Motorsport News Issue 86 - 25 October-7 November 1996

$3.95 (NZ $5.95 incl GST)

NEWS

25 October- 7 November 1996

M97FAICON REJECfED

and now Holden wants to bring on the VS Commodore! ●●●

BACK TO THE DRAWING BOARD: This is the proposed 1997 Ford Falcon racer as put forward

by Ford Australia. However, the rear wing has been rejected by CAMS and the race \s on to produce a replacement wing.

By CHRIS LAMBDEN

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Mark Webber is the toast of the motor racing world after dominating the prestigious British Formula Ford Festival at Brands Hatch on Sunday.

The 20-year-old Australian blitzed a crack field representing 20 countries to mark him self as one of the hottest young properties in Europe.

The huge win was most timely as Webber this week had his first test of a Formula 3 car.

Full details inside

FORD’S homologation of an EL Falcon body kit for 1997 touring car use has received a set-back with the rejection of a proposed new rear wing.

CAMS Ford Motorsport, hav Recognition ing received a one-month Committee likely to extension for its homolo meet again shortly gation application, now thereafter to accept or has until the end of this reject its recommenda month to come up with a tions. revised design, other The CAMS Recog wise it will have to con nition Committee, over tinue with the current seeing the homologation, EF model rear wing. rejected the new Ford At the same time, wing on the grounds Holden has entered the that it was a "two-elefray, requesting permis ment" wing, which is not sion to submit a VS- permitted under the model Commodore aero Group A rules.

The dynamic up-date! repositioning Originally it was (lower in the plane) and thought that Holden elongation of the slots in would defer any up-date the re-designed Ford until the all-new VT wing led to that judge Commodore is intro ment (see picture page 4). duced late next year.

Its current request can The homologation be seen as a tactical application from Ford came after months of move to cover any "inad vertent" performance design and wind-tunnel gains Ford may make work and, more recently, through its EL'Falcon the input of Ralph homologation bid.

Bellamy - the former FI In the end, the whole designer now engineer "who gets what" equa ing Tony Longhurst's tion is most likely to be Castrol Falcon. sorted out by what Continued Page 4 amounts to a Dutch auc tion at a forthcoming TEGA Technical Comm ittee meeting.

That will take place on the same day as a TEGA Special Meeting called for October 31, with the

ISSN 1320-9744

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Thanks to his win in the 1996 Duckhams Formula Ford Championship at Brands Hatch, Mark Webber can add the the world's most prestigious Formula Ford title to his trophy collection. Next year he’ll move up to Formual 3. Yellow Pages® is proud to have helped a young Australian champion find success.

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Webber set for F3

Young Aussie out to impress at Siiverstone test

By DAVID HASSALL

MARK Webber was about to drive out onto the Silverstone Grand Prix circuit for his first Formula 3 test as this issue of Motorsport News went to press.

The 20-year-old Australian fresh from his stunning victory in Sunday’s Formula Ford Festival at Brands Hatch in the Yellow Pages Australia entry - was to have a run in Alan Docking Racing’s Dallara (pictured right).

It was only to be a single-day test, though, with a couple of other drivers taking part also.

Nevertheless, Docking - an expa triate Aussie - has been following his career closely and is keen to have him on board in the future.

Webber hopes to secure a full time drive with the team in F3 next year on his rapid climb to the top.

“I really want to do Formula 3 next year,” said Webber after recov ering from his victory celebrations on Monday.

“We’ve just got to get the budget and do a good job.

“We are looking at Formula Renault as a fall-back - but after yesterday we are really focussed on Formula 3.

“People are telling me I have what it takes to go to the top everyone here knows that that (winning the Festival so convinc ingly) was ‘the business’.

“Hopefully this win will be the one tVrat will get us the backing we need.”

Since Sunday’s win, Webber has been offered numerous test drives, but none that he can’t refuse.

At this stage the only one he is likely to accept is with one of the leading European Formula Renault teams.

This was expected to take place at Zandvoort in Holland on Friday.

A number of other Formula Renault teams - including that of Renault works Super Tourer drive Alain Menu have

Lowndes F3000 test postponed

expressed interest in Webber.

Menu is reported as saying that Webber’s smooth style is ideally suited to graduation to either F3 or Renault.

It goes to show just how important it is to be in the UK,” said Webber of Menu’s interest.

‘You drive around in Formula Ford over here and, without even knowing about it, the likes of Alain Menu are keeping a firm eye on what’s happening and making their assessments. “dust about anyone could be watching...

Van Diemen boss Ralph Firman wants to keep Webber with his organisation, but a parting seems inevitable.

CRAIG Lowndes’ Formula 3000 test in England has been postponed until at least early next month.

The frustrated Lowndes was due to fly out last Sunday for three days at Siiverstone or Snetterton this week.

Now he is cooling his heels at home again, waiting to be advised of the new schedule.

Webber has also linked up with another expat, former Williams FI team manager Peter Windsor.

Although they are giving little away, Windsor and Webber’s manager Ann Neal are said to be working on a scheme designed to take Webber to FI.

TWR wants to give their young star a solid work-out, though, hence the relative luxury of a three-day schedule with the European series runner-up team Super Nova.

The first day is designed to allow Lowndes to settle in and get to know the circuit and car.

Day two will be to get down to business with the set-up and on the final day he may go for a hot lap.

-DAVID HASSALL

Teams dump Phillip Island Barrichello FI test week for Stewart CRA/G LOWNDES...He may be cooling his heels now, but he was certainly hot(and covered in champagne)at Bathurst (Photo by Margaret Curtis)

THE planned Phillip Island FI test has been shelved because of lack of support among the teams.

There is now talk of a four-day test in February at Interlagos in Brazil, although some team man agers would prefer going to Kyalami in South Africa.

At last week’s World Council meeting, the FIA confirmed its plans to introduce major restric tions for FI testing next year.

At the moment teams are not allowed to test at Grand Prix cir cuits until after the event each year.

They each have a designated

Grand Prix circuit where they can test- most use Siiverstone - at any time.

They are not allowed to test out side Europe but can use non-Grand Prix tracks in Europe (such as Jerez, Brands Hatch, Paul Ricard and Mugello).

Under the new regulations, pri vate testing may only be carried out at circuits already approved by the FIA and is prohibited anywhere in the week before a Grand Prix except for a 50km shakedown run.

There will also be a ban on testing between the last event of the year and December 1.

-JOE SAWARD

By JOE SAWARD RUBENS Barrichello is under stood to have signed to join the Stewart Grand Prix team.

The news is yet to be announced, but the 24-year-old Brazilian is believed to have agreed to a three-year deal to partner Danish rising star Jan Magnussen in Ford’s new factory team, Barrichello has been with Jordan since the start of 1993 but for the last couple of years

Lowndes interview -P22

has failed to turn his initial promise into big results and some Jordan team members have lost faith in him.

Rubens has struggled when he is under pressure but he is still very young and clearly does have a lot of talent if it can be properly harnessed.

Joining Stewart is a risk for Rubens, but a long-term con tract and support for the team from Ford should ensure some decent results in the long term.

3

Tourer tyre decision close Tyre D-day for TEGA is next Thursday(October 31), when a Special Meeting of all voting members has been called to finally resolve the long, drawnout matter.

The subject, which has wracked TEGA ranks for months, now has membei's reaching for their copy of the TEGA constitution, such is the polarisation of views among teams.

TEGA Chairman Ron Meatchem has prepared a sub stantial overview/questionnaire which is currently being circulat ed to all teams.

While the issues have been debated at length, the member ship cannot yet agree on the rel ative importance of the two key opposing factors - the perfor mance equality desirable for the quality of“the show” versus the commercial plusses of multi company involvement. n TOGA Australia boss Kelvin O’Reilly has quashed rumours circulating this week of talks between TOGA and the Seven Network about a Super Tourer Summer series. “We are commit ted to our May-November for mat, as this year,” he said on Monday. n BMW has flown in two cur rent ’96-spec Schnitzel- cars to try and peg back Audi’s current Super Touring Championship lead. The cars tested at Lakeside on Monday. n Jim Richards’ Targa Tasmania-winning Porsche Carrera is currently on its way to New Zealand, where Richo will contest the NZ Targa start ing next week in Auckland.

At the same time Richo admits to having “a couple” of good options for Super Tourer drives in 1997, but will wait until the potential UK plans for son Steven come to pass before mak ing any commitments.

Richo has, we hear, spoken with Volvo... n Jorg Muller, who controver sially clinched the FLA Formula 3000 championship at Hockenheim, hopes to make the move into IndyCars next season.

The 27-year-old German has turned his back on TWR Aitows, which had offered him a Formula 1 test - rather than a race - deal. Muller is to test a Reynard-Mercedes for Tony Bettenhausen at Sebring in the coming weeks. n The stewards imposed a one-race ban, suspended for three races, on Gerhard Berger for causing an “avoidable colli sion” at the chicane with the Ferrari of Eddie Irvine during the Japanese Grand prix. The Austrian insisted that it had been a racing accident, but nei ther the officials nor an angi-y Irvine shared that view. n Young Melbourne driver Jason Storace has returned to America and has tested a Formula Atlantic Ralt RT40 for World Speed Motorsports.

Storace, who won the 1995 Formula Russell series, is not hopeful of racing in the US next year and will probably come home again and look at Fomiula Holden or Formula Ford.

4 250ctobeiW96 n Next year’s Australian 500cc Motorcycle Grand Prix - which, of course, moves back to Phillip Island - will again be the final round of the series.

The date has been con firmed as October 12. n Toshio Suzuki, for mer FI driver and current Formula Nippon team owner, will drive a Mercedes in the final ITC round at Suzuka on November 8-10. Opel will run another Japanese vet eran, Masanori Sekiya. n Formula Ford fron trunner Justin Cotter is updating for the 1997 sea son. Cotter, who won the Motorsport News award for older cars this season, has sold his three-year-old Swift and will buy a newer car, which he is coy about nominating. n According to a lead ing research company, Craig Lowndes was the seventh-most mentioned person in the press during the week after Bathurst.

He was ahead of people like Princess Diana, Shane Warne and Christopher Skase.

Politicians John Howard and Pauline Hanson headed the list; winning co-driver Greg Murphy didn’t make the top 20. n Australian Superbike rider Shawn Giles - who was expected to race a Ducati - will now ride a Honda Racing Australia RC45 in the final round of the World Superbike Championship at Phillip Island this weekend. He may stay with the team for next year’s Australian championship, though he is still considering an overseas offer. n Former Cagiva 500 GP ridpr Mat Mladin will ride a Fast By Ferracci Ducati in next year’s US Superbike Championship.

The 24-year-old Aussie finished fourth in the US series, which wound up at Las Vegas recently.

Fellow former Cagiva man Doug Chandler won the the series. n After racing only spo radically this season, Freddie Spencer has final ly announced his retire ment from motorcycle rac ing. The 35-ye'ar-old triple world champion, whose career has been highlight ed by awesome perfor mances interspersed with mysterious health ail ments, will start a riding school in Las Vegas. n World Superbike Championship contender Aaron Slight has been in prime form in testing at Phillip Island but is still a full second shy of Troy Corser’s pre-season best.

Corser, who needs only to finish fourth or better in both races to take the World Title, is confident that his Ducati will be quicker after a season’s development.

(j^0®[FS[p(p^!70

Honda says no to Formula 1

By JOE SAWARD HONDA President Nobuhiko Kawamoto has said that there are no plans for an official Honda comeback in FI in 1998.

If this is indeed the case it is very bad news for several teams which are currently trying to convince the compa ny that they should be its factory team.

Honda has kept a techni cal involvement in FI through the Mugen Honda VIO engine project although this remains an unofficial link - and there has been evidence this year of talks taking place with Williams, Benetton and Tom Walkinshaw.

Despite the announce ment, informed sources in FI

reckon that Honda will prob ably either quietly support the planned Dome-Mugen operation when it enters FI in 1998 and then take the operation over as it becomes more competitive or fund the takeover of one of the small er FI teams.

Rumours in Japan suggest that this could involve for mer driver Satoru Nakajima, who says he is trying to buy a share of the Tyrrell FI team.

Williams, Benetton and TWR Arrows are going to have to look elsewhere for 1998 engine deals.

TWR could make its oneyear deal with Yamaha a long-term one if the alliance is successful, but Williams and Benetton - soon to be deserted by Renault - have

fewer choices available.

There are plenty of rumours of companies inter ested in entering FI in 1998 but no such deals have yet become reality - and time is running out if company’s want to have competitive packages in place for the start of 1998.

The two top teams will, therefore, probably have to turn to existing FI engine suppliers for their 1998 power units.

The choice is limited to Mercedes, Peugeot, Ford and Yamaha.

Mercedes is in a long-term relationship with McLaren, but if the team fails to deliv er next year (the third year of the relationship) there will be enormous pressure inside Mercedes to dump Ron

Dennis’s operation and find a team which can win.

Peugeot will be available as its contract with Jordan runs out at the end of next year.

The relationship has not been successful to date and there is pressure within Peugeot to get the job done or pull out.

Jordan is extremely exposed at the moment as not only are Williams and Benetton beginning to sniff around Peugeot, but also Alain Prost is trying hard to put together a deal for Peugeot to power his planned team (Ligier) in 1998.

One or even two of the big teams in FI look to be in danger of losing out on a decent engine deal in 1998.

Falcon rear wing rejected Continued from Page 1

“We’d already developed a few proposals earlier in the year, based on the EF,” Ford Motorsport Manager Greg Harbutt told us, “and then I was introduced to Ralph, who had some obvious expe rience to bring to the project.

“At the same time, the EL was coming along, so we decided to concentrate on that and in the end came up with our final version, which is what you see now.”

Although it has had windtunnel testing. Ford claims the new package has not yet benefited from any circuit testing, which will now have to wait until the rear wing problem is sorted out.

At the same time, the saga illustrates the paradox faced by the engineers involved.

The natural instinct is to produce an improved item in the case of the rear wing, one with more downforce.

But in a formula where performance parity rules, theoretically the EL Falcon should match EF performance exactly, or artificial parity adjustments will need to be made.

Regardless, the one substantial gain made with the revised front layout of the EL is in the area of cooling, thanks to significantly increased intake areas.

Brake cooling ducts are now, like the VR Holden, part of the main air intake area.

Holden’s John Stevenson explained the rationale behind his company’s seemingly late request for VS homologation: “The thing to note is that a new homologation over-rides existing parity set-ups.

“That means, for example,

New V8 tourer senes THE yet-to-be-named IMG/TEGA/CAMS consortium is set to announce Channel 10 as the new Shell series broadcaster next Wednesday, as well as details of a new V8 series and - hopefully - a 1997 race schedule.

Few details were forthcom ing from IMG in the lead-up to the delayed announcement, but industry sources have been predicting a Ten Network deal for the past cou ple of weeks.

One obstacle is said to have been the Network’s reluctance to put in the hard yards through the year, with the Seven Network retaining the jewel in the crown - Bathurst.

The new, second series, is expected to be made up of all the non-Shell series events.

Include in that the Melbourne GP appearance, IndyCar, Sandown, Bathurst, New Zealand and - potential ly - the SE Asian races that IMG hopes to promote.

As a result of the network shift, the Shell series is not expected to kick off until March.

The first racing appearance of the V8 tourers will there fore be at the Grand Prix, on March 6-9.

Promoters unhappy

that the new Falcon does not have to have the trimmed undertray that the EF now has.

So if Ford had been able to get an improved rear wing past the Committee, which it hasn’t, then they would have been looking at downforce gains at both the front and rear, producing an obvious performance gain ...

“Given that Ford has now had two one-month time extensions, we felt it reasonable to ask for a VS homologation to be reconsidered.”

Stevenson confirmed that Larry Perkins and Mark Skaife had conducted some “preliminary testing” on ideas that would make up a VS package “that would combine the best options from the VP and Commodores.

The final outcome?

All things are possible, but the negotiations could well produce no VS Commodore, a VR with its front undertray restored, and the new EL Falcon, but with a mildly - if at all - improved rear wing ...

COMING AND GOING ... The rejected rear wing (above) featured three large slots and had a more pronounced bend while took the trailing edge further out the back of the car.

The new front (below) features a large single opening which feeds more air to the front brakes and the engine.

(Photos provided by Ford Australia)

AUSTRALIA’S circuit owners are reacting with concern to the philoso phies being expressed by management group IMG. Most circuit owners met last Thursday, following individual meetings with IMG and TEGA representa tives.

It is understood that the meeting has subsequently sought legal clarification from CAMS and the Australian Motor Sport Commission on just what rights those bodies have handed to TEGA (and thus IMG) and what rights the circuit owners/promoters have.

“We are concerned,” one promoter explained to Motorsport News.

“IM(j are looking for a fee, a percentage of the gate.

They’re not getting that.

“We’d quite happily talk about a percentage of the increase we might get as a result of their involvement...

“But, given recent events, and the constant politics within the category, we have doubts that TEGA (and IMG) can deliver.”

The circuit owners have reportedly resolved that they will not negotiate further with TEGA/IMG until they have received the clarifica tion they are seeking from CAMS (they have given CAMS seven days to respond) and are convinced that ATCC sponsor Shell is supporting the TEGA/IMG programme.

25 October ms

Murphy stands in for Lowndes o

05

Idiosyncrasies

by Peter Brock Individuality

GREG Murphy will drive in the forthcoming NZ Mobil series, replacing Craig Lowndes in the HRT line-up.

While Murphy was origi nally on stand-hy pending Lowndes’ availability, the team has now formally nomi nated Murphy for the NZ drive.

GREG MURPHY... Another chance to impress HRT.

Ingall to wait

The early suggestion, it seems, came from his part ner in crime Lowndes, who told team boss John Crennan that it would be fitting for Murphy to drive in his home country.

The news sets up a New Zealand promoter’s dream, with Murphy pitched against Kiwi international Paul Radisich, who will drive the second Alan Jones-entered, locally-sponsored Falcon.

The 12-car TEGA field will contest three sprint races at

Pukekohe on November 17 and around the Wellington street circuit a week later.

While no decision has yet apparently been made, Murphy is aware that the New Zealand opportunity offers a chance to further cement his claim to the HRT drive in 1997.

In the meantime, Murphy is set to enjoy his solo debut with HRT: “Think about it. I’m com ing home with the team which has won the Australian Touring Car Championship, Sandown and Bathurst. It’s going to be unreal ...”

The touring car races will be supported by TraNZam (with Steven Johnson again driving), Formula Ford, NZ’s new VK/VL Commodore class, and a mixed Sports/GT category.

Mercedes ITC move It is believed that Mercedes-Benz is to spearhead a move to promote a new German race series, framed around production-based cars, in the wake of the now-defunct Class 1 FIA International Touring Car Championship.

Major sponsors are thought to be keen to support the Stuttgart company’s proposal.

Meanwhile, the FIA is examining a proposal to keep the ITC running with private entries.

Previously, the series was limited to works teams.

- QUENTIN SPURRING

nn ; ●if}-

ne of the great delights I I receive while observing motor sport is to note the var ious approaches drivers have to their chosen task. It varies enor 4 mously depending, I suppose, on ■? the temperament of the individual.

Some are intense and very concerned about outside factors. They go to great lengths to ensure that every sin gle thing that comes into their being is scrutinised. They need, and use, a filter system to help them maintain their focus, being very conscious of the outside comment and attention they receive and every gesture that is made.

Some would say this is more a heightened example of professionalism. My feeling is that’s not the case.

Others love to play mind games with others, elevating their own sense of importance by detracting from their fel low competitors. They sort of psyche themselves into a state of supremacy by convincing themselves that the opposition can't drive, can’t prepare cars, have the wrong equipment or crew, or goodness knows what.

