500ono. Ph: Barry Wrajth 07 5594 0860,018 450 213. 129 HQ Holden 253 V8,/not rusty, very straight body. Will sell separately. GTS dash, body panels in excellent order. May suit race car or Register. $1.OOOono. Ph: 024961 5527. 129 Chevrolet (rare) ‘62 Impala "pillarless" Norm Beechey replica. 350/auto; dual fuel, louvred bonnet, big wheels & tyres.

V good example, plus $1,500 NOS parts. No rego/RWC. Affordable classic. $7,950. Ph: Miles 03 9354 9322.

HQ race car, NSW#16, 2nd in 1997 Div/1 Championship.

Perfectly set up, strong C&B engine. Ready to race + complete inventory of spares. Assistance given to purchaser. $8,200(+ trailer $9,700). Ph:029748 1564. 129

Datsun 1200 2E Club Car. Top HP JTS A15, Sunny 5-sp, big brakes, Adj susp, MSW Championship 92-94. E Creek 1:51, Amaroo 58,$7900 ono(Bargain).(02)9757 1470. 129 Renault 12 Gordini replica. Historic rally car. Loads spares ino 3 motors, one full-race spec. $8,000. Ph:026554 2165. is

Turbo VL Commodore wagon. New turbo and gearbox and silver paint.'Colour-coded CSA mags, new tyres, ALL Calais elec options. Pedders susp, tinted windows. 12 mths reg, $10,500 ono(0418)471899. 129 Thunderdome HQ, all log books. New sealed motor (as nev/), sealed box.$7200,'can be test driven before sale! Ph (03) 9563 7072.129 NASCAR,Pontiac Grand Prix (ex-Jim Richards), complete or will separate engine, scares etc. Also pit equipment (03)9430 5538(AH). ,29 AUSCA^Sportsman, VL Commodore #6. ALI spares and spare body with cage. Urgent sale, $10,000 ono. (0417) 844 078. 129

Mazda RX3 Coupe rolling shell. Good tyres, mags, needs paint/panel work. Good for Club Car or rally. $2,500ono. Ph: 08 8261 6672,015 793 613. 129

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Sports Sedan, turbo, 500hp, Harrop brakes, adj boost adj bias. Just rebuilt, all new gear. 16" Simmons, Munoie four link adjsuspension. Too much to list Ph: Dave Hunter 036394 3541 (TAS),015 312 918. IX

1969 BMW 2002,fully prepared Road Rallies 2.2 litre engine 5 speed gearbox, twin caliper brakes, Velo seats, Simmons wheels. Terra Trip, Intercom, Sabelt 6 point harness, full custom interior. Ready for any event.$22,000. Ph:03 6231 4253. 129 AUSCAR Sportsman VL Comm,fully rebuilt body, 2 pack paint, all suspension, new full float diff, seat s/wheel, windows, fuel tank,5 rims. Urgent sale. $2,500. Ph:0397436259(AH). 129

Alfa Romeo Gullla Sprint GT. Full-off body restoration, 2 litre motor, adjustable suspension, 5 speed gearbox, log book, LSD, trip computer. Great Targa, Dutton or Club Car. 3rd in class Targa NZ, 3rd in class Targa Tas 97. Spent $45,000, ask ing $16,500. Ph:0418 793 390. 129 Sportsman VL, comes with fresh motor, radio, 4 spare wheels, jacks, stands, heaps of spares. $9000ono. (02) 6585 1397 AH(Cameron). 129

Subaru 94/95 WRX, Quiktrac, 12 months reg, 3" exhaust, AVO intercooler & blav-off valve, 4 x D98J tyres + rims, turbo timer, spray kit. Amaroo 58 sec, E. Creek 1:51. Second outright, NSW Sprint 6tle. Best offer over $30,000. Ph:029524 7849. m Datsun Stanza rally car, damaged from hitting stump.

