Triple Eight Racing duo Craig Lowndes and Jamie Whincup became the first men in 24 years to win a hat-trick of Bathurst 1000 titles. With a near-flawless and trouble free run in front of a record crowd at Mount Panorama last weekend, they equalled motorsport legends Peter Brock, Jim Richards and Larry Perkins on three wins.
The New Zealand pairing of Greg Murphy and Jason Richards pulled off an incredible second spot in front of the Ford of James Courtney and David Besnard, taking the minor rung on the podium.
Murphy and Richards, who have struggled in the V8 Supercar championship all year, performed the best for Holden teams following their fourth place a year ago.
Despite several late race safety car interventions that brought the Triple Eight Ford back to the field, the Rolan Dane-led team had a trouble-free 161 laps, taking the lead from early pacesetters Stone Brothers Racing pair James Courtney and Dave Besnard after the first pit stop on lap 34, and never looked back in their bid to enter the history books.
Thirty-four-year-old Lowndes moved to equal fifth on the all-time list with four Bathurst wins, behind Brock (9), Richards (7), Perkins (6) and modern rival Mark Skaife (5).
Skaife and current V8 Supercar champion team-mate Garth Tander had a horror day for the Holden Racing Team. Tander got off to a disastrous start when the clutch slipped, leaving him stranded on the starting line as he dropped from pole position to last by the first corner. The day would not get any better for Holden’s flagship outfit as on lap 102 of 161 Skaife hit the wall trying to fend off Lowndes, who was attempting to lap him.
The number one Holden hit the wall again a few laps later as he battled steering problems and the pair finished 12th in the end.
With four races remaining in the 14-round season, the next two Ford vs Holden battles will be the Coffee Club V8 Supercar Challenge on the Gold Coast in Queensland on the weekend of October 23–26, followed by the Gulf Air Desert 400 in Bahrain on the first weekend of November.
Magic Monaro
The 40th anniversary of the first major race win by a Holden Monaro will be celebrated in style at next month’s Historic Sandown race meeting. Appropriately, around 40 Monaros of all models are expected to be on track or on display at the meeting to mark the historic victory at Sandown on September 15, 1968 of the then-new HK Monaro GTS 327 in the Datsun 3 Hour production car race.
1970 Australian Rally Champion Bob Watson, who co-drove the privately entered Monaro to victory with its owner, the late Tony Roberts, will be a guest of honour of the meeting.
Back in 1968, the Monaro GTS 327 was the brainchild of Holden executive John Bagshaw (as the answer to Ford’s new Falcon GT), while Watson (a Holden suspension engineer) was among a small team given the task of making it race-worthy.
Ironically, the Datsun 3 Hour was the first proper motor race for Watson and Roberts, who were both rally drivers, but they took the chequered flag ahead of F1 World Champion-to-be Alan Jones and Clive Millis in a similar GTS 327. They finished with absolutely no brakes – even the metal backing plates had fallen out – so they had to be slowed by their pit crew after their victory!
It was the beginning of a racing legend, with another HK GTS 327 privately crewed by Bruce McPhee and Barry Mulholland, taking victory at Bathurst a few weeks later, with Watson and Roberts third this time behind the Jim Palmer/Phil West Holden Dealer Team entry, giving the new Monaro an unprecedented 2–3 result at Mt Panorama.
The Sandown Three Hour race in 1968 was part of a big day of racing that saw Peter Brock win the Sports Sedan race in his Holden-powered Austin A30 and Norm Beechey debut his new improved production Monaro GTS 327.
An entry of around 300 racing, sports and touring cars spanning eight decades will take part in the annual Historic Sandown meeting with highlights including an expected entry of 28 Formula 5000s and capacity fields for both Group N Touring Cars.
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