They’ll go for any perceived chink in the opposition’s armour and then exploit it. It all adds up to the entertain ment level being heightened for the outside observers, I suppose.

Then there is the physical type. He has a regime of exercise that must be maintained or he simply cannot keep up to the task. Working out constantly and maintain ing a focus on the body’s needs, anything remotely perfor mance-enhancing is either done, used or consumed.

Another type is the individual who oasically works to conserve his energy for the big moment. Working to main tain a relaxed frame of mind and body to ensure they are at the level they feel is best for them.

The list goes on. There are many, many different approaches to the task of racing a motor car. We humans are all a little different from one another and whenever ‘experts’ try to categorise and generalise, they are inevitably proved wrong by the exception.

One thing I have learned while observing these varying approaches to the demands that are undertaken is that each is appropriate for that person.

But what is right for one is not necessarily going to be successful for another. We need to understand and respect these unique approaches. Certainly, there are basic guidelines but, when it comes down to it, it’s each to his or her own, just as it is in all things.

Cheers.

for HRT White stars in Eurep STEPHEN White made it

RUSSELL Ingall is cur rently without a con firmed touring car drive in 1997, despite reports to the contrary.

Like many people in the category, the 1995 Bathurst winner is currently waiting to see what happens to Australia's most sought-after seat - the Holden Racing Team's.

Even though he has an agreed-in-principle deal for next year with Larry Perkins and Castrol, the for mer international intends "sitting on the fence" until the HRT seat is signed, sealed and delivered to somebody.

In the meantime, Ingall is not cooling his heels doing nothing.

He will be entering new territory this weekend at Lakeside when he moves into the BOC Gases Super Touring ranks for the fi rst time.

Ingall steps into the Vauxhall Cavalier formerly driven by Brooke Tatnell, who has been forced out of the series through lack of sponsorship.

The car, which he tested at

Amaroo Park last Friday, will be run by Mike Quinn's Phoenix Motorsport team, alongside the regular Peugeot of Mark Adderton.

Geoff Full will miss the rest of the series due to bud getary constraints.

"It was great," Russell said after the test. "I have only ever driven a Mondeo before as part of winning the British Formula Ford title in 1993, but this was really good."

"He went really well," enthused Quinn at Amaroo.

"You know Russell ..."

Despite some earlier reports. Ingall's drive will be neither supported nor sanetioned by his regular sponsors.

a great weekend for Australia by taking an excellent second place in the Formula Renault EuroCup final at Magny Cours in France, At the same time as Mark Webber was flying the flag at Brands Hatch, White was the lone Van Diemen challenger to a field full of the dominant Italian Tatuus cars.

White travelled over to the French Grand Prix circuit for a single test day and was foimth fastest in his first session.

“The track wasn’t what

I though it would be,” he said, “It’s a lot bumpier that it looks on television and

While Quinn is a long-time Castrol user, the car will be sponsored by Foxtel and Holden and Ingall will race on the car's regular Michelin tyres.

After Lakeside, his next assignment will be the two New Zealand 5-litre races where he will drive his famil iar Castrol Commodore VR alongside the 'Bathurst' VP of Perkins.

-PHILBRANAGAN

sections of it are really mickey mouse.”

At the top end of the 30car field. White made a good start to be in second place on the first lap, but soon the race was redflagged for an incident down the field.

White re-gridded fourth and, again, got up into second before suf fering a fuel pickup problem in his Coogi-

FINAL FLING ... Stephen White finished his season in Europe on a good note when he took his Coogi-backed Van Diemen to second place in the big final at Magny Cours. sponsored Van Diemen.

He soon fell back to third and held onto that position to finish second on aggregate times.

Understandably White was delighted with the result.

“To be dicing for the lead with this year’s European Formula Renault Champion

(Enrique Bernoldi) and to beat all the rest including this year’s British Champion (Dave Cook) was a fantastic result,” he said.

As a mark of White’s form, Tatuus cars filled 10 of first 11 spots, with his sole Van Diemen the only interloper.

White plans to have

some tests with a Formula Three team in the next month before returning home for dis cussions with current sponsor Coogi - which is already committed to White for next season and a new sponsor which the team would only say was ‘close’.

-PHILBILVNAGAN

6

5October W6

Ligier in tyre trap

GOODYEAR has con firmed that it is looking for a seventh FI team, which is likely to be Ligier. The French team wanted a Bridgestone deal but Japanese sources suggest there is a dispute between Bridgestone management and Mugen’s Hirotoshi Honda which is affecting Ligier. And the team may not want a long-term deal because the expected takeover by Alain Frost to become the much-vaunted French national team for 1998 is expected to include Michelin... n With Ligier looking to replace Pedro Diniz and his millions, the team has tested 25-year-old Shinji Nakano, Dome’s works driver in Formula 3000 (now Formula Nippon)in Japan. A protege of Hirotoshi Honda, he raced in British Formula Vauxhall racing in 1990 and 1991, though without much success. n The Japanese Dome FI team has announced that it is' delaying its entry into Grand Prix rac ing until the 1998 season as it has been unable to find the budget and engines necessary to com pete in next year. Dome is expected to run Mugen VlOs when it does get into FI. S Aitqws driver Ricardo Rosset is trying to find a drive next year and has some money avail able, which could make him attractive to Tyirell.

In Japan,former FI star Satoru Nakajima was quoted as saying that he may have some involve ment with the operation next year with PIAA money. n The favourite to drive for Sauber next year is Norberto Fontana, the team’s test driver.

Sauber’s failure to secure Ford VlOs means that it will have to use customer V8s, which has reduced interest from the likes of Gianni Morbidelli and Mai-tin Brundle. n There is some confu sion in FI at the moment over the designation of the Ford customer V8 engines for next year. The engine tested and raced in the last few weeks by Minardi was a develop ment version of the ED3, produced hy a team of Cosworth engineers which had previously been involved in the com pany’s Opel ITC engine.

The ED4 will be the 1997 version of this unit and will be used by Tyrrell, Minardi and probably Sauber. The Zetec-R V8 engine has proved to be too expensive to be a cus tomer engine as there are considerably more throw away parts.

-JOESAWARD

4WD ban for Super Tourers AUDI has had its fears confirmed; four-wheel drive is about to be out lawed in Super Touring racing.

At its meeting in Paris, France last week, the World Motor Sports Council ruled that four-wheel-drive sys tems will be banned from 1 January 1998.

Ironically, Audi had already begun development of a front-wheel drive version of its A4 race car and had agreed to the schedule to phase out 4WD from 1998 onwards.

The sport’s ruling body declared that it was impossi ble to find a satisfactory formula equivalency between the 2WD and 4WD cars, a reference to the fact that the Audi A4 was given a mid-season weight increase of 30kg but still contrived to win the British series against the rear-drive BMWs and front-drive Fords, Hondas, Peugeots, Renaults, Vauxhalls and Volvos.

Apart from leading the Australian series, Audi has also won the national titles in Belgium, Germany, Italy and South Afiica.

'The FIA also stated that it would not be finalising weights for the various con figurations of Super Touring cars until December, prompt-

FINAL YEAR... After 1997 there will be no more four-wheel-drive cars in Super Touring. ing an immediate response from Audi.

The manufacturer will not commit to any Super Touring programs until after the FIA decree.

The local distributor and Brad Jones’ Orix Audi Sport Team have stated that they “are in exactly the same posi tion as Audi world-wide and must wait for the December ruling by the FIA before making a decision on their 1997 plans.”

Jones’ only comment was: “I really haven’t had any time to think about it; I don’t think it will affect us unduly at this point in time.”

- QUENTIN SPURRING/ PHIL BRANAGAN

International dates confirmed THE Australian FI Grand Prix date has been con firmed for March 9.

This comes despite the lack of a final GP calendar from the recent FIA meeting (see below).

With calendar finalisation deferred to December, Australian FIA delegate John Large was apparently forced to explain the impossibility of progressing Melbourne’s marketing and planning without a firm and final date.

The FIA Council,surprisingly, agreed and took the decision to confirm Melbourne only,for March 6-9.

And in the United States, IndyCar has confirmed the move of the Gold Coast round to April 6 as the second round of the 1996 series.

Gow ready for 2L Bathurst TOCA (UK) boss Alan Gow will provide a field of UK-based Super Touring cars for Bathurst if asked.

Gow, who was present at the AMP Bathurst 1000 earlier this month, left that clear impression with Bathurst consortium mem bers, following suggestions from V8 marketers IMG that a rebel race would be considered if the package for the V8s at Bathurst was not improved.

“I don’t want to be seen as the instigator of anything,” Gow told Motorsport News as he prepared to return to the UK, “but if we were asked,sure,I reckon we could put a good field together.

“We’d grab the opportunity with both hands.

“Our main championships, in Eiurope, are over by late-September and some of the teams would wel come the opportunity to do some development/test miles down here.

Suggestions that most Super Tourers are built for sprint racing these days also hold no water with Gow: “There are two 24 hour races in Europe, so a few hours around Bathurst would be relatively easy!”

And would the crowds come to Bathurst to see Super Tourers?

“The biggest crowd ever at Bathurst was in 1987, when just about everyone was racing those foreign Sierras...”

Sauber gets top engine designer

SAUBER is on the verge of signing a deal to run V8 Ford’s customer engines in 1997 but is con centrating on its plans for 1998 when the Swiss team hopes to run a new Petronas VIO engine.

After talks with a variety of FI engine suppliers notably Cosworth and Yamaha - the Malaysians appear to reached the conclu sion that the best course of action is to establish a brand new company and hire a top FI engine man to run the show.

The man chosen appears to be Osamo Goto of Ferrari.

The 47-year-old from Tokyo was one of Honda’s brightest young engineers when he joined the compa ny’s FI programme in 1984.

A year later he became team leader and there fol lowed a string of Honda World Title victories.

He moved to Ferrari in 1994 to oversee research and development of the VIO. We hear that his contract is up for renewal at the end of this year and that he will establish a facility to design and build a Petronas VIO somewhere in England.

As many as 30 young Malaysian engineers are expected te arrive in Y.nrope early next year to begin the programme.

MEANWHILE, Sauber has also recently hired three engine designers from the Porsche Motorsports depart ment and they are expected to begin work shortly on the design of the VIO. All three were employed at Porsche when Sauber vicepresident Max Welti was Competitions Manager at Weissach.

Welti tried lo convince Porsche management to enter FI and a prototype VIO engine was produced by a young team of engineers.

When Porsche refused to go Grand Prix racing in 1994 Welti quit and joined Sauber.

-JOESAWARD

FIA delays'97 entry and calendar

By JOE SAWARD

THE FIA World Motor Sports Council, which met last week in Paris, has delayed the publica tion of the 1997 World Championship entry list which was due to be revealed on November 4.

Entries closed at mid night Sunday (Paris time) and, although it is too early to be sure how many teams have definitely entered for next year’s series, there is little doubt that we will ultimately see Arrows, Benetton, Ferrari, Jordan, Ligier, McLaren, Minardi, Sauber, Stewart, Tyrrell and Williams tak¬

ing part in the 1997 series.

This will give a total of 22 cars.

There is a very small chance that Forti and Lola will have made last-minute decisions to push ahead with their projects, but neither is considered to be very likely.

In both cases the entry will need to be accompanied by a $500,000 deposit and infor mation about the team’s financial position.

In the case of Minardi, which failed to score a World Championship point in 1996, the governing body will need financial details to convince it to grant the Italian team an entry.

The entry list is supposed to be published 22 days after the end of the previous sea son, but the new regulation states that the entry will henceforth be made public on the first working day in December Monday, December 2 in this case.

This can be interpreted as a way of keeping to the December tradition or as a move to give the governing body extra time in which to settle the current political problems it has with McLaren, Williams and Tyrrell and avoid a situation in which teams are not included in the entry list.

The current political jug¬

gling may also be responsible for the delay in the publica tion of the Formula 1 calen dar, which the World Council decided to refer back to the Formula 1 Commission “for further consideration”.

This decision is probably based on the dispute over whether there should be 16 or 17 races next year.

The idea of running 17 events had been opposed by the FI Commission in its 1992-1996 form. This body should remain in force until December 31.

In recent weeks, however, the regulations have been bent somewhat with the FI Commission meeting in its

1997-2001 form, despite the fact that this body has no power until -January 1, 1997.

The difference between the two Commissions is that the 1997-2001 version does not currently include McLaren and Williams, which were opposed to having more races.

The FIA is obliged by its own regulations to publish a final FI calendar by January 1 which means that either there will be more fudging of the rules and we will have a 17-race calendar in early December or that the deci sion-makers are going to be busy on New Year’s Day.

i

25 October me

Jordan considers Josf Jean lll and Nigel!

By JOE SAWARD

THESE are crucial weeks for Eddie Jordan as he

tries to find a way of attracting an established FI star driver to his team.

Jordan has already signed up Ralf Schumacher but, having missed out on signing a deal with World Champion Damon Hill, needs an experi enced topline driver to keep his partners Peugeot and Benson & Hedges happy.

'The Jordan team is enter ing its third year of a threeyear contract with Peugeot and to date the results have been very disappointing given that the Peugeot VIO is clearly a very powerful engine.

With and Williams Benetton looking for engines in 1998, Jordan is going to have to do well in 1997 if he wants to have any chance of holding onto the Peugeot deal.

Since Hill signed for Arrows, Jordan has been try ing to convince Benetton to sell him Jean Alesi’s con tract.

Benetton boss Flavio

Briatore has proved in the past that he will sell any thing if the price is right and he knows that if Alesi does go he still has Gerhard Berger to lead the team.

He also has young Giancarlo Fisichella avail able to jump into Alesi’s seat.

Jean’s gaffe in Suzuka where he crashed out by himself on the first lap when Benetton needed him to score points to help it finish second in the Constructors’ Championship - will not have helped him, but the deal seems unlikely at the moment.

Jordan also tried to get Alex Zanardi, but the 29year-old Italian has just signed a new contract with the Ganassi IndyCar team and appears content with his new star status in the United States.

There are also rumoured to have been quiet attempts

by Jordan to see if Mika Salo can be prised out of his con tract with Tyrrell.

Now Jordan is negotiating with Jos Verstappen, who is looking for a drive, having been dumped by Arrows.

HEARTBURN... Nigel Mansell does not believe he is finished with top-level racing at 42 years of age: “My time is not up."

i 1

i*

± Verstappen is fast but he makes mistakes.

Jordan reckons that a dri ver can be cured of that and

is keen to sign the Dutchman but all negotiations to date failed to make any progress because Verstappen’s man-

FI tyre changes

THE FIA World Council has announced its new Formula

1 World Championship tyre supply rules which will come into effect on January L The tyre regulations restrict drivers to 36 slick tyres (nine sets) and 28 wets (seven sets) per event.

Tyre manufacturers may supply two different specifica tions of slick tyres and drivers will be able to use the two dif ferent tyres in free practice.

They must then choose which tyres to use before qual ifying begins and must then stick with the choice in both

qualifying and the race.

Only 16 of the tyres may be used in qualifying, these being chosen at random by the FIA Technical Delegate.

The new regulation will not please tyre companies as it means that they must now bring twice the number of slick tyres to each event.

This will obviously suit

Bridgestone more than it will Goodyear as the Akron compa ny already knows which tyres will work at which circuits while Bridgestone does not.

Goodyear was opposed to the idea of having two choices of slick tyre available but seems to have accepted it to avoid the FIA doing some thing more radical, such as decreeing that FI cars should run on grooved tyres to cut down grip.

-JOESAWARD

Cangratu/at/ons to: Craig Lowndes/Greg Murphy & Holden Racing Team

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agement was asking for ludi crous amounts of money.

In recent days, however, Jos has begun doing his own negotiating and his chances of getting the Jordan drive have increased consider ably.

Verstappen is not yet suffi ciently big a star to guaran tee satisfaction from Peugeot and Benson & Hedges and the only man who is avail able and might fit the bill is former World Champion Nigel Mansell.

Last week Mansell said that he does not consider himself to be retired, despite the fact that he is now 42 years old.

Although American singleseater racers go on into their late 40s, in FI in recent years 40 has been the accept ed retirement age.

“Motor racing still very much burns in my heart,” Mansell said last week. “My time is not up.”

7

n We hear that Benetton’s plans to build a 50% rolling road windtunnel at the team’s Enstone headquarters have been shelved because the pro ject is too expensive for the moment. The team’s aerodynamics are being done at Fondmetal Technologies in Italy by Jean-Claude Migeot. n Sandro Nannini says that, although he is going to test a couple of FI cars in the next few months, he is unlikely to be able to make an FI comeback because his right arm severed in a helicopter accident in October 1990 but sewn back on by ' microsurgeons - will never be strong enough to let him complete a race. n Former FI driver Erik Comas, who now lives in Japan,speaks flu ent Japanese and races for Toyota, hopes to be trans ferred to IndyCars shortly. n China has officially opened the Zhuhai International Circuit,its first purpose-built racing circuit.'The first interna tional event will be a Marlboro-sponsored sports-► car race on November 3.

The circuit is expected to hold a Grand Prix in 1998.

■ Riccardo Patrese has tried out a modem Willi p.ms-Renault at Silverstone, shaking down a car for the team at Silverstone. Patrese had asked Fi-ank Williams if he could see how FI has devel oped in recent seasons.

Revolution for sale

■ Arrows test driver Jorg Muller won the International Fommla 3000 title last weekend at Hockenheim after a con troversial race in which his title rival Kenny Brack drove him off the road at the first comer.

Muller - who was one point ahead going into the final race - finished 18th while Brack ignored black flags for unsporting behaviour to win the event. The Swede was excluded, fi ned $50,000 and the case was referred to the FIA.

AFTER four years setting up what is arguably Australia’s most successful motorsport equipment business, Revolution Racegear boss George Santana is putting the business up for sale.

Having spent the better half of his life within the motorsport industry in Australia and South Africa, the ex-South African racing champion has decided to spend some time enjoying the ftaiits of his labour.

Revolution is well established as Australia’s largest racegear supplier with stores in Melbourne, Sydney and Canberra and franchised stores in Adelaide, Brisbane, Perth, Gold Coast, Newcastle, Mackay, Hobart, Darwin, Wollongong, Cairns, NSW Central Coast and Launceston.

Interested parties are asked to contact Revolution Racegear’s Melbourne office on 03 9873 8700 for more information.

- JOE SAWARD

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S 25 October 199S

Webber's brilliant Festival

By CHRIS NEEDELL and ANN NEAL QUEANBEYAN’S Mark Webber has brought the world-famous Formula Ford Festival title back to Australia after a brilliant display at Brands Hatch on Sunday, which mir rored the performance of Russell Ingall's victory in 1993.

Twenty-year-old Webber stamped his authority on the proceedings in two races held in very differ ent conditions.

First he romped home to a comfortable semi-final win in the dry (securing the fastest lap of the Festival on his way) and then proved to be the mas ter in a rainsoaked Grand Final.

Australian honour was also upheld by our other two Festival drivers, 1996 Ford/Slick 50 Australian Formula Ford champion David Besnard and Mygale chassis importer Dugal McDougall, who both reached the Grand Final.

Besnard took the joint fastest lap of the wet final on his way to finishing 14th.

Semi Final 1-15 laps Webber's works Van Diemen teammates, Brazilian Vitor Meira and Dane Kristian'Kolby, were the pace setters in qualifying for the first semi, with Meira snatch ing pole position away from Kolby on the final lap with a best time of 46.752s.

Besnard's session ended prematurely after he ran off the track and into the tyre wall at Dmids on only his sec ond timed lap.