2230CC motor, forged pistons, big port head. Twin 48s, ceramic clutch, 260Z/Holinger box, works rear end, 4.6 rear end. Davis struts, Bilstiens. S7500,will sep. Delian(0418)221 353(Melb). is

continued over page

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NAME; ADDRESS;

CATEGORY; Cars: □ Speedway □ Drag □ Sedans □ Open Wheelers General: □ Parts □ Engines □ Trailers □ Wanted □ Photographs □ Other

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Two LX Toranas, Standard Saloons, top susp. Less motors.

Ring for info $500 each. Also 4 V8 radiators. (03) 5157 5695

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Mitsubishi Galant VR4. Direct import. Gorrectly imported for rally reg. No damage, goes and drives A1. Absolute bargain, must be sold $7500. Ph Richard MoNay (0418) 526 852. 12s Sports Sedan, Escort. Half built fibreglass bonnet, boot spoiler.

Full cage, mags, ad] struts, clutch. Must sell $1500. (02) 6386 3575 (AH). ,29

1991 Reynard, ex-factory car, low kms, fully rebuild Benson RED engine, good assortment of spares. POA. Ph: Jeff 9570 3683,0418172889. ,28 TE Cortina Street Stock. Four meetings old, current ASCF reg, AutoMeter gauges/tacho, brand new 250 x-flow. Bilsteain SUSP, spares. Very Gompetitive car. $5400. David Duncan 30 Maroondah Hwy Healesvilles 3777. 129

H

Drag Racing

Torana, Group 2E Club car. Top HP Irvine headed engine (6 cyl), 4 spot brakes, new tyres. Totally re-shelled and rebuilt. Immac cond, $10,000. Matt (0417) 303591. ,s Mazda RX4 sedan, rolling shell. Fresh paint, new seat, harness, steering wheel. 4-wheel discs, new wheels (in boxes), never dri ven. Suit Club Cars or Sports Sedans, offers. (07) 3890 3725. ,29 Commodore Cup, 98 spec. Fresh motor. Plenty of spares, possible trade w/ road car. $23,000 ono. (0417) 794 933. ,29

14

Truck. 1959 Chev ramp back, V8 auto $15,000. Will consider car swap. 1959 Chev El Camino Wild Bunch Drag Car. John Payne-built, 540 Rodeok, 3 speed air Lenco. Turn key. $55,000. Will separate. Ph: 02 9711

2218. ,29

Open Wheelers

Sale or lease. Commodore V8 Supercar. VR, Perkinsbuilt and unchanged since delivery Chev engine. Lease to driver with correct budget or sale, with or without engine.

POA. Ph: Phil Ward 018 276 323, 02 9533 4909 (BH), 02 9817 5560 (AH), ,2a NASCAR, Pontiac Grand Prix. Ready to go, with 2-ways $25,000, Jerico $3500. Cambered rear axle to axle $3000. Chev and Pontiac heads, complete with manifolds, NASCAR block $3000. (02) 96364447. ,29

Speedwqy

Chevron B34, 1976, ex European F3 car driven by Marc Surer, with as-new Italian 2-litre Novamotor. Historic logbook.

Some spares, including wheels & tyres. Excellent value at $42,900. Ph:07 33961624. ,30

Elfin 622 Historic Group Q. Total restoration completed 5 years ago, now running F3 configuration. Quick, relaible car holds Group Q Linder 1300 lap records at Amaroo and E. Creek.,Full Cosworth Ford engine ex UK,.specifically built for F3 with BDA crank and rods, gear driven camshaft etc, twin plate clutch and Mk8 Hewland. Flawless in finish and presentation.

Documentation available, spares incl. Ph: Richard Harward 02 9789 8470 (BH), 02 9568 4147 (AH). 130 Kart - Azzuro, with Yamaha Glubman engine, new powder coated blue, AX6 sidepods. Gomes with stand. Suit beginner.

Urgent sale $1,800 ono. Ph: Geoff 03 5275 3140. ,» Elfin Aero Formuia Ford. This unique car is for sale with spares and trailer. Own a piece of Australian mAor sport history.