Happily, his long-haul trip

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JUBILANT AUSSIE ... Mark Webber was in a class of his own at Brands Hatch, marking himself as the man to watch on the British scene. (Photos by latDigital) wasn't for nothing as he was allowed to start the race, albeit from the back of the grid.

It was spitting with rain for the start of the race and, with everyone on slick tyres, it was Meira who initially led, only for Kolby to take up the mnning as they headed towards Dmids for the first time.

Besnard was already mak ing strong progress and was up into 13th by the end of the first lap.

With the rain becoming heavier, Besnard was clearly revelling in the conditions and, when Kolby fell off while leading on lap four, the two young national champions suddenly found themselves dicing for sixth position.

While Meira cruised home to a comfortable victory, the other positions were not resolved until the very finish.

Kolby managed to claw his way up into second place, but then suffered another off at Graham Hill Bend which dropped him to sixth at the flag.

Besnard, having latched

onto the rear of a splendid four-car dice for third place, ended up 10th after an illfated challenge on Italian Giorgio Vinella.

Semi final 2-15 laps Despite his pre-event turn of speed, Webber didn't take out his expected pole position for the second semi.

Webber pitted during the session, complaining that his car felt unstable, but it was only later that the team dis covered a rear bar had worked itself loose!

Pole went to Dutchman Jacky van der Ende in the Mygale with a time of 46.621s while Webber still took second with a 46.637s.

Webber slipped back to fourth at the start of the race, but was back into second place by the time the pack had reached the top of Druids after a gutsy drive aroimd the outside of Terrien and Field.

Race leader van der Ende fell victim to the same ploy the next time around and from then on Webber was never troubled, winning by

almost three seconds from van der Ende, Field and Terrien.

Grand Final - 20 laps

A heavy downpour had completely soaked the circuit just 15 minutes before the Final and thus full wet tyres were most definitely the order of the day as the 28-car grid lined up with Webber on pole.

However, Mark could have done without the dubious privilege of starting from pole position as, when it's wet at Brands, the slope of the track means pole is actually a dis advantage!

Sure enough, the Yellow Pages Australia car got too much wheelspin off the line and Mark slipped immediate ly back to fourth spot by the first comer.

What followed over the next four laps proved beyond doubt that Webber is a class act.

He tightened the lap straps and went past both Field and Meira around the outside of Paddock Bend to shoot back up to second place before Druids.

Van der Ende had made the

Q QUADRANT

best getaway and soon it was the Dutchman who was now under pressure from the charging Aussie.

Webber was clearly quicker than his rival and as they entered Paddock for the third time, Mark pulled off in auda cious manoeuvre around the outside of Jacky for the lead.

Right in the middle of this move, however, he noticed that the yellow flags were out as McDougall had spun his Mygale into retirement and the car was sitting on the edge of the track.

Although he had just got the nose of his Van Diemen in front, Webber showed incredi ble presence of mind, lifted his hand in the air to acknowl edge the flag and backed off a fraction to let van der Ende back through.

This was vital, as a blind overtaking move under yellow flags would have seen him - instantly excluded from the results of the race. _ With his confidence over^ flowing despite the treacherg ous conditions, the NSW dri' ver then saw that the flags ; had gone in at Paddock a lap

and BILST£tN MOTORSPORT SERVICE AUSTRALIA

MARSHALL J. BREWER AUSCAR PETER FITZGERALD

I later and instantly dived I down the inside of van der Ende to take the lead for the second time!

Again, however, he was unable to make it stick as the Dutchman had a better exit and regained the initiative at Druids.

But Jacky made a small mistake at Clearways later that lap and this time both Webber and Field were able to

scythe past and kick off their own private baffle for the lead.

After initial pressure from Field, Webber got into his stride and gradually pulled away at the front.

He had established a 1.5s gap by the time the race was stopped after eight laps when Kiwi driver Andrew Booth and Swiss Iradj Alexander David clashed on pit straight.

At the restart Mark made a better getaway but the man on the move was Meira, who stormed past the first three around tKe outside at Paddock to take the lead'.

Webber could afford to just sit behind the Brazilian as on aggregate time he was fi ve seconds behind Mark when the race had been stopped.

Webber did just that for a few laps, but then Meira lost it under braking for Paddock on lap 12 and ploughed into the banters.

This left Webber the clear leader on the road as well and, after a masterful drive, Mark eventually stroked home to win by over five sec onds from Field and Michael Vergers.

Besnard also made his mark on the Festival fi nal with a stirring drive in his Valvoline Van Diemen.

Starting alongside Vergers in 20th position, he worked his way up to 11th on the road at the end of the two-part race, but was put back to 14th in the results after incuning a 10-second penalty for jumping the second start.

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9

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Hill is the /shall never forget this weakest - Lauda T DAMON Hill is the weakest man to win the World Championship, according to a man who ought to know - Niki Lauda.

The triple world champion, who is also the ‘drivers’ consul tant’ at Ferrari, was speaking in typical forthright fashion to a German newspaper: “He clearly showed he was the weakest because with the best car it took him so long to become world champion.

“Damon HiU enjoyed an ideal situation which no-one else shared.

“Ferrari had a new car, a new engine, a new driver; McLaren wasn’t as strong as expected; Benetton could not stay at the same level in their first year without Schumacher and (as a result) the championship was fairly boring.

Lauda, now 47, won the world title in 1975, ’77 and ’84. The first two titles came with Ferrari and the third with McLaren.

he perfect end to a perfect season. I cannot begin to describe how elated I feel at having achieved the goal I have been striving for over the past four years.

To have won the first race and the last race plus six in between pretty much sums up the year. I’ve led the championship right from the start and throughout the sea son. I’ve started on the front row of the grid for all 16 races and I have won half of them. It’s some thing I’m very proud of.

I

’ve never felt so happy to win a race. I experienced a similar feel ing after my first Grand Prix victo ry in 1993; I wanted it to happen so badly and last Sunday’s race was much the same, even though I went into it knowing I only need ed a finish in the top six to secure the title.

It would have been easy to back off once I knew that Jacques Villeneuve was out of the race

By Williams F1 driver DAMON HILL because, at that point, I became the 1996 World Champion. But I wanted to win the race for every one at Williams Grand Prix Engineering. It would be a means of saying thanks to more than 230 people, most of whom you never hear about because they work with great dedication behind the scenes and don’t come to the races. It is the same for the team at Renault Sport in Paris, another

Mixed reaction to Albert Park finance report A FINANCIAL analysis reveals t\vat t\ie 'Victorian State Government spent $60 million on the Australian Formula One Grand Prix.

The report, by 'Victorian AuditorGeneral Mr Ches Baragwanath, also revealed that the Victorian Treasurer Mr Stockdale has agreed to underwrite loses for the event up to 2001.

In response, the Melbourne Major Events Company, which was responsible for getting the GP for Melbourne, has pointed out that the event generated $95.6 million of economic activity and $6.0 million tax on receipts.

MME’s Mr John Haddad pointed out that the $60 million figure included $45 million in capital spent on improvements to Albert Park itself.

However, opponents of the race have described the financial result as a cost “blow-out” and have called for a more thorough analysis.

- PHIL BRANAGAN

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extremely hard-working group who must take credit for their part in the success.

Cruising home with the champi onship in my pocket would have been all very well, but 1 knew that everyone wanted to finish the year in a way which underlined their tremendous efforts.

The hardest part was dealing with the mental battle during the final 15 laps as I tried not to think about the con sequences of the champi onship and how I would celebrate while, at the same time, concentrating on winning the race and sign ing off in the best possible way for the team which has given me 21 victories in the past four seasons.

I shall never ever forget this period in my life. We have had some unbelievable experiences, BUDDIES: reaching fan Looking more tastic high like life-long points and friends than the occasionally bitter rivals they plunging into have become, some terrible Damon Hill and low periods outgoing along the champion Michael way.

Schumacher This sea share a joke on son has been the podium typical, but (above). such pres Moments earlier, sures are part Damon had and parcel of winning the shared his big win with wife champ i onsh i p .

Georgia (left).

Driving the car is only a small part of

Top designer heads for Ferrari

By JOE SAWARD

BENETTON is facing a major reshuffle of its engineering staff, with technical director Ross Brawn and chief design er Rory Byrne both rumoured to be leaving the team.

Brawn is tipped to be on his way to Ferrari to head the technical department while Byrne is set to retire after 15 years in FI with Benetton and Toleman.

The 52-year-old from Johannesburg plans to

retire to Thailand, where he intends to indulge in his passion for scuba diving.

‘He has been mentioned in relation to a Reynard pro ject to build a factory in Thailand to produce racing chassis for the emerging Asian countries.

Brawn’s move to Ferrari has yet to be confirmed, although stories doing the rounds at Suzuka last week suggested that he has already signed a contract and will be leaving Benetton at the end of December.

Ferrari’s current techni cal director John Barnard has a contract until July 1997 but is unlikely to stay on.

The team is already edg ing him out, planning to close down Barnard’s Ferrari Design and Development facility at Shalford and having already terminated his windtunnel programme at British Aerospace in

Bristol.

The hiring of Brawn would please Michael Schumacher, who worked

Ross Brawn with Ross at Benetton, but is surprising in that Brawn has worked in the same area of England since he

started in Grand Prix rac ing in 1977 and was not thought likely to be very keen on moving to Italy.

The suggestion in the paddock in Japan was that the Benetton technical directorship will go to Pat Symmonds, the current head of research and devel opment.

The role of chief designer will go to 30-year-old Nick Wirth, the former boss of the Simtek FI team, who joined Benetton in August 1995 after Simtek went into liquidation.

9f

it. The most critical aspect is deal ing with the ups and downs of the season; the moments when every one has written you off and the bouts of over-enthusiasm when praise is heaped upon you and it is assumed that you are going to become world champion, even though it is mid-season and there are still eight races to go.

Winning the championship is about keeping your head straight all the way through. I knew from experience that nothing can be taken for granted in this sport.

The opening lap ofexample.

Sunday’sI race was a good made a very good start, whereas Jacques did not. But I knew that I had not won the race simply because I had reached the first corner ahead of everyone else.

I thought of the Italian Grand Prix when I was in a similar situa tion, only for it to go all wrong. I was telling myself to stay calm,

“The hardest part was dealing with the mental battle during the last 15 laps ... trying not to think how I would celebrate.yy drive cleanly and quickly, build up a lead and get to the finish. It worked perfectly.

It’s a terrific thing to happen and I can begin to enjoy the expe rience now that it’s over. But I am the first to appreciate that fate could have stepped in and Jacques could have finished the season as champion.

Jacques has been a revelation.

When he first came the team, I didn’t know what to think, but I quickly reached the conclusion that he’s a very fine racing driver.

I’ve enjoyed being with Jacques; there has not been a harsh word between us. It has been very enjoyable racing against him and I wish him well.

I have no doubt that Jacques will be a world champion of the future. It’s an experience I can strongly recommend.

The realisation is dawning, but seeing that chequered flag at Suzuka was a beautiful moment, one I will remember forever.

Lucky escape EYEWITNESSES have given details of the wheel which was launched into the grandstand from Jacques Villeneuve’s Williams at Suzuka.

There were two net fences between the track and the stand and the tyre bounded between them before landing in about the 10th row of the stand.

Miraculously, everyone had moved out of the way before the tyre arrived and no-one was injured.

Officials retrieved the wheel from the stand after Villeneuve had been moved to safety.

Ill 25October 1996

Nissan drive for Richards?

World of Sport

Motor Raiing Calendar Oit/Nov '96 *BOC GASES AUSTRALIAN SUPER TOURER SERIES

Rd7 *Rd8

Oct 27 . . .Lakeside Nov 9 . . . .Oran Park

'Under lights 8 Race series around Australia

♦AUSTRALIAN GT PRODUCTION SERIES

Oct 27 . . .Lakeside Nov 9 . . . .Oran Park

Rd 7 ,*Rd8

'Under lights 8 Race series around Australia

SLtr TOURING CARS

Nov 17 . . .Auckiand Sprints .NZ Nov 23 . . .Wellington 500 . . .NZ

♦AUSTRALIAN NASCAR - AUSCAR SERIES

Nov 15/16 Calder Park . . . .Rd 2 Dec 27/28 Calder Park Rd 3 Jan 17/18 .Adelaide Int. Rd4 Feb 7/8 . .Calder Park Rd 5 Mar 7/8 . .Calder Park Rd 6 6 Race series at Calder Park's Goodyear Tdunderdome and Adelaide Int. Raceway.

M

WINSTON CUP NASCAR SERIES

Oct 27 . . .Phoenix Nov 10 . . .Atlanta .

R d 30 Rd31

31 Race series across the US

AUSTRALIAN RALLY CHAMPIONSHIP

Oct 25/25 .Sth. Australia . .Rd 13 Oct 26/27 .Queensland . . .Rd 14 Nov 15/17 ACT Rd 15 15 Race series around Australia.

AUSTRALIAN DRAG RACING

Oct 31 . . .Grand Finals . . .

EC

Nov 1/2 . .Grand Finals . . .

EC

Qualifying

Qualifying/Racing - Top Fuel/Top Alcohol/Pro Stock/Top Doorslammer/Top Bike ADR Series Final.

Nov 9 . . . .Jet Car Feature . .RIR

Aussie Invader Challenge

Nov 9

Bikes

All Bikes Thunder Drags

Nov 9 . . . .Top Fuel

Bob Sherry v Robin Kirby match race

.CID .AIR

Nov 23 . . .National Open . . .CP

Nitro Funny Cars

Nov 23 . . .Wild Bunch .CID Nov 30 . . .ET Drag Racing . .CP Rd 1 ET Drag Racing Series

Tracks: AIR-Adelaide int. R'way. CP-Catder Park, EC-Eastern Creek, RIR-Ravenswood Int. R'way, WB-Witlowbank R'way, CIDCanberra

NHRA WINSTON DRAG RACING SERIES

Oct 27 . . .Winston Finals .Rd 19 19 Race senes across the US

♦WORLD SUPERBIKE SERIES

Oct 27 . . .Phillip Island . .Rd 12 12 Race series around the world.

AUSTRALIAN OFF ROAD CHAMPIONSHIP

Oct 27 . . .Puckapunyal (V) Rd 6 6 Race series around Australia

All event dates in this calendar were correct 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.

STEVEN Richards went to England straight after Bathurst and tested for Vauxhall’s British Touring Car team - but may get a Nissan drive out of it.

The Pembrey test, which Motorsport News predicted a month ago, went well, if slightly unusually, according to Richards.

“They don’t give you a car that’s set up to do lap records,” he said.

“I went out and did several runs and, each time, they changed the car. I wasn’t allowed to know what they did, but I had to give them feedback on the effect of the changes.

“At the end, I did a race run of about 20 laps.”

Also tested at Pembrey were Dane Tom Kristensen and Briton Darren Manning. Both drivers were driving at Pembrey the day before Richards arrived in Wales.

But the question is not so much ‘how did Richards go’ but ‘why was he tested’?

The test was one of the final jobs for Ray Mallock Limited, which ran Vauxhall’s 1996 program.

Two weeks ago Vauxhall/Opel sacked RML and announced that it was taking the Vectra Super Touring program in-house into their ex-ITC facility at Russelsheim, Germany.

Gobert for Suzuki GP

ANTHONY Gobert, the young Australian who has set a match to the World Superbike Championship this year, is cer tain to partner Daryl Beattie in the Lucky Strike Suzuki GP team in 1997.

Motorsport News' sources have suggested that the 21-year-old signed a contract several weeks ago and that the deal will be announced by the team before the end of the month.

Speculation mounted at Eastern Creek last weekend about the veracity of Gobert's signing, with some reliable sources claiming that the deal was yet to be cemented, given the spectre of Scott Russell re-signing with the team.

But this has been denied by the Gobert camp and it appears that the American, who ran hot and cold for much of 1996, is out of the pic ture, with Lucky Strike at least.

It's understood that Beattie, 26, who sat out most of the season after a spate of injuries, rates Gobert the best of the new crop of riders in the WSC, while Suzuki believes that the young Aussie has displayed the same level of ability as Kevin Schwantz did at the same stage of his career.

With Beattie still recovering from a bad wrist injury and Gobert hav ing only ridden a 500 once before.

Lucky Strike Suzuki will face a challenging off-season developing its RGV500, which failed to win a GP in 1996.

Testing is expected to start very soon, with the possibility of Gobert junning this year's RGVs at Eastern Creek in the first week of November.

Gobert’s signing will give Australia great representation in 500 GPs next year, with he and Beattie (Suzuki), Doohan (Honda) and Troy Corser (Inzinger-Yamaha) already confirmed.

Just to top things off, the Swiss Elf team was extremely impressed with Marty Craggill last weekend ...

- DARRYL FLACK

The deal to ran Vectras in the ‘97 BTCC has gone to 888 Engineering, a new team ran by former FI driver Derek Warwick and ex-Williams Renault BTCC engineer Ian Harrison.

Driver John Cleland is confirmed for 1997 and, while Warwick’s drive is not yet confirmed, a team source told Motorsport News that it was “almost certain”. That leaves no room for Steven.

Mallock has wasted no time, though.

His team signed a deal with Nissan and will race a Nissan Primera GT in the 1997 BTCC with David Leslie, who walked out on Prodrive-Honda after ex-Vauxhall driver James Thompson arrived with a contract making him num ber one driver.

Even though another Scot, Anthony Reid, has been pencilled in at Nissan, no confirmation has come from the team.

Richards’ test was overseen by Mallock’s chief engineer Phil Barker, who is staying with RML for the Nissan project.

Meanwhile, Richards waits.

“The team didn’t say much, and they said not to expect anything for two to three weeks”.

- PHIL BRANAGAN/ QUENTIN SPURRING

STEVEN RICHARDS

Tested for Vauxhall, but will not race one.

Formula Holden looking Bright

FORMULA Brabham looks set to have large fields in 1997 with a number of familiar names and also new ones step ping into new cars.

One of the championship favourites will be Jason Bright.

Without the funds for an Indy Lights assault the Victorian has been confirmed as Birrana's replacement for Paul Stokell and he starts testing the Reynard 92D at Mallala shortly.

Birrana will run Brenton Ramsay, son of team owner Malcolm, and a third driver yet to be identified.

"I've been working through my list of potential candidates," said Ramsay Sr last week. "But I am yet to sign anyone.

"It's a bit disappointing really.

These cars are quite cheap to ran and I would have liked to have had my drivers in place by now.

"If I can't get a good front-run ning driver, we'll keep the third

car as a spare for Jason, although 1 haven't ruled out bringing over a couple of '94 cars and selling what we've got."

Elsewhere, Jason Bargwanna, currently in Europe for the GM Nations Cup, is believed to have done a deal to continue in Simon Hardwidge's Reynard, which he drove to victory at Sandown.

Hardwidge is importing a ’94 car for back-to-back testing.

Ex-FF man Darren Pate is con firmed with Arthur Abrahams, who will likely ran a second car for a yet-to-be-named driver. .

Steve Cramp, having raced an 'unfashionable' Ralt over the last few seasons, has upped the tech nical ante by importing an exGareth Rees 1994 Reynard.

On the Lola front, the ex-Mark Skaife T93/50 is expected to re appear, the ex-Heinz Harald Frentzen machine being readied now for 'a current touring car driver’ ...

Green looks at Kendall

AUSSIE IndyCar owner Barry Green is close to making a final decision about a driver for 1997 - and it could be Tommy Kendall.

T\ve WaLWTsL AQQO 'rooVne of the year’ was tight-hpped about the drive earlier this week, but it is being widely reported in the US that the deal has been done and will be annoimced next week.

Green had talked to Michael Andretti, Jimmy Vasser and Bryan Herta and thought he had a deal with Robby Gordon until he decided to jump to NASCAR. Green has also talked to NASCAR's Jeff Gordon and IRL star Tony Stewart, but both are committed to NASCAR. Neither Green nor Kendall would comment on the deal and there are still other candidates for the drive Mike Groff, Eddie Lawson and Indy 500 winner Buddy Lazier.

"I don't absolutely have to have an American," Green said.

"If somebody like a David Coulthard or Damon Hill was avaUable I might go after him.”

- PHIL BRANAGAN

Winton moves ahead

WINTON Motor Raceway is forging ahead with plans to up grade the track after receiving the go-ahead from the Victorian government.

The Minister for Planning and Local Government, Mr Robert MacleUan, has approved changes to the Delatite Planning Scheme which will accommodate the Benalla Auto Club's extensions.

Apart from controlling the development itself, the Plan will give a high level of certainty to residents about the maximum level of development proposed for the site," said Mr MacleUan. The BAG'S Mick Ronke was

delighted with the minister's response.

"He's guaranteed that Winton will be the home of motor rac ing in the region for the next 50 years," Ronke said.

"It also guarantees that all future development will be ancillary to the motor racing track."

The Plan allows for a noise restriction to be set at 95dB, measured from a point 30m from the track.

Ronke has recently had meetings concerning drainage with the Broken River Management Trust and, with the local Delatite Shire council fast-

tracking plans to proceed with the upgrade, the first sod of earthworks are expected to be turned in a week or so.

Renovations to the existing track, which will extend it from 2.03km to 3km, should start in mid-November and, given a nor mal summer, the track will be ready for racing in February.

The Plan also allows for other motorsport activities, The next step will be a 500600m kart track, to be built in the next two years, Eventually the facility will house speedway and autocross tracks as weU. -PHEL BRANAGAN

250clober1996

Katayama looks at IndyCars

UKYO Katayama’s Formula 1 career seems to be coming to a close with Mild Seven appar ently looking to change its driver strategy next year and drop Katayama in favour of one of a new generation of Japanese racers.

Katayama, who has

been in FI since he joined Larrousse in 1992, is understood to be close to signing a deal to drive for Toyota in IndyCar racing.

We hear that Mild Seven is now planning to put its money behind Toranosuke Takagi.

Flavio Briatore - now

the controlling sharehold er in Minardi - is trying to get Mild Seven to put its money into the Italian team and turn it into a Benetton Junior team with youngsters Giancarlo Fisichella and Takagi as drivers.

This would he bad news for Ken Tyrrell, but there

is no love lost between Briatore and Tyrrell.

A couple of years ago the relationship became so heated at one FOCA meeting that Flavio told Ken that one day he would make sure that Ken got no money at all from Japan Tobacco...

-JOESAWARD

TWR confirms package

By JOE SAWARD

TOM Walkinshaw has revealed his expected deals for 1997 with Bridgestone, Yamaha and Pedro Diniz.

Walkinshaw’s package for next year is now in place and work is advancing on the design of the TWR Arrows team’s new car.

As we predicted as long ago as April, Bridgestone finally confirmed its plans to enter FI a year earlier than the com pany originally announced.

Bridgestone is expected to be a major financial partner in Arrows as well as the team’s tyre supplier and the tyres are likely to be designed specifically to suit Damon Hill’s driving style.

Hill is expected to begin testing for $13 MILLION SMILE... Walkinshaw toasts the signing of Pedro Diniz to Arrows.

Arrows in the middle of November.

Walkinshaw’s deal with Yamaha is for one year only as Walkinshaw is known to have wanted a Honda deal for 1998. But Honda has decided against this(see separate story this issue).

TOM Walkinshaw has The 1997 design is ing with Walkinshaw However, TWR is well-placed to Jong been rumoured to already well-advanced and Dernie at Ligie r develop a much more successful rela last winter. be looking for a new with the design team tionship than Tyrrell and could no technical director for headed by TWR’s chief The aerodynamics is ●doubt take up the option of making it a the TWR Arrows team, designer Paul Bowen, being done at the old longer-term deal. but for the moment he Arrows windtunnel at who was previously The Yamaha N10 is a remarkable has placed his trust in chief engineer at Milton Keynes by engine, but has not been reliable this Arrows FI before Frank Dernie, giving Simon Jennings (of year. and Eric the Englishman the goWalkinshaw bought Arrows) The one-year deal will put pressure the team. ahead to hire anyone Lacotte (of Ligier). on Yamaha to do a better job while he wants to get the job His design staff The team is looking allowing TWR to move elsewhere if the done. which is now based at for a new head of relationship is not successful.

TWR’s Leafield base Of course, highlyresearch and develop We understand that Walkinshaw has ment and the word at rated Australian engi includes six engineers managed to convince Yamaha manage from the old Arrows Suzuka was that ment that it needs to double its FI neer Chris Dyer is joining the team from drawing office and McLaren’s Pat Fry is investment. seven TWR designers, top of the list.

John Judd’s Engine Developments TWR’s Holden Racing Team. most of who were work-JOESAWARD company will continue to manufacture and rebuild the engines but the research and development programme Walkinshaw had been hoping to get being happy to throw in $3m to be asso is to become the responsibility of TWR Mugen Honda engines for 1997 but ciated with World Champion Damo n Hill.

Engines under ex-Cosworth designer Mugen decided to stay with Ligier.

Geoff Goddard.

Walkinshaw hired the 26-year-ol d The deal with Diniz will bring the The first major goal will be to team as much as US$ 13m of extra budBrazilian last year when he was run improve Yamaha’s quality control to get, Diniz bringing a sponsorship packning Ligier and reckons that Pedro has make the engines rehable. age worth around $10m and Parmalat surprised many people this year.

Tom’s technical team

n Michael and Mario Andretti have been invited to appear as special guests on an episode of'Home Improvement'. The Andrettis will join the show's star, racing nut Tim Allen and the'Home Improvement' cast to tape the Thanksgiving episode.

Mario and Michael have been frequent guests on the show in previous seasons.

n Arciero-Wells got a bonus recently; they have lured Richard IBuck, chief mechanic for A1 Unser Jr since 1994, away from Penske to be their new team manager. Buck, 34, was with Penske for 11 years and has two Chief Mechanic of the Year awards.

n Ross Perot Jr, the son of the US billionaire presin Ron Hornaday Jr. condential candidate, has tinues to show no signs of escaped uninjured after a faltering in the late-season ' 240kmh accident at the new Texas International run toward what he hopes will be his first NASCAR Raceway. Perot was on the Craftsman Truck Series new track alone when he championship. With three crashed his Chevy Monte Carlo into the wall. His was races to go, he leads defend the first ever accident at ing Champion Mike Skinner by 96 points and the speedway. Perot Sr owns much of the land sur Jack Sprague by 118. rounding TIR. ■ IndyCar team Bettenhausen Motorsports ■ Indianapolis Motor will test four drivers at Speedway matriarch Maiy Hulman has been released Sebring next week. They are Formula Atlantic from hospital after two weeks of treatment for Champion Patrick Carpentier, Benetton test emphysema. Hulman, driver Allan McNish, Tom grandmother of IRL insti Kristensen and European gator Tony George, is F3000 Champion Jbrg famous for uttering the Muller. The test will be famous "Gentlemen, start supervised by new crew your engines" at the start of chief Tom Brown, who every Indy 500. recently left Penske Racing after 12 years. Long-time ■ The recent Indy Racing driver Stefan Johansson League test at Charlotte in left the team last month.

NASCAR's heartland has drawn mixed response to a future race fixture. Track ■ Carpentier is in big demand. As part of his owner 'Humpy' Wheeler FAtlantic prizes - he won said: "We're going to give nine races out of 12 races, this serious consideration, tying the all-time record set but we'i-e also going to ►

by Gilles Villeneuve - the move carefully. This isn't Quebec driver will test with going to happen overnight."

Wheeler says that the race the Toyota-supported would need a US$500,000 Arciero-Wells IndyCar out sponsor, a number of minor fit. "We have planned a test for Patrick that will chal sponsors, a guaranteed gate of 50,000 and a solid TV lenge him and give him a deal to make it viable. good idea of how an IndyCar drives," said co ii A novel solution to the owner Cal Wells III. 'Mad' problem of changing engine Meix Papis is already brands has been reached by signed to continue as the team's lead driver in 1997.

Walker Motorsport and the new Davis-Craig Racing team, which has risen from ■ Jim Chapman, the man who took PPG the ashes of Jim Hall Industries into IndyCar Racing. With Davis going from Honda to Mercedes and racing in 1982, has died in Michigan at 80. Chapman Walker doing the opposite, died of throat cancer. He they have simply swapped was formerly a journalist cars (in both cases Reynard) and executive with the Ford to save a lot of re-engineer Motor Company. ing work.

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1

25 October 1996

0 ^

The human face of FI W

illiam Taylor thought it was Christmas. The 17-yearold from Towcester was wandering around the Formula 1 paddock in Suzuka looking as though he had been hit by a bolt of lightning.

Taylor is a big Damon Hill fan literally; he weighs 17 stone - and for the last year or so he has spent his time making sure that Damon feels wanted by waving a Union Jack wherever he can.

"He's been waving that flag for every lap that I have driven in over a year," Damon told the press in Silverstone, "in testing and racing, wet weather, cold weather, sun shine or wind. Every lap I go past he waves that flag. He's a bloody maniac really."

Taylor went to Estoril hoping to see Hill win the Championship there. He was not going to be able to afford a ticket to Japan and so he wished Damon luck in Portugal and asked him to win the title there if at all possible.

As we know, Damon did not win and, feeling that Taylor deserved the opportunity to see him do it, arranged for William to be sent an airline ticket to Japan.

Just one hears such niceoccasionally stories in Formula 1, which too often is a world where every one is too busy slitting each other's throats and back-stabbing.

If there are nice things they are usually publicity stunts and it is rare to see spontaneous kindness.

Normally team owners are too busy trying to make millions to care and drivers are too wrapped up in their careers to care about anyone else.

Michael Schumacher recently went to Serbia on behalf of UNESCO, an organisation for which he is an international ambas sador, and the World Champion seemed rather shocked by what he had seen.

I remember back at Imola in 1994 talking on the Friday with Roland Ratzenberger about FI. Roland was old enough to know just how important FI was in the real world.

"The serious business is a cou ple of hundred miles to the east of here," he said. "In Bosnia. This is just a game."

A day later this charming and intelligent man died at the wheel of his racing car.

Roland spent a lot of his career in Japan and, like many others who

THE BOX SEAT

By Joe Saward,Japan went to race in Japan, became a wiser and more balanced man from the experience. Being a European in Japan is very frustrating, but there is always lots of laughter to offset the pain.

My first visit was 11 years ago and I went on a bus to Mount Fuji, communicating to the driver by forming a triangle with my arms and saying "Fuji" several times over.

We drove down the motorway from Tokyo and I looked out of the window looking for the perfectly shaped Mt Fuji and he smiled and shook his head, either because he thought I was completely mad or to tell me that I still had some way to go. He told me when to get off the

DAMON AND FANS: That’s his biggest supporter Wiliiam Tayior27th from the right. Perhaps. once it was. Football has grown into today's passion. Honda pulled out of FI and then the demi-god Ayrton Senna was killed.

There is a still a large and wellinformed fan population and all the tickets for the Grand Prix are sold, but it is not the same ...

The FI circus does not actually

‘There were tears in pare ferme that day and there were nearly tears when I remembered my bet.’ bus and I was horror struck that I couldn't see a mountain at all. One rarely can. They say it is a lucky day when you can see Mt Fuji through the clouds.

Trying tonot cope witheasy Japanese ways is always for FI folk for it is the strangest of all the flyaway races. When we first start ed visiting Japan we were called "aliens". We felt like it.

At the time Japan was not a country geared to foreigners. That is changing, but it is still very differ ent. This means that the FI circus tends to draw closer together.

Everyone is a long way from home.

The Japanese culture may be strange, but they love Formula 1.

The passion for the sport is extra ordinary.

One year there were seven mil lion applications for the 150,000 available tickets. The spectators were so dedicated that hundreds would sit in the grandstands in the dark, staring at nothing in the pitlane.

Times have changed. The econ omy is not in as good a shape as

mind as the fans were so enthusi astic in the old days that it was dangerous. Drivers used to heli copter in from the Suzuka Circuit Hotel, just 300 metres from the track, to avoid being mobbed.

JJ Lehto once told me that he had tried to get to the paddock on a motorcycle and had fans trying to jump onto the bike with him. On one or two occasions I recall end ing up as a bouncer, helping a dri ver through a crowd of hyper-venti lating fans.

This camaraderie is a pleasant change. It feels sometimes like the old days in the junior formulae when racing journalists and press men had time to become friends and had endless adventures.

The FI paddock pulled together at Suzuka on Saturday when six members of the MSL Catering team, which feeds many team peo ple in the paddock, were involved in a nasty road accident.

Returning from the circuit late at night in a minibus, they had to avoid a local coming out of a turn ing without looking properly. The

minibus hit the central reservation and rolled before being hit by another car. Two of the team were very seriously injured and all suf fered head injuries.

In the paddock the next morning everyone available joined in to help MSL produce breakfast for the troops. Photographers were doing the washing-up (something which one would suggest is a rare thing even at home!), the BBC producer was making sandwiches, BBC pitlane commentator Tony Jardine was spotted cutting up tomatoes very badly, according to paddock catering aces - PF! ladies were cooking bacon and even one of the FI marketing managers was involved in producing breakfast.

The accident cast a shadow over the meeting but gave evi dence that for most people in FI it is more than a business. It is a shared passion. It is fun.

I have always believed that in the paddock there is an expert in everything if you know where to look. There are brilliant academics, marketers, there are brilliant chefs and nutritionists, there are artists and painters, there are dancers and brain surgeons. The drivers are just the tip of an iceberg of multi- faceted talent.

If you have a problem there is always a way to solve it. You just have to know who to ask.

I I made a very Afew ago!Benetton would rash years bet that not finish 1-2 in Japan. It was the year that Senna and Prost sailed off at the first corner, Berger went off on their sand and Nigel Mansell turned his Ferrari driveshafts into corkscrews by accelerating too fast

Ferrari’s aerodynamic ambitions

'errari's new windtunnel at Maranello, which is due to be opened next Spring, may take FI by surprise.

When he announced plans for the $15m facility last April, Ferrari boss Luca di Montezemolo said that it would be a half scale tunnel but we hear that it has now been decided that Ferrari should leap ahead of the opposition with an eye for the future and is building a 66% facility with a high-speed rolling road.

If this is true, it will be first of its kind in the world and the biggest rolling-road tunnel in use in FI. In the past teams have on occasion used 100% facilities without rolling roads, but these are not much use to FI aerodynamicists as they do not reveal much about the critical air¬

flow between the car and the road surface.

FI designers disagree on the best size for a windtunnel. Some feel that Grand Prix teams should aspire to full-sized facilities, while others consider that 40% is sufficient. A third school of thought argues that windtunnels will soon be redundant as electronic simulation techniques - computational fluid dynamics - develop.

The major drawback with a two-thirds scale tunnel is that building models becomes more complicated and expensive.

The expense does not seem to matter at Ferrari at the moment. The US$15m price tag is sure to go up with the size of the tunnel.

Indianapolis City Council recently did a study into establishing a 100% rolling road

facility but gave up the project when esti mates passed $25m ...

MEANWHILE, Eddie Jordan will soon announce that he has bought the Comtec windtunnel at Brackley, near Silverstone, from former March boss Robin Herd.

Herd has drifted away from motor racing in recent months after he became owner of Oxford United football club.

The Brackley windtunnel was built by March in 1988 by a young Nick Wirth (now at Benetton), under the guidance of Adrian Newey (for now, at Williams).

The tunnel has been upgraded this year to take 40% models.

So now Jordan has its own dedicated facil ity, having previously rented time in the Southampton University windtunnels.

out of the Ferrari pit. And through the carnage came the two Benettons of Nelson Piquet and Roberto Moreno (Nelson's pro tege).

There were tears in pare ferme that day and there were nearly tears when I remembered my bet. I had said that I would learn to tapdance if Benetton finished 1-2 in Japan.

Benetton later presented me with a pair of tap-shoes painted up in team colours. I have them in pride of place in my study at home. One was signed by Nelson, the other by Roberto. I wondered how I would learn to dance and discovered that the Ford PR lady was an expert...

I am ashamed to admit that I did not get further than a few basic steps - one of the metal attach ments on the bottom of one of the shoes fell off - and I never did learn (Welcher...- Ed).

One can in learn things in career FI:many languages, dria ving tips, you name it. The most useful thing, I think - and one of the most enjoyable I have to say was how to get to sleep when suf fering from jet-lag.

Anyone in Formula 1 will tell you that going to Japan is usually the worst visit of the year when it comes to jet-lag.

The most important thing is to eat chocolate. Chocolate contains a wonderful chemical with a very long name which sounds like an FI fuel additive. I used to have it writ ten down somewhere for moments like this but I have lost it some where in the sections of the com puter where virtual spiders weave cobweb sites.

I learned the chocolate trick from an osteopath who used to work on occasion in FI. They called him Dr Spock and he was asked by someone or other to find ways to improve driver perfor mance by investigating such things as seat design, steering position and high-energy drinks.

One day he explained to me that if I was tired and wanted to stay awake that I should not eat chocolate - as people do - but rather than I should walk around the hotel room, do a few exercises and re-oxygenate the blood.

Chocolate perks you up, but a few minutes later the body reacts and produces insulin to deal with the high blood sugar level. And then your circulation slows down and before you know it - boom - you are asleep again.

You learn something every day!

u

25 October m

Playing Hard Ball Reports by PHIL BRANAGAN and PHIL MORRIS

IT was looking like another one of 1996’s 500 classics.

For almost all the 30 laps of the race the two Repsol Honda NSR500s were locked in their familiar formation World Champion Mick Doohan leading with his Spanish Shadow Alex Criville right in his shpstream.

Into the last lap, there was a nasty moment in turn two when Criville tried for a gap on Doohan’s outside but the Australian was having none ofthat, edging him out ofline.

The Attack was always going to come at the hairpin. Doohan braked late and took the perfect line and Criville, to his right and behind, started to run wide up the track.

His front wheeled banged into Doohan’s rear and, in a flash, the grass was being mown with $1 mil lion worth of Honda NSRs ...

A stunned Loris Capirossi swept by to take a surprised win. The lit tle Italian, who impressed everyone by taking second on the grid in Saturday’s windy session, added his first 500c GP win to his eight on 125s and seven on 250s.

Criville re-mounted to take sixth and Doohan did likewise to take a highly emotional eighth.

Criville left no doubt as to what he thought had happened. “I could have won the race,” he said. “Mick and I had already collided once that lap, then he blocked me at the hair pin and I couldn’t avoid him.”

Doohan was, understandably, not in a very agreeable mood. “Alex can’t lead on his own, he always has to get a tow off me,” he fumed. “I don’t know what he had in his mind - whenever he tries to overtake me, he always runs wide or something.”

‘Something’, in this case, trans lating to ‘runs into me’...

The win is also the first win for three time former world 500 champi on Wayne Rainey as a team owner.

“This is so beautiful!” beamed Capirossi. “I tried so hard to stay with them but the Hondas are a bit faster, and then my front tyre startAUSTRALIA may have collec tively groaned when Mick Doohan bit the tarmac on the final lap of the 500cc GP but, two hours before, the coimtry’s bike racing fans held their breath as Garry McCoy took out a thriUuig 125cc battle.