Eligible for Historic racing. Ph: 03 9563 1390,04^7 774 193. ,29 Karts (2), CRG rolling chassis, 40mm rear axle, front camber adjuster. About 8 months old, excellent condition. Also, Kali frame with National engine, ready to race, good cond. Ph: (Tas) 03 6391 1890 between 6.30am & 7pm. ,2a

Elfin MRS Chev F5000. Ex-Cooper, Perkins, Schuppan, Pironi 1979 Rothmans winner. Superb cond, good spares paok-

96 Maxim, only done 7 meetings. Best of everything. Will sell as roller or will separate. Lots of parts. Ph: 03 6363 1231 , 03 6363 1382 (AH).

Oil pump, Jenkins 3 stage dry sump pump and pulley.

New. $1,000. Ph: 02 6686 9000, or 02 6686 3735(AH). 130 Brand new 2-litre Kombi heads, 48x38 titanium stainless valves, Chev double springs. These are the best heads. $1,800. Ph: 02 6655 5715, or 019 125 965. .*> AVS 17 inch polished rims, made by Yokohama, with 245x45x8 P7 new series tyres. Good for road or racing.

Suit Porsche or VW, Porsche stud pattern. $2,500. Ph: 02 6655 5715,019 125 965. .30 Commodore suspension, 4 coilover Bilstein struts, with springs, sway bars, adjustable top hats etc. To suit IRS Commodores. $2,500. Ph: 0419 355 376. 129 Brodix dash-12 heads compolete with jessels $5,500.

Lightweight Grower carnk 3.625 $2,300; Grower 6” rods $1,300; roller cam to suit $500. All parts 1 season old. Ph: 0418 579 530, 03 6442 3053. 129 Tyres - Hoosier racing wets, brand new 16”, 220x10.0-16, x4. New $1200 Sell for $900. Ph: 0412 337 227. 129 Pi-4 data logging acquisition system. Complete with all software etc. Good cond. $10,500. Ph: 03 9752 3030, 0417 526 446. .29 Webers (4) 48 IDA (new), c/w Inglese linkages, fuel fit tings, gaskets, pressure gauge, never used, cost $4,300.

Sell $3,200. Ph: 0417 104 582, 03 9890 3454. 129 Brakes - large 4 spot $950; race clutch $500; Lakewood bellhousing $200; Large oil cooler $200; Single rail box with race clutch and bellhousing $950. Ph: 02 9639 2730. 129 Toyota 5 speed, with conversion to suit Holden V8, one rebuilt gearbox and two spares. $1,000ono. Ph: 019 331 845. <29

Scorcher twin point dist. New, suit Leyland V8. $350.

Ph: 02 6554 2165. .29 Gearboxes, Lotus twin cam, 2.5 first gear Quaif single rail and 2.2 Xtrac 3 rail ultra close box $1500. (02) 9758 1377. .29

n

Commodore wheels & tyres: five 16x8 Starform alloys with 225/50 Bridgestone RE 520s tyres (half worn). $2,000. Ph: 0419 355 376. .29 Raliy parts, Marsh maximo sheepskin, near new $450.

Simpson 3", 5-point aircraft buckle, wrap-around shoulder straps. $280. Terratrip 202-r, inc probe and RZU, $400.

Bluebird TRX mags (5), exc cond. $300 (2) good cond $100. 200B SX mags (3) $80. Yokohama A.509, 195/60R15, buffed (4) $160. Other tyres available. Delian [0418)221 353. .29 Longacre computer scales, new, never used. Ph: 02 4628 8322(AH). .29 V6 Holden parts. Forged steel crank and Carillo rods.

Still in boxes, $3100.(08)9045 4305. .29 Ford Genuine Boss 302, right numbers, 4-bolt block, stel crank (crack-testedj, roller rockers, dual high-rise, 2 x Holleys. $6500(08)9045 4305. 129', GT40 fibreglass body, $6500. D-type fibreglass body, $500. (08)9045 4305. 129 048IDA Weber carby, single or pair. Dean (08) 8260 3577. ,29

Compomotive rims, 4 stud 15x6. Also Evo 2/3 spares, shafts, suspension, bumpers. Mazda 323 4x4, fully rebuilt gearbox. Ph: 0419 040 788 (Perth). ,29

Trqiisporteffs/TrqiSers y

4 tM.

Modified Production Charger, CM panels, aluminium f/tank, Holley blue, rear radiator, power steering. Fulcrum modi fied suspension, strong near new 265 Hemi 12.5 to 1, methanol 350 Holley, McCreary tyres. Fast and reliable. Urgent sale. $4,300. Ph; Ray 07 4035 5100 any time. IX

&

3

Swift SC93, ex Steven White, currently raced by Christian Jory. Top Lamer engine, blueprinted, gearbox, many spares, updated bodywork. Ideal 1st car. Has good record National series. Nothing to spend. Complete package $28,000, would consider lease. Ph: Tony Jory 0418 130 133,0363265555. ,x Experienced race car engineer with transporter and all equipment available for 1999 season. Space for two Formula Fords. Ring for prices or package deal. Ph: 07 5446 7611, fax 07 54467480. ,» Fomiula Vee. Ready to race with fresh engine. Ideal lor cir cuit and/or hill climb events. Comes with lightweight trailer, all for $3,500. Ph: 03 9850 5566,015 527 854. IX 95 Mygale F/Ford. Not raced this year. Front-running car, perfect condition. Adjustable shocks, many spares. Can supply latest Lamer engine. $24,000ono. Ph: Justin 0418 478 867, or (AH) 045 723 589. m

Van Diemen Fomiula Ford. As raced by Marcus /Ambrose to second place in the 1997 championship. Top HP Lamer engine (2 races old). New white paint, maintained by Galloway with no expense spared. Come with spare panels, ratio and all Trail Boss, 95 model K57859. Hot water, sh.toilet, fridge, 5 parts to do with car. $37,000. Peter Dell (02) 9821 4283 (W), berth, rear compartment, 13'x8' car or workshop. 1986 Isuzu (02) 9755 1709(H) or (0418) 267 670 (Mob). ,29 d/cab, 5.8 diesel, steer, air, 137,000kms, rego (NSW) 2/99. Will Formula Vee, Elfin Crusader. Top 10 car at 97 Nationals.

Gebert engine parts, fully end alloy trailer. Updated chassis to ' $85,000neg. Ph: 02 4454 0244, or 02 4455 1221 (BH). IX Toyota Transporter, car or motorcycles. Dual cab, seven Borland specs, urgent sale. Make an offer (014) 907 845. 129 seater, diesel, good cond. $6,250ono. Ph; 015 737 768 or 07 Superkart, 80cc Haase Calipso. Second in Aust 5572 9226 (AH). ,x Championships. Full body lit, heaps of spares including tyres, engine, bodywork etc. Engine currently rebuilt. $3500 ono (02) 9796 8942 (AH). ,29

Engines

Speedcar. Beast hi bar, 4 bar chassis, 13B Bridgeport.

Fastest rotary speedway racing. All good gear, fresh engine, ready to race. $22,000. Ph: 02 9618 7006. ,29 Torana Modified Sedan. New fibreglass panels, 186ci motor. Old car being updated - unfinished. All major parts there, just needs to be put together. $2,000. Ph: 08 8556 3944 (SA). ,29

AMCA NSW48. 253 methanol engine, LHD, power quicksteer, alloy Kirky seat, powder coaled chassis, 2 pack paint.

Best of everything + many spares - rims, wheels, gearbox, power steer, ditf, roof. Very fast, ready to go. Bargain price at $12,500ono. Cost over $16,000, 9 months old. Ph; Jason 0418 861 224,'02 4736 6424 (AH), 129 i . Centura Modified Sedan 265ci, MB72 ex-Cory Reid, fabri'nrated front & rear ends, Volvo diff. Commodore rims, Quicksteer with power, fibreglass panels with moulds. $5,500. Ph: 08 8556 3944 (SA). 129 Sprintcar, 85 Gambler roller, low bar, excellent cond, new Maxim bonnet, new seat, alloy axle, quick change super slider, new bladder. Exhaust, helmet net, KSE power steer. Must sell.