The 24-year-old New South Welshman held out the cream of the class’s talent as he went wheelto-wheel with defending World Champion Haruchika Aoki (Honda), Masaki Tokudome and Jorge Martinez(both Aprilias).

The win was a long time coming for McCoy. At the 1995 Australian Grand Prix he qualified well and led into the first two comers, only to be thrown over the handlebars in a typical cold tyre accident.

Ordinary early-1996 form sug gested that he would not get the chance to make up for it at Eastern Creek. But a mid-season switch to Michelin tyres on his Scuderia Alfa bike saw a dramatic reversal in form and he started contending in the final five races.

Aoki qualified on pole position and, with the 125s seiously affected

by Saturday’s buffeting wind, it appeared McCoy was in real grief back in 11th position.

But a late-session charge vaulted into fourth and a front row position.

k't?-;

THE CALM BEFORE... Doohan and Criville were locked together in formation (above) before the Repsol-Honda duo headed into the fateful last lap. Capirossi(right) now joins an elite band of GP riders to take wins in the 125, 250 and 500 classes. No-one smiles like Loris...

His Rainey-Mariboro Yamaha was the best of the rest of the field and gave Wayne Rainey his first win as a team owner. ed to go off. I thought third would be a great result after all the prob lems we’ve had, but then I was sud denly in the lead. I can’t believe what’s happened - it’s a funny way to win a race!

“I saw Mick and Alex touch at turn two on the last lap, so I got myself ready to take advantage if they made a mistake. I really want to thank my team for this win, and I’m very happy for Wayne. He’s taught me so much this year - how to ride a 500, how to save your tyres, and how not to fall offl” Rainey was just as delighted after his squad’s first 500 win. “It’s strange, we talked this morning about Mick and Alex doing some-

thing like that, so I told Loris to be ready for it,” said Rainey. “I’m real ly happy for Marlboro and for Yamaha, but most of all I’m happy for Loris and the team.”

And, as for the collision, Capirossi left no doubt as to his feelings, claiming that Criville stuffed his bike up the inside too hard and left himself with nowhere to go.

A steady second was Tadayuki Okada. As usual his V-twin Honda 500 was stronger in the second half of the race than in the first and he was looking very good for fourth, but second, a career best, was a bonus, and maybe a taste of things to come; next season there will be a lot of V-twins on the grid.

If Criville missed out, one Spaniard still made the podium.

Carlos Checa continued his fine late-season form and rode smartly to take a podium position in the last race of the year, one where he has showed increasing speed and matu rity on his Pons-Fortuna Honda.

Alex Barros showed strongly in the first few laps of the race, at one stage reeling in the leaders at about a half a second a lap but the Brazilian faded past the half way mark to take fourth.

Jean-Michel Bayle rode a strong race, shrugging off the after-effects of his heavy Friday tumble. The French Yamaha rookie spent the final stages of the race chasing

Okada, Barros and Checa.

“The race was okay, but I was getting a lot of chatter from the front end,” said Bayle. “The chatter was only really a problem on the right side of the tyre, so maybe the tyre never got hot enough. It was a fun race, but a bit annoying because I couldn’t go fast through the right handers.”

Luca Cadalora blamed an incor rect tyre choice for his seventh-place finish. “I got a pretty bad start but then I started passing a few guys,” said Cadalora, who ran fourth for much of the race. “Things were going okay but then I started having prob lems with the front - we chose a toohard tyre for today’s cool weather.”

McCoy powers to 125 win US'^ALIAN

>N$HIPS

RBPfOL

REf

MAC TIME... Winner Garry McCoy salutes the crowd after beating Aoki (left) and Takudome (right). from where he made a good start and took the lead for the first time three comers into the race.

The front four quickly broke away from the pursuing pack. With Aoki needing only to finish 12th or better to keep his title, he seemed content to sit in fourth and watch

Tokudome and Martinez challenge the Aussie, who fought off every passing manouevre by almost immediately reclaiming the lead.

On the last lap Aoki displayed his superiority by zapping past both Tokudome and Martinez but, on the run to the flag, the Aussie’s

green and gold Aprilia had too much for the Honda and McCoy held on to win by 0.049s.

After a well-deseved victory lap he accepted the plaudits of the crowd, “I’m real chuffed,” he said. “But it was tough because I wasn’t getting

much grip through the turns, so I was having to make up all my time on the brakes, into the turns.”

Tokudome, who later said his bike lost power half way through the final lap, had to win the race to stand any chance of taking the title, and finished second in the champi onship. For McCoy, from nearby Camden, it was his his first ‘fullpoints GP win’. He took out his first GP in Malaysia last year, but only half points were awarded, because the race was red-flagged following a heavy rain storm.

Results-Australian 125 Grand Prix 1 G.McCoy (Aus) Aprilia 42:12.90s (145.227kmh), 2 H.Aoki (Jpn) Honda 0.049s, 3 M.Tokudome Aprilia (Jpn) 0.247s, 4 J.Martinez (Spa) Aprilia 0.533s, 5 I.Goi (Ita) Honda -9.741s, 6 L.Cecchinello (Ita) Honda -10.037s, 7 Y.Katoh (Jpn) Yamaha -11.987s, 8 N.Ueda (Jpn) Honda -18.127s, 9 T.Manako (Jpn) Honda -19.405s, 10 A.Saito (Jpn) Honda -22.643s.

Final points; Aoki 220, Tokudome 193, Manako 167, Alzamora 158, Martinez 131, Perugini 128, Ueda 126, Sakata113, Rossi 111, Goi 110, OettI 97, McCoy 87.

25 October im

15

USTR Craggill impresses on Swissauto-Elf Report and photos by TONY GLYNN

It was a solid ride from the hotand-cold Italian, who now moves from his under-financed Kanemoto Honda ride to the security of a sponsored Yamaha in the Inzinger/Promotor team, alongside Aussie Troy Corser.

One of the best rides of the race came to nothing. Norifumi Abe had a difficult start, tangling with Russell as he left the grid.

He came through to sixth place at two-thirds distance and would have been a sure-fire podium fin isher if he hadn’t had a huge crash.

Tenth place went to the first of the ‘locals’.

Current Australian Superbike Champion Peter Goddard rode sensibly on the second Lucky Strike Suzuki, ‘God’ delighting a team worn out after a summer

picking up bits of Terry Rymer’s best handiwork.

The other Aussie guest rider, Marty Craggill, impressed everyone at Team Elf with his technical feed¬

back and worry-free speed. His race ended early when he parked with brake woes but the Kawasaki super bike regular may yet be seen in Swiss blue in 1997.

Results - Australian 500cc Grand Prix 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

L.Capirossi T.Okada C.Checa A.Barros J.Bayle A.Criville L.Cadalora M.Doohan S.ltoh P.Goddard

(Ita) (Jpn) (Spa) (Bra) (Fra) (Spa) (Ita) (Aus) (Jpn) (Aus)

Rainet-Yamaha Repsol-Honda Fortuna-Honda Pileri-Flonda Roberts-Yamaha Repsol-Flonda Kanemoto-Honda Repsol-Honda Repsol-Honda Lucky Strike-Suzuki

45:47.858 (154.462kmh) -10.980s -11.397s -11.438s -12.424s -20.394s -22.064s -22.134s -29.821s -32.744s

Final points; Doohan 309, Criville 245, Cadalora 168, Barros 158, Abe 148, Russell 133, Okada 132, Checa 124, Bayle 110, Capirossi 98.

Manufacturers; Honda 365, Yamaha 216, Suzuki 152, ROC Yamaha 53, Elf 500 35, Aprilia 24, Harris Yamaha 11, Paton 1.

Max makes it three ITALIAN superstar Max Biaggi wrapped up his third consecu tive 250 World Championship with a masterful win over title rival Half Waldmann.

After a series of recent debacles, including a disastrous, race-leading crash last time out in Brazil, Biaggi started the race just one point ahead of the German.

After both made solid starts the pair rapidly assumed command of the 28-lap race. Both men had their share of the lead in the early stages until Biaggi went into his familiar, ‘head down’ mode and upped the pace to try and break away from Waldmann.

It didn’t work. Biaggi slowed the EUROPE UNITES... Biaggi (left) wasjust too fast for Waldmann (right). pace again, allowing Brazilian GP “I feel great - like I can fly like a Aoki tore himself away from broth winner Jacque to bridge the gap, bird!” grinned Biaggi after the race. er Ham’s 125 Championship cele briefly making it a three bike race. brations to come home in seventh.

It was only in the last eight laps “I have proved once again that I am Matty Payten, in his second out that Biaggi began to stretch any fast enough to be World Champion.”

Jacque took a lonely third place ing on the Axo Team’s kitted advantage and, this time, Waldmann had to answer to Max’s ahead of Japanese Torhu Ukawa, Honda,finished 14th. who fought off of pack after a race pace.

Final points; Biaggi 274, Waldmann After a perfect display Biaggi long battle.

268, Jacque 193, Fuchs 174, Ukawa roared home to his ninth GP of the Right behind him were Jurgen 142, D’antin 138, Aoki 105, Harada 104, Ruggia 91, Boscoscuro 62, year and the 29th of his career by Fuchs and Jean-Philippe Ruggia on a similar Hondas while Nobuatsu V.D.Goorbergh 56, Tsujimura 56.

1.730 seconds.

Aussie Superbike star Marty Craggill further enhanced his international status with an impressive Australian Grand Prix Eastern Creek outing on the Swissauto-powered Elf 500 ROC GP bike.

A relative novice on Grand Prix machinery, having riden only a Harris Yamaha at last year’s event, Craggill nonetheless quali fied 16th in a 24-bike field with a 1:32.329 lap.

While his time was some two seconds off the outright pole pace of Team Repsol Honda NSR500 rider Alex Criville and seven-hun dredths slower than Elf 500 team-mate Juan Boija, Cragill’s evident testing and development capabilities made a deep impres sion on the Franco-Swiss team.

Boija is in only his second year of road racing, his on-track infor mation flow to the team reflects his lack of experience.

Encouragingly, while Craggill’s retired after 18 laps after a brak ing problem with the Nissin car bon system sidelined the machine at two-thirds race distance, word has it that moves are afoot by the team to establish an ongoing rela tionship with the widely experi enced and affable local rider.

It’s an inescapable fact that the Elf 500 ROC team, which made its debut this season, has enough power to run with the hig boys, but its progress has been ham pered by the apparent develop mental shortcomings of the cur rent Ohlins suspension and pur pose-built ROC chassis package.

But Craggill’s input, albeit con fined to only a few days at the Creek, allowed the team to broad en its existing data base and sig nificantly refine its suspension set-up, the highly regarded Aussie quickly establishing a

comfort zone with his new-found European buddies as a result.

The heart of the bike is a com pletely European designed and manufactured 108-degree V-four from the Swissauto concern, the compact, lightweight, carburetted, reed valve engine tipping the scales some seven kilos less than the benchmark Yamaha YZR500 GP engine, which weighs only 37kg.

Designed and built by Sidercar powerplant gurus Urs Wenger and Hanspeter Kohler, the 192 horsepower at 12,500rpm unit utilises a single crankshaft with six fl3Twheels, four main bearings and a single crankcase volume for each pair of opposed cylinders.

The crankcases split vertically to facilitate crankshaft removal and servicing - the Honda NSR500 V-four has a single crank with four crankcase volumes and five main bearings, while both the Yamaha and Suzuki units have twin crankshafts with eight main bearings in each engine.

Powerwise, the engine is condsidered to have a little less than the Honda, but roughly about the same as a Yamaha or Suzuki.

The engine currently uses Austrian-sourced Bartol cylinders with five transfer and two exhaust ports - developed for use on Yamahas, the cylinders will be replaced next season by Swissauto’s own in-house units which will incorporate an innova tive flap-type powervalve system.

Currently, there’s a choice of poweijet-equipped Dell’Orto flatslide carburettors in banks, with 39mm units designated for fast tracks and 36mm for slow tracks, though Craggill felt that the engine was being over-carburetted at Eastern Creek, regardless of carby size.

Continued on page 49

ROC STAR... Craggill(top) dazzled the Swissauto team with his rid ing and feedback. The bike (below)features some tricky componen try; ROC frame, Nissin calipers, Ohlins suspension and Elf oil...

1S 25October m

JAPANESE GP

l^®0®l7S[p®D‘9

r

L mEVISION JAPANESE GRAND PRDi

By JOE SAWARD DAMON Hill dominated the

A champagne-soaked Damon with Michael and Mika at the conference.

What the drivers said: This is an edited transcript of the post-race press conference at Suzuka: DAMON HILL: At the moment I am getting intoxicated from the [champagne] vapours coming off my driving suit. It smells great!

You don't have to ask me any questions, Bob. There are too many people to thank, I don't know where to start. Certainly none of the other drivers in the championship...

This victory is for everyone at Williams; it is my leaving present to them. We are signing off with the team and I am really grateful to them, for everything that they have done, especially Tom Preston, my race engineer, and my mechanics - Bob, Les, Matthew and Paul. Also Adrian Newey, who has worked closely with me all season; Denis Chevrier, who has worked on my engines, and everyone at Renault Sport; to everyone at Rothmans; my personal sponsor, Cellnet.

I would like to thank everyone who has been on the team, and on my side, all season. I think that includes the majority of the British population - and quite a few others. Thank you, everyone.

Q: There could be no better way, could there, to end the championship?

HILL: No, It is absolutely per fect, a fairytale ending. It is a ter rific feeling for me. I have worked with the team for three years to achieve this, and it is a tremen dous relief finally to have won the championship and ended all the waiting, the training, the prepara tion and the sleepless nights.

It is also the end to all the anx iety that my wife Georgie has had to bear. I owe a big thank you to Georgie, and to all my family and the friends who have supported me, including my mother and my sisters, who are watching me back in England. I can hardly wait to get back to my children, but it is especially Georgie I would like to thank for this championship.

She has stood by me the whole way and has been a tremendous strength to me throughout the season and all the time I have been racing in Formula 1.

Q: You must have been pleased at the start when Jacques got away so badly ...

HILL: Yes, of course. But I thought the same thing at Monza, so when I was out in front I was telling myself,'This is all very well. Hill, but now you have got to stay calm and see it through to the finish.' I decided to drive nice and easy, which is what I did all through the race, keeping a nice margin on Michael and Mika.

Q: There was also an incident with Berger at the chicane ...

HILL: Perhaps you can tell me more than I know. I heard the noise of someone else's engine, which is the first time that's hap pened to me in a race since I stopped riding motorbikes, and

a

There are so

many people to thank...(but) certainly none of the other drivers.99 - Damon Hill when I looked in my mirror I couldn't see anything. Then when I looked in the mirror again, com ing out of the chicane, he was a long way behind. Maybe he took a big dive at me, because the previous time I had looked in my mirror he was also a long way behind me. Through the chicane I just took my regular line ...

Q: When did you learn about Jacques going off the road?

HILL: There were 15 laps still to go when I got the message that Jacques was out. As soon as I heard, although I knew I was world champion, I wanted to con centrate on the race. If you can believe this, it was a matter of putting [the championship] out of my mind and concentrating on winning the race, which is what I really, really wanted to do.

Q: Michael, do you have any advice for Damon on how to prepare for the next few hours?

SCHUMACHER: I will show him later. He knows he’s going to need some aspirin. And a wet suit, perhaps...

Q: Mika, how did it feel to be so close to the leader?

HAKKINEN: I was running in 2nd place for quite a long time, which was really good. I felt com fortable there, it was easy to maintain speed and keep the lap times consistent. Everything was cool.

Q: Did you have a problem at the first pit stop?

HAKKINEN: We made a little mistake there. Actually, I got the message to come to the pits too late and I missed one lap. That cost me one position.

Japanese Grand Prix at Suzuka, leading from start to finish to win his eighth victory of the year and the World Championship.

It was a controlled drive hy Hill, who knew what he had to do to clinch that elusive world title and found himself in the envious position of controlling the race from the front.

He was never forced into a wheel-to-wheel battle, although and overly aggressive Gerhard Berger almost turned it into one early on.

His challenger Jacques Villeneuve had taken pole posi tion, but he made an awful start and was never really in the hunt.

The issue was put to rest when he went out in mid-race when a wheel fell off his car and he skat ed into a sand trap.

British fans everywhere cheered the victory. Damon had done it!

Preamble Having the Japanese Grand Prix as the final race of the year was always going to be difficult.

For the last 11 years the Grand Prix season has ended on the streets of Adelaide. Formula 1 enjoyed a lengthy love affair with Adelaide and it was with some regrets that the cir cus moved to Melbourne this year.

Melbourne was great fun, of course, and so the pain of having to leave Adelaide did not seem as bad when we were in Albert Park back in March.

But the pain was driven home at Suzuka. Finishing the FI season in Japan is just not much fun when you compare it to Adelaide.

In the old days the circus would pop out from Europe to Suzuka and then hop on to Australia for 10 days of sea, sun, smf and (whisper it) sex before regrouping, relaxed, in Adelaide.

The difference is probably just one of culture. FI is a European busi ness. Japan is involved, but there is nothing European about it. In fact, to most FI people it is still like going to the moon.

Everything is more difficult in Japan. No-one speaks the same lan guage. Not everyone likes the food.

It’s often enjoyable but it is so differ ent that people do not relax as they

OUT WITH THE OLD ... Michael Schumacher was the first to congratu late Hill on taking his world title. (Photo by Race Access) used to do in Adelaide.

The parties at the famous Log Cabin bar at the circuit hotel may have been uncontrolled in the past, but they were never like the end of term parties in Australia.

After seven months on the road, FI folk like to have a party to see out the old year before people have to get their heads down again to build next year’s cars.

This year there would be no sunfilled break between the last couple of races. A few folk planned to go on to Australia after the race but a lot were simply rushing back to England.

One or two of the luckier ones decided to have a few days of holiday before Suzuka. Damon Hill was one of them,jetting off to Hong Kong for a few days of rest before the big event.

With only one point needed to wrap up the Championship - and that only if Jacques Villeneuve could win the race - meant that Damon did not need to feel pressurised.

Jacques kept saying that there was

no pressm'e on him because it was a long-shot and that all the pressure was on Damon, but this sounded more like gamesmanship than logic.

Qualifying On Friday morning Jacques arrived for breakfast in the Williams area in the paddock.

“You’re looking tired,” he said to Damon.

‘Yes,” said Damon,“I am tired. It’s all over. I’ve got no chance.” Hill was not going to be got at with mind games.

But the relaxed Damon in the paddock did not look like the Damon Hill we saw in the car in the final qualify ing session. Hill looked worried. He seemed to be struggling to compete with Villeneuve and with just a few minutes to go was behind not just Villeneuve but Michael Schumacher and Mika Hakkinen as well.

It was unlike the Damon Hill we have seen all year. Was the pressure getting to him or was he trying to lull Villeneuve into a false sense of security?

Q: Several drivers were penalised today for blocking.

What was your experience with them, Damon?

HILL: Unbelievable. Some of them drive along as if they are in a world of their own. It was especial ly bad with the Arrows drivers ...

Q: You waited a little while before finally getting out of a Williams for the last time. What were your feelings at that moment?

HILL: There is a lot to take on board. It takes a lot of mental energy just to do a Grand Prix.

And when you have won a Grand Prix AND the world championship at the same race, it is a hell of an occasion. It is going to take a while for the full impact to hit me, but at the moment 1 feel as though I am on a rocket which is just about to take off - or has just taken off.

PODIUM RUN ... In McLaren’s last race with Marlboro backing, Mika Hakkinen ran second for a long time before Michael Schumacher in the Ferrari got him at the pit stops. (Photo by la t Digital)

250Merl996

17

!