Impressive car for age. $6,000ono. Ph: Jason 0418 861 224, 02 4733 6885. ,29

Holden 186 race engine. Triple Del Orto carburet tors on methanol, with air box or petrol . Speedway, Super Production Open. Series. Ladies. Spares includ ed. Very quick, fully rebuilt. No. 2 car ACT/NSW 1997.

Ph: 02 6492 3869. ,x Alloy Chev SB, block brand new, with Ridgecrest 4 bolt main caps $3,500. 13.5:1 Keith Black signature series pistons, new, $600. Ph: Steve 014 029 619. IX Benson 250cc International Supeikart. 91 Yamaha TZ ” Lotus Twin-cam, professionally built, receipts. Steel crank, dynoed 170hp, 1600cc, dry sumped tank, pump, Vee twin engine, heaps of engine spares, Kelgate brakes, slicks filter, Aeroquip hoses, 45 Webers, ready to run. Plus 2nd and wet tyres. $10,000ono. Ph: 08 8340 2099. IX complete spare engine. $8,000 for package. Will pay Formula Ford RF95, maintained regardless of cost. Ex freight. Ph: (NZ) 00 11 647 575 8599 (fax 575 8911). 129 Webber, Bargwanna. Top hp Lamer engine, one meeting old, Speedcar or race car engine - Volvo overhead top ten AFFC in 1998. $36,000. Ph; Roger 0417 335 965. ,x cam, stroker crank, forged pistons, dry sump pump, alu Drive available, Formula Ford, Oran Park DTE round and minium oil tank, braided oil lines, fuel injected, Hillborn Bathurst support race November V8 race. Championship-win fuel pump, magneto, exhaust system, plus spares. ning oar. Fully serviced, including crew and testing. Ph: 07 5446 $6,000ono. Ph: 02 9604 0208. 129 7611, fax 07 5446 7480. ,x Formula Holden V6, Not raced since thorough Historic Delta Ford 1500, VW gearbox. $5,000 Ph; 02 6554 2165. ,29 rebuild. $15,000 (0411) 724 297. 129 Chev small block, Childs&Albert alloy rods, 5-7, brand Will Kart Magnum rolling chassis, made by Top Kart. As new new (still ifi box) $1000. (07) 3888 5934 Brisbane ,29 condition, r&ed once, 30mm chassis, 40mm axle. Suit Chev small block, alloy airflow Research heads.

Clubman Heavy or Reed class. $2,350ono. Ph: Steve 08 8532 1425. 129 Brand new, 590hp, complete with valves, springs etc.

Kart - ready to race Clubman kart with 100S motor. Many Still in boxes. Cost $5000, sell $3200.(07) 3888 5934 Brisbane 129 spares, all in excellent condition. $1,800. Ph: 03 94341069. ,29 Formula Two Avanti, 1980, Ford engine. Fully enclosed trailer with tyre rack, 2 sets wheels, spare ratios, spare rear wing, numerous tyres. Engine and ignition rebuilt. $25,000 plus, for right person, will include up tp $5000 sponsorship. Paul Subaru. Four 15x7 Hotwires with RE520S Bridgestones, Nelson (02) 9620 7408. ,29 205/50x15, $425; Fuel boost system, WRX, $300; Kart, Swiss Hutless Rookie rolling chassis. As new (6 starts) Electronic boost control $250; Padgid brake pads $200; $1800.(0418)851196. 129 roll bar $250. Ph: Ron 0414 399 337. 130 Sprint Kart, Monaco GP rolling chassis. Compete less engine Attention, Targa BMW drivers. Half cage, full har and pipe. Race winning kart in exc cond. $900ono (0418) 120 ness seat belts, Halda mounting, spare (new) wheel for

Parts

758. ,29

31 Si s 91 model. Ph: Phil 0412 042 615. 130

FIDO XLT, 81 model Ranger 250. Cross-flow, 4 speed manu al, bull bar, driving lights, canopy, CB, phone, side steps, air shockers, twin fuel tanks. 9 months rego. In mint condition. No rust. $13,000ono. Ph: Peter 03 5275 4904. ,x

1979 Isuzu SBR car transporter. Auto, 8 ton winch, tyre racks, ramps, rego Sept, inspection due Feb 1999. $10,600ono.

Ph: 02 6368 3220. ,29 Enclosed trailer, suit Speedcar, Litre, or race car, 129" long, 6'9" wide. 5‘7” high. Override brakes, dual axle, tyre rack, shock rack, radius rod racks, spares shelf. Three months rego, in excellent cond. $3,000ono. Ph: 02 9604 0208. 129 Transporter. Converted Millard Starcraft caravan, 30' 4 axles, elect brakes, Stanfast annexe 27' x 15'. Sleeps 3+, HWS, show er, stove, 3-way fridge. $10,500ono. Ph: 02 4942 6233 (BH). ,29 Enclosed Tandem, with annex and tyre rack. Suit open wheeler up to F/Holden. Internally 4820 x 1920 x 1020. $5000 (0411)724 297. 129 Bedford CF LWB van, V8, Turbo 400, dual filler, bull bar.

Commodore dash and buckets. Engineering certiicate, $6000.

(0411)724 297. ,29

1

49 Be<iford, 77 model, Rat Top. New 202, 5-speed, twin LPG tanks. Tool boxes, tyre rack, bucket seats, hwy diff. 11 mths rego.,$3000.(0419)692 6577 or(AH)(02)97240806.

Transporter, 1985 Mazda T4100.18 x 8 x 8feet pantec. 18 x 10 feel awning. 12V & 240V piower. Benches and o'head cupboards.

Reco motor, new rubber,$10,000 ONO(0417)794 933. irs

Pit Crew: Super Tourers, Sydney based, voluntary basis, over 18 years, female/maie, experience not necessary. Long term, no time wasters, no criminal record. Ph: 02 9774 171 1 (BH), 129 Historic 10HP Ford open wheeler was for sale early 97, Penrith area. Would owner contact Barry Ph: 02 9747 8777 (BH), 02 9674 2001 (AH), ug Pit Crew Subcontract, I'm enquiring about any full time positions available on a team. I have Speedway, NASCAR and touring car experience.

Own tools & equipment. Ph: Jason 019 967 450, 03

Wanted Quick-change diff to suit small sedan. Speedcar diff complete would be fine. Cheap as possible. Ph: 02 6242 6638 (AH), 02 6296 1774 (BH), 0412 273

9431 3653. 129

113. 130

1971 edition Australian Competition Yearbook.

Also 1968 Hardie Ferodo 500 programme. Must be in good cond. Ph: Scott 03 5025 7293. 129 Rally prepared Falcon, V8 XT, XW or XY. (08) 8344 3113. 29

2 BBS 19 inch touring car rims, centre iock. Ph: 02 6655 5715, 019 125 965. 130 Old Super Sedan parts - arms, shocks springs, brakes, coilovers. Ph: 02 6242 6638 (AH) 02 6296 1774 (BH), 0412 273 113. 130

Mazda RX-7 series 4 competition parts: rack, suspension, wheels, glass panels, anything .

Ph: John 02 6734 2259, 02 6732 3353. 129 Wheels, alloys to suit Lexus SC400/Toyota Soarer.

Must be 16, 17 or 18inch and in good condition, with or without tyres. (0418) 581 961. 130

Other Books: Great Race books Nos 5, 6, 7, 8. Also Australia's Greatest Motor Race, various prices, excellent condition. Ph: Anthony 08 8277 3752. 130 FI 1/43 scale diecast Onyx 89-90 models, Quartso Classics, all surplus to my collection needs. From $20 each.