“It was always going to be close,” said Damon, “but I was confident that I had a car which would do it. I had four runs on new tyres on the second run; I wasn’t happy with the set-up and we changed some things.

The car was much better on the last two runs and I was able to take more risks on the last run.”

The last-minute dash took him back to second on the grid - 0.461s behind ViUeneuve - and he seemed happy with that.

“T have done what I wanted to do,” said Damon. “I am exactly where I wanted to be. I have a good opportu nity to beat Jacques into the first comer.

“I think the best form of defence is attack so I will be looking forward to a good race tomorrow. As long as I can see Jacques, everything is look ing good.”

Was Damon sandbagging or has Jacques simply got ahead of his championship rival in the last two races?

“My car was very veiy competitive and I could attack with it,” explained Jacques on Saturday. “Tomorrow will be a very difficult for us but the pressure is on Damon. The only option for me is to go out and win.”

As the Williams men quibbled over who was under more pressure, there was little doubt that the Williams-Renault FW18 was well ahead of the opposition once again.

Vdleneuve was 0.4s ahead of Hill and Damon was 0.7s ahead of Michael Schumacher. The Williams was a second a lap faster than the Ferrari.

Schumacher was philosophical about third place; “It was the maximum that we could do. I could have got another tenth if I had not had an engine problem on the last run, but that was not enough to make a better position.”

Eddie Irvine was a second behind his teammate, which meant he was sixth on the grid.

“One car on the second row and one on the third row is more or less what we expected,” said team boss Jean Todt. “because the result is a true reflection of our potential. Our objective is to get both drivers into the points with one of them on the podium.”

This was important because the battle with Benetton for second place in the Constructors ChampionsWp is close indeed - one point separating the two teams.

Gerhard Berger was fourth on the grid for Benetton, 0.3s behind Schumacher. It was a last-minute effort in qualifying. In general, how ever, the team was struggling in qualifying with neither driver very happy with the set-up oftheir cars.

Jean Alesi ended up a disastrous ninth on the grid, complaining that his B196 was handling like a pig.

Fifth on the grid was Mika Hakkinen in his McLaren, which was much as one would expect from the McLaren with the Mercedes engine quick on the straight.

The Finn had lost one set of tyres in qualifying because of the red flag interruption, but it is doubtfiil that Mika would have gone much quicker.David Coulthard had a spin, which meant that he was eighth on the grid, having had to jump into the spare car.

“I was able to do the same sort of

CHAMPAGNE SUPERNOVA; Schumacher and Hakkinen give Damon Hill a heavy dose of Moet as they celebrate on the podium at Suzuka. It was a controlled drive by Hill in the WilliamsRenault(below) which won him the day - and the title.

(Photos by Race Access and LATDigital)

r j

’. i J

lap times in the spare,” said David, run,” said Martin, “the car didn’t “which makes me think that I could respond at all well to the new tyres. have gone faster if I hadn’t thrown We had to make a lot of changes the race car off the circuit. It’s disap through the four mns. My last lap pointing.” was an absolute peach.”

Heinz-Harald Frentzen was any Next up was Olivier Panis - 12th thing but disappointed, putting his - a good effort for the Ligier driver, Sauber seventh on the grid - the given that his car has not been very team’s best qualifying position of the good since the French holiday season year. Frentzen said he had not in July and August.'There is nothing expected it but that the car went bet unusual in this as Ligiers tradition ter and better as the track dried. ally drop behind at this time of year.

Johnny Herbert was not so fortu Pedro Diniz was 16th,just under a nate. Early in the qualifying session second a lap slower than his team mate. he came through the high-speed 130R - one of the few decent comers Fourteenth and 15th on the grid left in Grand Prix racing - and ran were the two Tyrrell-Yamahas in the over the outside kerb. last race of the alliance.

As in Portugal, the cars looked “It must have been slightly damp and the back of the car broke away,” good in every session except the one explained Johnny. that counted and everyone said they ‘T kept my foot on the power, hop were disappointed that things had ing to sort it out, but when the car not gone their way. The reality was goes at that kind of speed there is that the cars were where they have not much hope. I was lucky because I been for much ofthe year. was able to scrub off a lot of the Jos Verstappen was 17th in his Footwork with Riccardo Rosset 19th. speed before hitting the barrier.”

The impact threw the car back Verstappen complained that all the rain had meant that he had not across the road, with bits of wreck age flying everywhere and wheels been able to do as much set-up work bouncing dangerously around. as he would have liked.

Johnny climbed out unhint and the Splitting the two Footworks was red flags came out.

Pedro Lamy’s Minardi, using the Herbert had to go to the medical development version of the EV3 centre for a check-up before he was Cosworth engine, which was mn for the first time at the post-Portugal allowed to get in the spare car.

GP test.

“We changed what we could in the Lamy’s Minardi teammate short space of time available,” said Herbert, “but it is never the same. Giovanni Lavaggi did not get to use Thirteenth on the grid is not bad the new engine and because of under the circumstances.” mechanical problems of his own he had to use the T-car and consequent The two Jordan-Peugeots were pretty much where they would be ly failed to qualify under the 107% expected to be with Martin Bmndle rule. It was probably the last time 10th and Rubens Barrichello 11th. we will see “Johnny Carwash” in FI. When qualifying was over the Neither driver was happy with the handling of his car and had to work skies darkened and, as dark fell rain began to fall, it became heavier and hard on the set-up.

“I got a bit of a shock on my first heavier. The puddles became

streams and all the rubber on the race track was washed quietly away.

Race -52 laps The sun came out on Sunday morning and so everyone had to rethink their set-up in the warm-up.

Jacques ViUeneuve was fastest and looked strong.

TTie start was going to be cmcial, but we had to wait because the first attempt to get the race under way was aborted when Coulthard stalled his McLaren. He would have to start at the back of the grid and the race was reduced by a lap.

They lined up again and this time everything went to plan - except Villeneuve’s start. It was a disaster.

“It was my mistake,” he admitted.

“I didn’t give it enough throttle, so the engine bogged down. I gave it some clutch and the engine went too high. It wasjust a very bad start.”

For once, when it mattered most, Damon Hill left ViUeneuve behind.

Schumacher was also slow away and so it was Berger who emerged second as they dived into the first comer.

Hakkinen was third, with Schumacher recovering to grab fourth just ahead of Irvine.

ViUeneuve was fifth but nearly lost the place to Frentzen.

“I got past ViUeneuve going into the first corner but then ran a bit too wide and went into the dirt,” explained Heinz-Harald. “That cost me a couple of places to the Jordans.”

Jean Alesi’s race was over very quickly. He had made a good start but found himself boxed in by the two Ferraris and had to back off.

Exiting the second corner he ran over a kerb and spun across the track, demolishing his car in the wall on the inside of the track.

It was hardly the best way for

Benetton to begin its defence of sec ond place in the Constructors’ Championship.

In those early laps Berger was close to Hill but on the third lap he tried a fairly daft overtaking manoeuvre.

“I was going faster than Damon,” explained the Austrian “and I thought it was important to get past him as fast as possible. I wanted to build a lead over him as I was on a three-stop strategy.”

The move was at best optimistic, at worst absurd. Gerhard came from a long, long, way back. So far, in fact, that Damon never even knew he was there.

“He was way back when I looked in my mirror before the comer. I was keeping my line and I heard an engine noise. When I looked in my mirror he was a long way back.”

Damon was unaware of any con tact between them, but Berger’s front wing was damaged, probably from the higher kerb on the inside of the chicane.

As Damon rushed away, Berger held off his chasers as he chased along with the front gradually com ing off. By the end of lap four - when Gerhard pitted - Hakkinen was 4.3s down on Hill.

Everyone was watching Hill to see if the \Villiams was damaged and the Williams boys came out of their pit at one point as though preparing for a pit stop, but gradually it became clear that Hakkinen was not catch ing him.

Damon gradually pulled away and by the first pit stop on lap 18 he was six seconds clear of Hakkinen.

During the pit stop sequence Hakkinen lost time and Schumacher moved to second, but Michael could Continued next page

IS 25October m

JAPANESE GP

I

went out early to the Japanese GP and spent a few days relax ing in Tokyo and seeing old friends. It was great being back there and walking down the street in Tokyo - and getting recog nised!

I raced there for three years in 1991-93 and I love Japan and I love the Japanese people.

They're so well mannered com pared with a lot of countries we go to. They're really enthusiastic.

I went to all the old bars and clubs and stayed at the President Hotel, where the foreign drivers used to stay. There were a lot of memories.

My old friend, the late Jeff, Krosnoff, actually said that we were all going to get together one weekend in Tokyo and party, but without Roland Ratzenberger and Jeff, it's not going to happen now.

It's a shame. But I'll keep partying for both of them.

Suzuka on Ithe bullet train.

On Thursday headed down to People say it's my home circuit, but I haven't raced there regularly for three years.

Mentally, though, I was right there from the start. I've been sixth, fifth and fourth there in the last three years and I went there thinking it could be quite good, because I thought the track is quite similar to Estoril, where we went quite well. But really they only have a similar downforce level and that's about it.

When I did the first few laps I thought this is not going to be good! The car was just totally wrong. It was the worst car I've ever driven around Suzuka.

I went there knowing exactly what I wanted from a car and I thought I'm not going to get any where close with this thing.

To add insult to injury, I was 5kmh down on Michael in qualify ing and we didn't know why. So I was losing 0.4s on the straights alone.

Then I didn't get to run my last set of tyres. I went to put the tyres on and they said we've got a fifth set, but they're not warm! So I had put a used set on and try again, but it was a waste of time.

And then Gerhard Berger held me up anyway. He came out of the pits and I had to follow him for a few corners. It was totally delib erate and I thought, "Next year, my son, next year!" I was actually going to spin and park my car in the hairpin next time round, because I knew he'd be on his attack lap! What goes around comes around.

We closed the envelope a little, handling-wise. We got rid of the really bad understeer, but the car was nervous going in, no traction.

Basically I had to give away a lot of traction to try to get rid of the under steer.

I really thought I could be as low as eighth, but I was helped by Coulthard going off, so I ended up sixth.

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eserosTEss I

I was very good at Spoon corner, but through the fast 130R corner which follows it, he was really impressive, so much quicker than me it was unreal.

He obviously had the car set up for high speed rather than medium speed, but he couldn't overtake me. But in the end I thought, forget it, just get out of his way. I didn't really push the point with him.

I was actually catching up on Michael. I don't know what hap pened to him at the first stop, but I lost about five seconds to him. I don't know whether it was me coming in or him going out, but I was disappointed about that.

I kept pushing and pushing and couldn't really make any head way. So I just sat there in the sec ond stint. I was a bit lonely at that stage! I pulled away from whoever was behind me at about a second a lap.

Then Berger started catching me. There was no way I was going to outrun him. I made my second stop, came out and was 7-8 seconds ahead of him. But he was still catching me, so I thought i'd keep the tyres in good condi tion for when he gets here and he won't be able to get past.

He just came into the chicane and thumped me, put me up in the air and round I went, it was just like the last lap in Estoril!

He apologised afterwards and i said once is fair enough, the sec ond time, forget it. It's just too much.

I told the stewards this one wasn't as bad as the last one. The last one he deserved to have a serious reprimand. It was a joke.

This time, maybe you could say he messed up. Last time, you couldn't. Something needs to be done. How many people has he taken out of races over the years?

He nearly cost Damon the cham pionship at Suzuka.

So I lost fourth place and some useful prizemoney. I don't even want to think about it.

It was not a bad race and I was hanging onto Michael. If you take out his first lap, on which he was pushing very hard and I wasn't because I didn't want to hurt the tyres, we were running compara tive lap times, so I was quite pleased with that.

I was well pleased for Damon, to be honest. It was his last chance. He's never going to get a chance to win the championship again. He deserves it more than Jacques does. Jacques is going to win it again, if the Williams is as good as it was this year.

The pressure Damon must have be under at the start must have been phenomenal. I know I give Damon a hard time because I don't really rate him that highly, but he does deserve it.

1

996 was the season from hell for me, really. It never really fixed itself. Most of the time it was a disappointment.

The highlight of the year was obviously Australia. What a start, outqualifying Michael and then fin ishing third. It's pretty sad that the first race was the highlight, but that says it all!

But the best race I did was Imola. I finished fourth and I really pushed the whole race. I really felt I did a good job there. The car wasn't good, but I really pushed and hung it together and was very pleased with it.

I'd been finishing races at that time, so I had confidence. I wasn't quick in Brazil, but in Argentina I had a really good race and Imola was good,too. Then it all fell apart...

Next year it has to come together. I think our car is going to be right there with the Williams. I think the team is going to be a lot better sorted.

And they're going to put a lot more effort into me. They have to.

It's no good Michael winning everything and me winning noth ing. It doesn't look good for Ferrari - it looks good for Michael Schumacher!

made a good start and tried to go around the outside of Michael at the first corner. I was sitting on the outside of him what thinking should I do? So I lift ed off and pulled in behind him and fol lowed him for the first stint.

Jacques Villeneuve messed up his start, so I got in front of him. He couldn't get past me. EVIL CAR... “Next year they’re going to put a lot more effort into me. They have to!'

HIT MAN ... Gerhard Berger had a lively race. He may even have been able to win it had he not run into Hill on lap 3. (Photo by lat Digital) do nothing about HOI. When Damon emerged from the pits he was 1.5s ahead of his great rival. That lead grew to 5s before Damon’s second stop on lap 34. Once again he emerged just ahead of the Ferrari.

Villeneuve had a rather frustrat ing time of it in the early laps, stuck behind Irvine. On lap 12, however, he sliced past Eddie in a beautifullyjudged move at the chicane. He was through and gone.

Jacques set the fastest lap of the race before his pit stop on lap 14.

When all the first stops were done he was still in fourth behind Hill, Schumacher and Hakkinen, and there he remained for the middle section of the race. There must have been some sort of problem, and there was: “Before the second pit stop there was a vibration and I thought I had a puncture,” he said.

The pit stop on lap 32 dropped Jacques back to fifth, but he was set ting fastest laps soon afterwards so all seemed to be fine. And then in the first corner on lap 37 the right rear wheel came clean off the Williams, dumping Jacques into the sand trap.

The errant wheel bounced past Jacques and over a high safety fence.

Luckily - or perhaps by design - it hit a second fence rather than going into the grandstand.

The World Championship was over. Damon had won.

As Jacques trudged in he had no idea what had happened. Hours later it was the same story. The team was too busy drinking cham pagne to explain what had gone wrong. That would be worked out later, back at the factory.

There were a variety of different theories.

One said that the wheelnut was cross-threaded, but that would not explain the vibrations before the pit stop. Patrick Head said that the safe ty device designed to keep a wheel on if it was loose was intact so if the wheel had cross-threaded it would have broken the safety device as it came off.

There didn’t seem to be anything wrong with the hub because that appeared to be still on the cai- after the incident.

The only vaguely logical explana tion was that there was some move ment of the wheel on the hub - as happened to Damon Hill at Silverstone - and that this eventual ly caused the pegs on which the wheel was mounted to shear off.

Hill heard the good news over his radio.

“It threw me,” he admitted.

“Trying to concentrate on the race when you realise you are World Champion was not easy. I had to try to put it out of.my mind to concen trate and win the race. I really want ed to win the race.”

And win it he did, with ease and style, pacing himself on those behind. As he crossed the line the team showed him a board saying: “Damon Hill 1996 World Champion”.

“I cannot put into words how I feel,” he babbled. “It is perfect. A fairytale ending. A terrific day for me.

“This victory was for everyone at Williams - my leaving present for them. I am really gratef^ul to them all.

“The championship is a different matter. I have worked for it for three years and this is a tremendous relief The championship is for my wife Georgie, who has stood by me and been a great strength to me all the way.

“I think it will take a while for it to hit me. Right now I feel like I am on a rocket which has just taken off.

There is the release of pressure and the satisfaction.

“But I want to reflect on the sea son. I have won eight races and that is something I am very proud of” In his moment of victory, Damon always the gentleman - had nice things to say about Villeneuve.

“Jacques has been an outstanding newcomer to FI and I am certain he is a future World Champion. He has taken to FI like a duck to water and I have been impressed with him all Continued Page 20

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Damon Hill kicked asphalt in Japan in his Champion-powered Williams Renault FI car to win the 1996 World Drivers

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Championship. His victory in Japan was also the eighth time this season that Hill has claimed the chequered flag.

Champion Spark Plugs congratulates a true champion.

Damon Hill - 1996 Formula One World Drivers Champion.

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JAPANESE GP Japanese Grand Prix World Championship, round 16 Suzuka, October 13th, 1996 - 52 laps

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1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13

Damon Hill, Williams-Renault FW18, 1h32m33,791s Michael Schumacher, Ferrari F310, 1h32m35,674s Mika Hakkinen, McLaren-Mercedes MP4/11, 1 h32m37,003s Gerhard Berger, Benetton-Renault B196, 1h33m00,317s Martin Brundle, Jordan-Peugeot 196,1h33m40,911s Heinz-Harald Frentzen, Sauber-Ford VI0 CIS, 1h33mS4,977s Olivier Panis, Ligier-Mugen Honda JS43,1h33mS4,977s David Coulthard, McLaren-Mercedes MP4/11, 1 h33mS9,024s Rubens Barrichello, Jordan-Peugeot 196, 1 h34m14,856s Johnny Herbert, Sauber-Ford VI0 CIS, 1h34m15,590s Jos Verstappen, Footwork-Hart FA17, 51 laps Pedro Lamy, Minardi-Ford ED V8, 50 laps Ricardo Rosset, Footwork-Hart FA17,50 laps

Fastest Lap: Villeneuve, lap 34, 1 m44,043s Lap Leaders: Hill, lap 1-52 Retirements:

F//VAL POINT... Heinz-Harald Frentzen took sixth in his last race with Sauber. (Photo by la t Digital) season. He’s been a great team mate.”

Schumacher came home second, but the gap of 1.8s at the finish did not give a true impression of his competitiveness. Hill had cruised the final part of the race, while Michael held off Hakkinen’s McLaren.

“He was pushing as hard as he could and I was pushing as hard as him,” explained Michael. “On one occasion when a Minardi got in our way I had to be careful, otherwise I don’t believe there was much chance of him getting past me.”

Hakkinen reckoned that he would not have lost his place in the first pit stop but for a late message from the team for him to come into the pits. It meant he lost time and second place.

His only chance to pass Schumacher came when they stum bled upon Lamy’s Minardi a few laps from home.

“It was a reaUy exciting moment,” said Mika later, “Tout it was too risky.

We could have both gone off and that would have been boring.”

And so he settled for third place.

He was just 3.2s behind the winner.

It looked good on paper but with Hill pacing himself to Schumacher it was not perhaps the marvellous per formance that it might appear.

Ron Dennis said something about the team optimising its potential and focused on 1997. Let us hope that McLaren’s window of opportunity is maximised next year. A great team should not be made to struggle as it has been these last couple of years.

Coulthard’s stall was only the start of his troubles. On the first lap he ran into the back of Pedro Diniz and damaged his front wing. This

needed changing.

That dropped David miles behind and, although he set some good times in his recovery and overtook a few of the midfield, he finished eighth.

Gerhard Berger was fourth for Benetton but it was not enough for Benetton to hold onto second place in the Constructors’ title.

After running into Hill, Gerhard rejoined in 14th position and charged his way up into the top six - a good drive.

He was then stuck behind Eddie Irvine’s Ferrari until the second pit stops. Gerhard probably hoped to overtake the Irishman during these, but the tactic failed and he found himself behind Eddie again for the run to the flag.