Send sae to R. Krane, 11 Rogers Court, Ballarat East, Vic 3350 for list, la

Historic Photos: 70s and 80s, Brock, Johnson, Richards, Senna, Prost etc. b/w and colour, majority unpublished. Tourers, F5000, FI, Sports, also V8s, 2-litre, 500co, Histories. Fax for details 029960 6552. 129 Fastman driving suit, almost new, size 7, $65. Also Bell open face helmet, used twice $75. Ph:02 9894 4634. 129

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Dear Sir, Enough rancour in the ranks, enough griping on the grid.

2L is struggling locally and some people seem to be looking forward to just having V8s doing the rounds.

Sure, the V8s put on a better spectacle right now but, if 2L disap pears, I’ll only be going spectating once a year (instead offour times).

We have enough good categories to support two series.

If a few local categories are slipped in to make up a couple of races every meeting, that’s fine with me. n It’s a chance for them to rub shoulders with the next rung up the racing ladder and a chance 'for me to look around the pits, Last year’s Bathurst 2L was a bit stringy.

As a 17 year-old, Cheever showed brilliant form in Formula 3.

I

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Send !e rroTalk roPOEc.v lOION'ouh Cau.::!i Vic 3!bl. our E-mai: aoare:.?. o.' ‘ax rc 03 9527 7766 Maonpori News does .no;.nece::a.'!y agree ■. jpimons express ty,' .'eaders

fans, and team owners and TV sta tions and racing mags...)

Andrew Guy Paddington, NSW

Them’s the brakes Dear Sir, In response to one of your recent articles, “McLaren’s winning

It’s only ^natural that a team which brings out something that is legal should use it to their advan tage. Why shouldn’t they?

Regulations have tightened up this season by making the cars slightly narrower, longer and intro ducing grooved tyres, which all up make the cars slower.

Surely this makes the cars safe enough.

: 89 Orrong Crescenr , Caulfield North VIC 3161 i (PO Box 1010 North Caulfield 3161) Phone: 03 9S27 7744 Fax 03 9S27 7766

Dear Sir, What a crock of shit in another publication’s wing photos.

Take a close look at the photo.

The Commodore is going down a straight and the Ford is obviously going around a right hand corner.

Stop the wanking over the parity issue and get on with the racing.

Leave the technical decisions to technical people - ie Skaife, Seton, Perkins, etc - and not journalists and ‘Kenny Couldabeens’ with no technical background whatsoever.

I

General: Mike Kable, Jon Thomson. i , Brian Reed, Darryl Rack ; FI: Joe Saward, Adam Cooper i Europe: Quentin Spurring, Ian !

Bamsey : US; Bruce .Smith, Phil Morris NZ: John Hawkins Speedway: Dennis Newlyn, David ' McNabb, Wade Aungor, Geoff Rounds, David Lamont, Chris Metcalf.

Sue Hobson, Michael Attwell.

Tony Millard (UK), Darren O'Dea Rally: Peter Whitten, Jon Thomson \ Drag Racing: Gerald McDornan, Greg Ward, Jon Asher (USA), ; Dave Ostaszewski (USA), !

Nick Nicholas, Steven White, Ken Ferguson, Scott Jug Super Speedway: Martin Clark (USA), i Brett .Swanson, Grant Nicholas Karts: Ian Salvesrrin, Allan Roark.

Grr^ne Burns, Edward Krause Pho&graphers: lAT, Dirk Klynsmith, Zoom Photographies, Neil Hammond, : Nigel Snowdon & Diana Burnett, Brad Steele, Tony Glynn, Thunder-Pics, Marshall Cass, Mike Harding, Brisbane Motorsport, : Frank Midgley, John Bosher, ; Phil Williams, Mike Patrick (UK)

Publisher: C Umbden Printed by: Wilke Color 37-49 Browns Rd Clayton 3168 Distributed by: NOD Ltd

i : , ; : ;

I ;

M.;m?ri.il published by MOTORSPO.';! NliWS o : copyrighL and may no; Pc reproduced in full or in ,wr w.thuui me wniien permission of me ; puf)l::>hc'r. Freelance coofribulions .ve wcirome. ; 7incl wfiile all r.ue will be taken, Australasian j Moioispon NesMs Ply Lid does n-oi ;iccep: ’ responsibility for (Jamatjc or io.ss of material > submitted.

■ Opinions expmssc'd In MorotspoH News arc nor nccessaril)' those of r’\usutilasian Moiofsport News Pty I td Of its staff.

■'Ref.omrnenrled and maximum puce only

Rod Smith Rod Smith Racing Rye, VIC

LIGIND... Iddi Cheever, one of racing's all-time greats in open wheelers, is still idolised by his Kiwi fans.

Give it another 4-6 factory cars and a 40 car grid though and I’ll happily support it.

What a great chance for Bright, Bargwanna, McConville and Romano etc to get some overseas attention (ask Richards, Baird and Mon-is) .

Judging by last year’s race, it won’t detract fi-om the V8s putting on the usual top class show.

Sure, we have a small population and, if the two series keep trying to shaft each, other someone is going to lose out.

If we can get a friendly rivalry ruled over by a neutrally benevobody, both Series are quite . . . ^ CapablG 01 llounsning tO tilG DGIlGIlt of all Categories (and drivers, and

secrets revealed,’ the McLaren team’s new braking system which incorporated a second brake pedal that applies brake force to two wheels is a good idea and should be ruled perfectly legal.

CmTent regulations state that it is legal.

Many teams seem to be question ing the team’s system after its stunning 1-2 victory at the Melbourne Grand Prix, due to them being approximately three; seconds faster on each lap than all the other cars.

If the team had a different mechanical set-up from the other cars, it should be ruled illegal; but, in this case, it is only a minor brake system adjustment.

What harm can an extra brake pedal do other than make the cars handle better around corners, which make the cars even more safe?

Only the grand prix officials can answer this one.

Nick Alygizakis Doncaster, VIC

Iddie fan from NZ Dear Sir, Eddie Cheever’s victory in the Indy 500 was well-deserved.

But for a tremendous shunt in a BMW saloon at the end of 1977 which took away his edge, Eddie would have been one of the greats.

Overseas (/’or M.iilJ New Zealand, PNG Malaysia, Indonesia Phillipines, l-IK, Japan US. Canada Fiji ope Post or fax lo address above.

Dear Sir, I never thought the letters I read in your magazine were true, but that was until... oops, soiTy, wrong magazine ... what did I want to widte?

Oh yes, that’s right, it was anoth er body-shaking experience that affected me recently ... something called the Winternationals at Willowbank last weekend.

Talk about being turned on by groups, well I can tell you it was great to see over 500 racers hit the Willowbank track and wrestle (mud?) their way to glory.

Congratulations to Willowbank and Australian drag racing on pro ducing a brilliant event that, despite all the oildowns and crashes, was a great event to witness.

Thanks, I’ll be coming back again.

Joe Marasco Craigiebm-n, VIC

By Barry Foiley

'

Subscriptions (I yt'Or - 36 issues) .Australia

Even in Formula 1, Cheever was probably under-rated.

His only good car was the Renault in 1983 and he had Prost as team-mate and even Rosberg did not compare well with Prost when he had him as a team-mate at McLaren.

As a driver, I feel Cheever was a latter-day McLaren.

Bruce looked like a potential world champion until his shunt at Nurburgring in 1964, but was still good enough to triumph in CanAm.

What’s wong wSth wings

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MOTORSPORT NEWS 1.1 publiVicri uy Aus;iiiiaii.in Ivloiorspon Newi Ply Uc! ACN No 060 179 92B riatcloi. C. (Miirwyi.ig). D HiUMlI, A Glynn

Phil Hill.

Robert Miles Timaru, NZ

: Email: msnews@corplinl<;.com.au

Contributors

By 1977, his second year in Formula 2, he was arguably the quickest in the world, winning on classic circuits like Nurburgring and Rouen against drivers like Rosberg, Pironi, Aimoux and Daly, arguably better than those in Formula 1.

I felt that Eddie was at his best on the old fast road circuits, like

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