This Gerhard could not afford and on lap 40 he simply nerfed Irvine out of the race in a very rude manoeuvre which presumably had nothing to do with the fact that Ferrari and Benetton were fighting for second place in the Constructors’ title ...

Berger’s bulldozer tactics could not save Benetton’s bacon. Schumacher’s six points took the team to second in the Constructors’ title - and rightly so.

The Benetton press release did not actually manage to mention this interlude at all, but Eddie Irvine is never one to let anything stand in the way of an open mouth.

“Gerhard was much quicker than me but could not get past,” he said. “I braked a little bit late and went slightly wide and the next thing I knew I was up in the air.

“This is the second time in two races that Gerhard has driven into

me. He said sorry, b ut it is not enough.”

Irvine has presumably forgotten that he did the same to Derek Warwick in the same place in 1993 ...

Benetton press releases are, of course, famous for saying absolutely nothing about anything bad for the team - Jean Alesi’s impact with the wall, for example, was described as “not too strong”.

Most of the press room seems to agree that the team would do better to follow the Benetton company’s earth-loving tendencies and save trees by not turning out such rubbish - which is presumably sent to spon sors as well.

On this occasion, however, we had an alarming outbreak of the truth with Flavio Briatore admitting what everyone else has known all year long: “In some races our cars were just not competitive,” said FI’s most famous wearer of backward-facing caps. One can only assume that Flavio was hit by a bolt of lightning on Saturday night because every other Benetton press release this year has banged on and on about how competitive the cars have been.

Perhaps the team will do better next year when all the people leaving the team are replaced ...

Martin Bnmdle finished fifth for Jordan, a lonely race dictated by tyre wear. But it was still a good result for the team.

Rubens Barrichello ran a different set-up to Martin and had horrible understeer all afternoon, ending the day in ninth place.

“It is sad to finish hke this,” said Rubens speaking, presumably, not of

STUCKEY TYRE SERVICE

Lap 0 Lap 13 Lap 20 Lap 36 Lap 37 Lap 39

Jean Alesi, Benetton-Renault B196, accident Pedro Diniz, Ligier Mugen-Honda JS43, spun off Mika Salo, Tyrrell-Yamaha 024, engine Jacques Villeneuve, Williams-Renault FW18, lost wheel Ukyo Katayama, Tyrrell-Yamaha 024, engine Eddie Irvine, Ferrari F310, collision with Berger

Final World Championship Standings: 1 Hill 97; 2 Villeneuve 78; 3 Schumacher 59; 4 Alesi 47; 5 Hakkinen 31; 6 Berger 21; 7 Coulthard 18; 8 Barrichello 14; 9 Panis 13; 10 Irvine 11; 11 Brundle 8; 12 Frentzen 7; 13 Salo 5; 14 Herbert 4; 15 Diniz 2; 16 Verstappen 1 Constructors’ Championship: 1 Williams-Renault 175; 2 Ferrari 70; 3 Benetton-Renault 68; 4 McLaren 49; 5 Jordan-Peugeot 22; 6 Ligier-Mugen-Honda 15; 7 Sauber-Ford 11; 8 Tyrrell-Yamaha 5; 9 Footwork-Hart 1 the 1996 season but of his career at Jordan.

Frentzen scored a point to end his Sauber career, having spent most of the race tiying to find a way past a less than co-operative Barrichello. At one point he flat-spotted his tyres as he tried to get by. An early pit stop finally enabled Heinz-Harald to get ahead.

Johnny Herbert finished 10th, having suffered bad understeer all afternoon.

Frentzen was chased for most of the latter part of the race by Olivier Panis, who set some very fast laps in his Ligier. He twice went over the chicane trying to pass Heinz-Harald but in the end decided that seventh was better than eating sand.

Pedro Diniz survived the bump with Coulthard but fell victim to tyre wear and fading brakes. He went over the chicane twice, spinning on the second occasion.

The other survivors were the two Arrows and Lamy’s Minardi, all a long way behind.

Verstappen drove a lonely race to 11th, while Rosset was given a stopgo penalty for blocking for no appar ent reason.

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“I didn’t block anyone,” he said, and the lap times seemed to back him up. All foul- leaders passed him on lap 25 and all lost about two sec onds doing so, which is not an outra geous amount. None suffered any particular delay. An odd decision.

Ukyo Katayama was also given a penalty for blocking Villeneuve, but again there was not much evidence of it on the time sheets. Ukyo retired with engine trouble during his stopgo penalty.

Mika Salo also went out with engine grief, bringing Yamaha’s total of engine problems this year to a number which is slightly larger than the Yamaha men are keen to admit to.

And that was that.

“It’s a great day for Damon,” said Frank Williams - the man who has dumped the new World Champion from his 1997 squad.

“It was a brilliant way to win from the front all the way, great control of a race. He has been climbing the mountain for four years, he had got to the top and fully deserves to be there.”

Shame Frank had to push him off

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We all depend on the television to bring us most of our motorsport action, particularly the GP races, and the art of TV remains a mystery to us.

JOE SAWARD takes us into the BBC’s inner sanctum for this curious insight:

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n^veryone in Britain and Australia knows about BBC J motor racing commentator Murray Walker and his famous gaffes. For 20 years Murray has kept television viewers around the world informed with his screeches and yelps of excitement.

When I was just a race fan watch ing the BBC, Murray’s mistakes would drive me mad. I used to get so worked up that I would throw cush ions at the TV and roar abuse because any idiot could tell the dif ference between a Minardi and a Ferrari.

When I got into the business of Grand Frix racing I began to appre ciate just what a difficultjob it is and how well Murray does it. Murray makes mistakes simply because he is so excited that his mouth does not react to what his eyes see.

There is nothing forced about Murray’s commentary. He really is that enthusiastic.

At the same time he is incredibly well-informed and works hard trudg ing around the paddock making sure that he is up to speed with every thing that is happening. He has a notebook for each race and inside in neat and ordered boxes - he has eveiy detail of what has happened to each driver in the course of the weekend.

The notebook is never far away from him in the commentary box, where the wall is usually dotted with notes pinned up to remind Mmray of things he is going to say or quicker refei'ence material he needs about a specific driver.

For those who have seen Murray in action in the commentary box

I

MUDDLY TALKER... The voice of Formula 1 in the relative iuxury of the Adeiaide commentary booth.

Behind the scenes at the Grand Prix

there is a time-honoured tradition just before the race which begins with Murray - quite literally - lim bering up like a boxer, getting the adrenaline running by stretching and waving his ai-ms around. Then the microphone goes into his hand and he’s off...

During the broadcasts he has fel low commentator Jonathan Falmer sitting beside him - the two fight over the same microphone - while Ken Burton keeps an eagle-eyed watch from the sidelines, passing notes about important things which should be said. If Murray says,‘We are at half-distance now”, you know that in his hand is a note from Ken. Also in the box is producer Mark Wilkin, who keeps everything under control.

Murray tells a story of fighting over the microphone with his late and lamented partner James Hunt to such an extent that the two very nearly came to blows. On one occa sion Murray says he raised a fist to clonk James, only to see Wilkin wag ging a warning finger in his direction to suggest that physical violence was not the right thing in the middle of the programme.

In the high-pressure atmosphere of a commentary box, things can get pretty stressful. For a start, the boxes are usually tiny so everyone is crammed together with TV monitors stacked up in corners. There are wires and plugs all over the floors and telephones which end up buried imder papei-work.

Sometimes one cannot even see the race track while on other occa sions the view of the cars is com pletely blocked by fans waving flags and gawping in through the windows and pointing as though TV commen tators are some kind of wild animal, needing to be caged.

The commentaiy boxes are gradu ally getting better, but as commen tary teams have grown so it has become more and more of a squeeze.

Back in the very early days before James Hunt was on the team - Murray would operate with just a producer and a lap-charter.

Gradually the team grew, but BBC finances were never vast and so a few comers had to be cut.

One thefor best-kept BBCMurray secrets wasofthat many years and the crew did not go to the expen-

sive non-European races - unless someone else - like Channel 9 Australia - would pay for the trip.

When the World Championship kicked off in Brazil in the late-1980s Murray would sometimes be flown to Rio for a day or two before the first race to do a few stand-up pieces in front of a camera before being flown home to commentate the race from the BBC studios in Shepherds Bush, London.

On such occasions the BBC employed what was called a “ghost commentator”- someone at the race track who was in constant touch with the team in London and who had access to all the necessary tim ing monitors and could see what was going on at the track.

Murray and James Hunt had only the pictures on the screens in front of them in London. The ghost commen tators had to talk non-stop because in effect they were producing a ver bal lap chart which someone in London would write down so that Murray and James could refer to earlier incidents or comment on strategy.

In addition, the ghost commenta tors would pass on relevant informa-

tion such as the gaps between the cars and what the weather was doing. This would go to Wilkin, who would pass on what he considered to be relevant to the commentators.

The original ghost commentator was Australian radio journalist Mark Fogarty, but in the late-1980s and early-1990s I took over thatjob.

It was a bit of high wire act. There were times when Murray would identify a car and there would be screams down the wires fi-om across the world suggesting the correct name. Mark Wilkin would tell Mun-ay and the error would be cor rected.

There were other times when this ghost commentator sent Murray spinning off by wrongly identifying the cars. It happens sometimes.

The ghost commentaries actually became something of an event in London when some of the Fleet Street reporters found out what was happening and instead of flying to Japan and Brazil they snuck into the BBC studios in London and listened in to the guide commentaiy and thus were able to write more informed articles.

There was one sure-fire way of telling if James and Murray were not at the race. James was fi-ustrated that the BBC would not buy him a ticket and would always want to know all the latest gossip before the programme began, inten’ogating the ghost commentators about silly sea son rumours or the moods of individ ual drivers. To make his point he would inevitably say something like “and we can’t quite see from where we are sitting” at some point in the programme.

Murray sometimes put in a little artistic hcence, notably at Suzuka in 1989 after the famous collision between Ayrton Senna and Alain Frost. From the commentary posi tion I could see across the circuit into the glass race control building and were able to tell Murray about Frost’s progress as he climbed through the building to see the stew ards. We even told him that Frost and the stewards were watching videos and waving their anns about a lot. Murray somehow managed to see all of that fi-om Shepherds Bush!

One thing we did learn was never to get too involved with weather pat terns.

Continued Page 49

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I He has taken the Australian racing scene by storm and threatens to keep the momentum going overseas. And at Bathurst he wrote himself into folklore by demolishing the field to become the youngest ever winner of The Great Race. Here he talks with DAVID HASSALL: MOTORSPORT NEWS: Are you getting sick of all the congratulations yet?

CRAIG LOWNDES: No! You never get sick of it. I haven’t had a wave of mail. really; I’ve just had a few cards of congratulations and a few letters. It hasn’t been too bad.

But I have been run off my feet a little bit. We’ve been interstate, back and forth and all over, but I can handle it, I suppose.

LOWNDES: Not much longer. Now that we have got to where we are we have to capitalise on it, and ensure that we go from strength to strength. We have to use the publicity from this year to make sure we gear up for next year.

This year I have learnt how to do it and now we have to go to another level because of the success we have had this year. It’s good for my learning curve.

MN: Have you told your parents yet?

LOWNDES: Yes! Dad actually found out before I got home from Bathurst; he heard it on the news. He knew before I got home and, luckily, he took it well. It was disappointing for me that I never got to tell my dad, but I told my mum. Dad was dri ving home from Bathurst and I didn’t have a chance to catch up with him. He found out by watching TV!

MN: Can you describe the days since the race?

LOWNDES; I’m stretched to remember them, actually.

Since Bathurst we have just been on the go. I’ve been to Sydney twice already, I spent all day yesterday at Calder with the ‘Fuil Frontal’ (television show) guys.

Every day is just fully booked. When I get home I go straight to bed; I never have a chance to see anybody.

MN: Sunday night at Bathurst; it must have been some celebration.

LOWNDES; it was good.

Last year, I didn’t even go out, though Greg did. There wasn’t much to celebrate.

But this year we had a Mobil function first and virtually everybody was brought together in the one room at the one time and it was quite a good night. Greg and I had a very busy 24 hours, and on Monday morning it showed. We suffered ...

MN: Bathurst week itself; it seemed to go so smoothly. Was it really like that?

LOWNDES; It did, actual ly. The car was perfect and we never struck a problem. and On Wednesday Thursday the car was so fast - especially Thursday - I was quite surprised.

We lost ourselves a little bit on late Thursday, going into Friday. We tried differ ent set-ups on the car and we couldn’t quite get a feel for the right set-up. We went back to where we started on the Thursday and pro gressed fon/vard again from there.

By Saturday morning we were very, very happy with the car, and so were Peter and Tomas.

MN; How much longer does it go on for?

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MN; Was it such a good idea to propose to your girlfriend in your state of euphoria?

LOWNDES: It just fell at the right time, so I did (pro pose).

MN: Tell us a bit about her.

LOWNDES; Natalie? I met here at Lakeside during the year and stayed in con tact from then on. Straight after the (Shell) series we did the trip to Ayers Rock in the 4WD and we started seeing each other fairly reg ularly. It just went on from there.

MN: Does she have a career?

LOWNDES: She works at an aluminium company in Brisbane and she is one of the personal assistants to one of the bosses. She’s quite high up in the compa ny, but I’ve never actually been to the factory. She seems quite happy doing what she does and she likes being in Brisbane.

MN: Have you set a date?

LOWNDES: No. Every time I set a date to see friends it gets destroyed, so before we can plan (a wed ding date) I need to find out when everything (in Europe) is starting to happen.

MN: In the race itself you were rarely troubled.

LOWNDES; It was impor tant to get a good start. The best scenario was to get in front and lead it. I’ve been able to do that all year, and at Sandown I did it.

We didn’t think we’d get the gap we did. I thought it would be harder, but it would have been a bit different if it was dry. I am sure that Glenn (Seton) had a good set-up and good horsepower and he was always going to be very quick.

It’s good to be out front, where you can see where you’re going, but the only problem is that you’re first across the top of the hill and you don’t know if there are any rivers or puddles run ning across the circuit.

Luckily, it wasn’t that bad.

On Conrod Straight the car aquaplaned, but we were still flat. We backed off into the Chase, but we would have done that anyway, so it

i

25 October 1996

wasn’t that bad until the Safety Car came out.

Then it started raining again, the fog set in on top of the mountain and, at one stage, it was getting difficult to see where you were going. I thought at that stage they were actually going to stop it, but they didn’t and, luckily enough, the fog lifted, the rain went away and it dried out.

That was the difficult stage, when it was drying out. The wets (tyres) were getting hot and starting to move around and (team manager) Jeff (Grech) kept asking me if it was dry enough for slicks. It was very hard to determine and we got to the point where the fuel light came on and we decided to put him (Murphy) out on slicks.

Greg went out, got the temperatures up in a couple of laps and did a tremen dous job.

MN: I believe your final decision was made on your ‘in’ lap?

LOWNDES: Yes. From one lap to another Jeff kept asking me,“Is it dry, is it dry, is it DRY?” and 1 kept on saying, “no, no, NO!”. 1 said, “within two or three laps it will be dry”, and we knew we would be getting close on fuel. We knew it was getting dry, but if it had started driz zling we would have had to go back onto wets for a lap or two, like Peter and Tomas did.

MN: That must have been tough for Murph. He was getting into the lead car, on a damp track, on slicks.

LOWNDES: Yes. All I said to him was that the top was a little greasy but that everywhere else was quite good. On the first couple of laps all he would have been doing was observing the cir cuit and figuring out where it was dry and where it was wet.

He did say he had a few little moments and so did I, but everyone had a moment out there; it was those type of conditions. Those first laps would have been treacherous. It would have been quite easy to make a mistake and put it into the wall, like Steve Richards did; he just made a little error, touched a kerb and spun around and hit the wall. In the dry he would have got away with it.

MN: Had you experienced Bathurst in the wet before?

LOWNDES: No, not in those conditions; ‘94 was the only time I’d struck it wet there and Brad (Jones) had virtually done what I did this year - run the whole first stint, and I went out on slicks. I think I went out on intermediates for about five laps before putting slicks on.

MN: You seem to get on pretty well with Greg.

LOWNDES: We get on well. We don’t compete with one another, we work together and we have come from a similar background.

We both want the same end result - we’d both like to

race open wheelers and go overseas, and we’re trying to show that we can do it from this angle.

We have tremendous fun.

We’re a similar age, we have similar hobbies, and we're built exactly the same.

At times we get a bit testy, but that’s my nature annoying the shit out of some people!

made before Bathurst; do you think they made much of a difference in the end?

LOWNDES: They did make a little bit. But over a one lap dash they didn’t make any difference at all.

You’ve got cold tyres, a cold engine and everything and you want mechanical grip.

Once the tyres are hot, then you want aerodynamic grip.

MN: The parity changes

Continued next page

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GOOD ADVICE: Craig in race week discussion with the man who ted the team to victory, HRT team man ager Jeff Grech.

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24 25October m

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ATHURSTi

The motorcycle accident:

It was pretty frightening

MN: The main story about the build-up to Bathurst was your motorcycle crash. Tell me about that.

LOWNDES: I was at a friend’s factory working on my 4WD and I’ve just recently bought a road/trail bike. This was the sister bike to the one I’ve got and when he showed up with it a couple of friends went tor a ride around the block, in an industriai area, at around seven o’clock at night, so it was pretty well vacant.

Of course, me being me, 1 jumped on the bike and went flying up the road and stopped and turned around to come back. I passed the factory and came to a T-intersection. I couldn’t stop and I couldn’t quite see, because it was just on dark. 1 got over the intermediate kerb on the road, but then there was a car park with a double kerb and I was still travelling at around 60 k’s. I popped the front wheel up to get over the kerb and the back wheel hit it and bucked me off over the front of the bike.

I landed beside the bike, which was still running and doing doughnuts. 1 was lying there for a few seconds, jumped up, then collapsed again with the shock. It was a pretty frightening moment.

MN: I believe you had a lot of trouble Continued from Page 23 After a little bit the tyres went off more than we hoped they would but they (the changes) didn’t make as much difference as we thought they would. We had to work a little bit harder and we ended up chasing rear grip, not front grip. But at Bathurst we didn’t seem to suffer as much as at Sandown.

MN: What about the ‘supercar’ business? Was it really that much better?

LOWNDES: The seating position is a little bit differ ent; the Petty bar that we have doesn’t do anything, really, it’s just there for looks. Peter’s car hasn’t got it and it’s just as quick as mine. It’s more for safety that anything. They weren’t allowed to put Brock’s in, but they still came up with simi lar torsional stiffness in the car.

We were winning races early in the year with the old car, so I can’t see a big dif ference in it.

MN: And what about the Bridgestones;, are they that much better or is HRT just using them so well that you could win on Dunlops,for example?

LOWNDES: We were actually blistering some tyres at Bathurst early in the week and we’ve never had blistering problems before.

We had to find a car set-up that was actually friendly on the tyres; we worked hard at it and we found a car set-up that would actually be quick er, very consistent and friendly on the tyres. We just changed the set-up of the car and made it a lot better.

But there were still a number of nervous Bridgestone peo ple there, wondering what would happen. But we got through the race without blistering any tyres.

with your arm as well as your head?

LOWNDES: The head wasn’t a problem.

Although I had a pretty deep cut which needed stitching internally to stop the bleed ing, I never had headaches or I didn’t get knocked out. I suffered a little bit of, um ... memory lapse, but it all came back within a couple of days.

The problem 1 did have was that, when my head hit the ground, 1 pinched a nerve in the back left side of my neck, which made my left arm numb for three days. It virtually turned to jelly; I couldn’t control it.

MN: And this is two weeks before Bathurst?

LOWNDES: Yes. Within three or four days I had control of my arm again, but long after it happened my index finger and thumb were still tingly. I still didn’t have much strength; 1 went to the physio and got mas saged for the pinched nerve and he gave me the clearance the Monday before I came up on Tuesday.

I went for a check-up on the Friday prior to that and he gave me a 98 percent bill of health. I got the stitches out and got tested for reaction time, memory, using a grid of numbers and trying to pick out words from 100 letters. The first time I did it I missed a

MN: The wets apparently looked brand new when they came off the car.

LOWNDES: It’s funny when you have a wet tyre in the right conditions. You still have to look after them or they will burn up and turn to shit. I was able to drive the car fairly straight and get the power down without wheelspin so it was quite handy to do that and not burn the tyres up.

Every time we had a restart the Dunlop tyres were a lot quicker to respond the than Bridgestones. Ours still need a lap to come on, and you can see that with Glenn. He needed a lap to get the tem perature to attack Tomas. AJ, when he passed me at one of the restarts, had obviously kept his temperatures up.

The slicks didn’t seem to be a prob lem. I seemed to be able to get the jump on the competitors behind and the actual slicks didn’t seem to be disadvantaged as much as the wets.

couple, I only got about 70 percent of it right, but I gradually improved and, come Monday, I got 100 percent of it right.

Jeff was very, very close to the point of getting a relief driver.

MN: That would have been an incredible situation. You must have been mentally kicking yourself for what happened.

LOWNDES: Sure I was frustrated, but there’s no use beating yourself up. The doc tor said that the best thing was rest and I virtually did nothing for the whole week.

Even at Bathurst, we used a gym to regain the strength in my left arm but during the week it was virtually 100 percent.

MN: Did you use a simuiator to help with your recovery?

LOWNDES: Yes, we did. We used the simulator to help with hand/eye co-ordina tion and to try and get the concentration level up. Firstly we sat for three 10-minute sessions and then we sat through a 45minute straight race and it was a little bit dif ficult at first, but then I started to relax and get on with the job and they were quite happy with that.

have a slightly quicker driver change than Peter and Tomas, we can do a driver change within a tyre change and the only thing left is the fuel.

MN: HRT is losing (engi neer) Chris Dyer to TWRArrows next year. What effect will that have on the team?

LOWNDES: I don’t think it will cause a problem. We will have to work a little bit hard-

MN: They’re very realistic (machines), side of it to drum up the money.

MN: Now, we’ve had this conversation a few times in recent years, but surely, with the success you’ve had in Australia this year, you must have a good chance of getting the sponsorship?

LOWNDES: You’d hope so! John (Crennan) is work ing extremely hard to capi talise on the success we’ve

F3000 test and, mayhe, a test in a Formula 1. There’s no talk about it at the moment, but it would be nice.99

MN: Your pitstops were very quick. You must have been pleased with them.

LOWNDES: We worked on them very hard virtually all year. We set up booms in the workshop and we would practice and practice and practice. We had observers watch and they put their two bobs’ worth in to save us some time.

The guys spent a lot of time doing that and, from our point of view, it’s just as important as the drivers keeping up their end and leaving the guys to hold up theirs. Greg and I seem to

MN: So, what is the situa tion with you for 1997?

LOWNDES: We plan to go at the end of the week to the UK and have a three-day test with a Formula 3000, at Silverstone or Snetterton, I’m not sure which one.

Then I’ll get my backside back to Australia quick smart because we have to go to New Zealand then.

If the (F3000) test goes well, we have a week to a week-and-a-half to start working on the corporate

aren’t they?

LOWNDES: They are. I’m trying to find out which circuit we will be running on in England (with the F3000). If it will be Silverstone, then I can practice with it (the simulator) and then at least I will know where the corners go.

a gap in the contract that says, ‘If Europe fails, I can stay in Australia and drive a touring car again’. If that is the case, then that is only a 12 month agreement and at the end of next year, hope fully, we can still go over seas. It is an option and, hopefully, it won’t be THE option.

MN: Is there a deadline?

LOWNDES: Yes, the mid dle of February.

MN: That’s pretty late.

LOWNDES: It is.

They want to be looking (for a driver) very soon and this is the time when everyone is negoti ating deals for next year. Everyone will need to get their act together and start finalising deals.

“What it comes down to is the

er now that we have lost a teammate. The guys are unhappy that Chris is leav ing, but they will work hard to make up that difference and they will still go forward.

THE UGLY SIDE OF SPORT: Craig dis plays the scar where he had eight stitches. '

had, so what it comes down to is the test (in the F3000) and, maybe, a test in a Formula One for me to mar ket that side of it as well.

There’s no talk about (the FI test) at the moment, but it would be nice.

We will just have to see how the test goes, if everybody is happy. I believe that there’s going to be a lot of media there, so if they can feed information back to Australia, then it is going to work for me.

MN: Three months ago you had to admit that stay ing in Australia next year was still on the cards. Is that still the case?

LOWNDES: There is still

MN: Is money still the problem?

LOWNDES: John is working very hard. He is hoping to get around 300 (thousand dollars) for overseas, which I don’t know will be enough for the program. I think they are looking for a two- to three-year program.

Tom’s feeling is, ‘If we get the money from Australia, we’ll go ahead with it’. He’s very keen to get me over there, he’s gone from a ‘we’ll see what happens’ attitude to ‘yes, we’ve got to get him over’ attitude. I feel that he will make it happen, regard less.

I think he wilf still be wait ing for the test results, but he is keen to get an Australian over there; it’s a very marketable thing for him to do that.

MN: Have you spoken to him at all since the race?

LOWNDES: I spoke to Tom on Sunday about six o’clock and he congratulated me. It was a 10-minute chat and he said, ‘We had better get our act together and get you over here’. He had a quick talk to Murph and to John and that was as far as it went!

But he is obviously pleased with the result; it couldn’t have gone any bet ter. Up until the start of this year he hadn’t won anything with the Holden Racing Team, and the only thing we are waiting for now is for the car to go into his museum!

That will be a relief to CAMS, to get rid of the only 'Petty bar’ car...

MN: Finally, is it true that you said that the one thing you learned this year was to lie through your teeth?

LOWNDES: That was an off-the-cuff remark! You know that the journos, the TV crews and everyone are all over you and you soon work out who are going to work with you and who will work against you.

There have been times where ... you don’t lie, but you don’t tell the whole truth.

Like the accident with the motor bike; we didn’t reveal that until after the race, we wanted to keep quiet because we knew it would cause some PR eruptions.

There were people that did know about it - Mobil, and a few other people and they were good enough to keep their mouths shut.

But there have been times when we haven’t revealed everything; we haven’t lied about anything.

MN: Like being a politi cian...

LOWNDES: Exactly. Or a diplomat.

MN: Thanks for your time in the busy schedule and con gratulations once again. n

25 October 1996 « Xe

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ATHURST :

How we won Bathnrst By winning co-driver Greg Murphy

ago you would not have At Bathurst 12 months found a more disillu sioned bunch of guys. Tw'elve months later, the absolute opposite.

I had dreamed of this moment in the lead-up to the Bathurst ‘96 classic but, at the end of the day, no amount of dreaming could let you know how good this is.

A similar feeling occurred at Le Mans this year, mainly because of the overwhelming atmosphere which is generat ed, and also because of the fact that it is probably the biggest race in the world. But there is no substitute for win ning.

The response from Bathurst has been phenome nal, so much bigger than I could have imagined. I think that it has a lot to do with the fact that Craig and myself are the youngest combination ever to win The Great Race.

Obviously, Craig’s incredi ble year has been the focus of most of the attention, but he had always been quick to remind people that the both of us worked together to do this and also it could not have been done without the 110 percent dedication of around 20 guys who, this year, have lived through the hideous reminder of‘95!

Those 20 guys are the back bone of the operation and deserve as much credit as Craig and myself

Dynamic duo: Greg and Craig Lowndes await the start of what turned out to be the biggest day of their careers to date. It even included a letter of congratula tions from Prime Minister John Howard.

(Photo by Graeme Neander)

Dencar after being damaged at Mallala. The 05 car had its debut at Sandown.

The new cars were built along similar lines to a mod ern Super Tourer, with an incredibly intricate safety cage and a very low and rear ward driving position which required an extended steering column, newly-fabricated pedal box and a very trick gearchange linkage system designed by Ron Harrop.

All in all the new rocket is a fantastic piece of kit and a lot of ftm to drive.

By the time Sunday rolled around Craig had recorded the second fastest time for the top 10 shoot-out while Glenn Seton, the unluckiest man ever to race at Bathurst, had

The entire week up to the race ran leading as smooth as silk, exactly the same as the week did 12 months earlier.

HRT team man ager Jeff Grech had spent weeks perfect ing the strategy and schedule which we stuck to through the lead-up. There’s a substantial amoimt of time to utilise to make sure every thing is 100 percent and, therefore, no rush.

The association with tyre supplier deservedly taken pole. The 05 Bridgestone is fantastic. The Techno Weapon was third team works closely with tyre and looking every bit a huge guru Graeme ‘Mort’ Brown threat.

The weather had been and a lot of time is spent great all week but the fore ensuring the right combina tion of construction and com casters had been pretty much on the ball when thunder pound is used. storms were predicted for The engine team has obvi ously been working tirelessly Saturday night and Sunday to ensure a perfect run this morning. ‘Heavy rain - clear year and, like many of the ing’ was the summary for Sunday afternoon and that is other teams, found improve ments across the board with exactly what occurred.

Sunday looked bad and economy and power.

'The engineering of the car black. Our front row grid spot would prove invaluable. this year has been in a league of its own, with steady devel opment and the production of the time the light green the circuit waswent very two technically advanced race By cars (‘TWR’ actually stands wet. It didn’t look like the day was going to be very nice. for Techno Weapon Racing’!)

The number 1 Mobil HRT I did a couple of laps in the car was debuted earlier in the warm-up and felt comfortable year by Craig, but had a trip in the conditions, but it back to chassis builder seemed a little anti-climactic

after such a great build-up.

Craig made a great start (he said is was ‘only OK’) to lead into turn one. A clear track in front was his reward.

The spray behind looked bad on TV so it must have been downright scary sitting behind the wheel.

Tomas Mezera was a sur prise starter in 05 and was finding the conditions less than enjoyable.

Just as they began to settle down the first pace car was brought into play for Mark Larkham’s crash on Conrod from trying to avoid a slower car; his visibility was nil.

While this was being cleaned up another accident occurred which allowed the weather to improve slightly and the rivers to subside.

At the restart Alan Jones decided to take it to the limit and passed Craig for the lead, which he increased until his car was engulfed in flames, bringing out the second pace car.

Because of the lengthy pace car periods fuel consumption was obviously low and we didn’t pit until around lap 44. The schedule had been for around lap 32 or 33.

By this time the rain had gone for the day and the bot tom half of the track had dried out considerably. It was tyre choice time and Craig said he thought slicks were the go. Some of the other teams had been in and out of the pits changing tyres but our Bridgestones held in there.

I went out on slicks to find the top of the mountain still wet in some spots, but drying, and it was definitely the right move.

I had a dice with Tony Longhurst for a while before another pace car, where I was passed under a yellow by Dick Johnson. Nothing was

done about it until after the race...

At the restart I had to get back past him which, of course, he didn’t make easy.

After a couple of laps I did, taking back the lead, and by the time I handed over to Craig we were about 10 sec¬

onds in front.

We wouldn’t lose the lead again. Our pitstops were elec tric and we were gaining sev eral seconds on every stop.

The lead was increasing every lap and at the next stop it was in the 50 second region.

Because of the long first

stint, the last one was going to be short. I circulated com fortably, holding around a 36 to 40-second lead. I pitted under another pace car for the final time and Craig jumped in for the finish. But, of com’se, the pace car closed up the field, which dimin ished our lead once again to -j almost nothing.

Another pace car was need ed immediately after, but finally Craig showed them a clean pair of heels and cruised away comfortably to the finish line.

The few laps were as final nail-biting as not at Sandown, but the thought of Glenn Seton stopping nine laps from the finish last year was pretty well etched in my mind for some reason.

At the end of the day the car was still running perfectly and she didn’t have a scratch on her. That’s how you win races.

Thanks for all the support that’s been given; it has been overwhelming. I can only say that I hope there’s a few left yet and Craig and I get to share a few more. n

n HA^hoon - J.996, AUgCAR Champion

“The thought of Glenn Seton stopping nine laps from the finish last year was pretty well etched in my mind for some reason.”

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Legends live on in Bathurst Rally Story and photos

by BRIAN REED

To say you have met six men who won ‘the Great Race’ is something, but to have spent a week with them socially and to have competed against them is something else.

For more than thirty enthusiasts who contested this year’s Bathurst Legends Rally, this was the reality.

The ‘legends’ taking part were Frank Goad, winner of the first Armstrong 500 at Phillip Island in 1960, four-time winner Harry Firth (1961, ’62, ’63 and ’67), George Reynolds (1964), Bob Holden (1966), Bruce McPhee (1968) and

Ian (5eog:hegan (1973).

The five-day event began in Melbourne’s City Square a week before this year’s AMP Bathurst 1000 and the first competitive events were held at the Thunderdome and flat track at Calder Park.

Other timed lap dashes were at Winton Motor Raceway and at Wakefield Park, Goulburn. There were driving tests at Shepparton’s DECA and at the Sutton Driver Training Centre, Canberra, a hillclimb at Wakefield Park, l/4mile sprints at Mangalore Airport, vari ous motorkhana events and gentle navigational exercises in between

to keep the 37 crews on their toes throughout the rally.

While cars generally associated with the history of ‘the Great Race’ are the main focus of the Bathurst Legends Rally, there are also class es for all makes and models - there was even a VW Kombi ‘Tram’ entered by Melbourne’s Graeme Love and an unlikely 4WD Suzuki X-90 which became known affec tionately as ‘the motorised money box.’

A strong comaraderie developed among competitors during the rally, and at the nightly social events yel low caps were presented to the dri ver and co-driver who won each

LEAN, MEAN... Kel Thomas performed creditably throughout in his class-winning FJ Holden.

CAPITAL, H ...

A legend amongst legends - evergreen Harry Firth showed how it’s done with some impressive times at Winton Motor Raceway.

day’s competition.

Vince Westphal and Jo Scollary (Commodore HSV) and Frank Purdey won three caps while John Gardener (Porsche 944)took two.

Westphal and Scollary were the outright win ners of the Bathurst legends rally for the second successive year.

On arrival in Bathurst the crews were rationed to two buckets of water and a sponge by the local bush fire brigade to remove five days of accu mulated mud and slush from their cars prior to taking part in the annual street procession. The immaculate FJ Holden of Kel and Jenny Thomas was judged the win ner of the Show and Shine.

The final buzz was a parade lap of the Mt Panorama circuit on Saturday morning, a static display of the cars outside the Hall of Fame, and the opportunity to watch the AMP Bathurst 1000.

Enquiries re the 1997 Bathurst Legends Rally can be made by con tacting Peter Mornement, Waratah Events, PO Box 17, Kew 3101.

Mobile 019 138 772.

/

»Ai RESULTS OUTRIGHT -1 V. Westphal/J. Scollary(HSV Commodore);2 B. Holden/C. Rutledge (Ford Escort GT);3 P.Sambell/G. Laurie (Ford Falcon XD) Al: CLASS AWARDS(Up to & including 1962) Under 2000cc: J. Watt/J. Molineux(VW) 2001 l 3000cc: K.Thomas/J. Thomas(FJ Holden) 3001cc & over: Clarc/Heming(Jaguar Mk2) A2:CLASSIC 1963-1970 Under 2000cc: C.Smallman/M.Robson (Morris Cooper) 3001cc & oven G.Crawford/G. Crawford (Capri V8) A3:POST CLASSIC 1971-1980 Under 2000cc: B. Holden/C. Rutledge (Ford Escort GT) 3001 & over. P. Sambell/G. Laurie (Ford Falcon XD) A4: MODERN-1981 ON V. Westphal/J. Scollcry(HSV Commodore) B5: OTHER VEHICLES Under 2000cc: B. Reed/D. Permezel(Suzuki X-90) 2001 to 3000cc: L. Eather/B. B. Heydon (Toyota MR2) 3001 & over: F. Purdey/J. Gardener (Porsche 944T).

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SUPER SPEEDWAY

Martin tests Texas track Mark Martin became the first Winston Cup driver to test at the new Texas International Raceway just outside Fort Worth, Martin describing his October 13 outing as “smooth as silk; it’s proba bly the smoothest track Fve ever driven on.”

The previous day, Ross Perot Jr, son of the presiden tial candidate, spun a ChevTolet Monte Carlo twice at speeds approaching 150 mph and then hit the wall, luckily escaping unscathed Perot Jr sold the land to Speedway Motorsports, the owner of the 1.5-mile facility.

The first Winston Cup race is scheduled for April 6, 1997.

Speedway Motorsports is part of the corporation head ed by Bruton Smith which also owns and operates the After damaging engines prior to two the

opening NASCAR race of the new season, teamowner and NASCAR punter Ian Thomas has made the decision to return to flat-tap pet camshafts on his Monte Carlo fleet, shying away from the roller rocker assembly currently used by most of the leading teams. l “We were led to believe that the roller setup was best,” he said.

“However, after having a pushrod thrown past the roller on two separate occa sions at one meeting, 1 think we’ll be reverting to the older setup. That configura tion never caused us any problems at all.”

The whole roller assem bly had worked its way loose, in a similar manner to the problem that occurred with the Ford Thunderbird of Terry Wyhoon only two weeks prior to the opening round.

Another Superspeedway competitor reverting to the previous season’s

Ricky Rudd took a gam ble late in the running of the AC-Delco 400 last weekend at Rockingham and crossed the finish line just 3.397 seconds ahead of championship contender Dale Jarrett.

Rudd’s chances of carrying his one victory at least per season streak to 14 straight Charlotte, Atlanta and years looked increasingly Bristol Motor Speedways, remote this year, as the Tide along with 50% of the North team has struggled both on Wilkesboro track. the track and in the pits It now appears that but he luckily reversed his Speedway Motorsports will form at Rockingham.

Rudd started on the out have an active hand in the operation of a new track side of the front row along under construction in side Jarrett, but lost places Madison, Illinois - Gateway at every pit stop and then International Raceway is had to battle through traffic located just outside St Louis. to get back into the top five.

The track is being built by When Derrike Cope crashed the #12 Ford of Chris Pook, who spearhead Bobby Allison, members of ed the Long Beach Grand that crew came over to Prix IndyCar race Speedway Motorsports attempt to speed up Rudd’s stands to pocket up to 40% of pit stops; but the final stop the track income. for the #10 was no better than the earlier efforts.

A CART race is scheduled Robert Pressley and Lake for May 24 and NHRA drag racing for June 26.

Speed tangled to bring out NASCAR’s Busch Grand the yellow on lap 298 and, when the action resumed on National or SuperTruck Series could become a third lap 305, Rudd was at the 1997 fixture. back of the lead group, due to - MARTIN CLARK a 40-second stop.

25 October ms

Tide turns for Ricky Rudd at Rockingham The green was only out for 10 laps before another inci dent brought the leaders back into the pits.

Rudd and his crew chief, Richard Broome, gambled and stayed out to inherit the lead and never relinquish it over the closing 69 laps.

Rudd’s good restart gave him some breathing room over Jeff Burton’s Exide Ford for a while, but the second place car began to close the gap until the tyres went away some on the #99.

Jarrett moved up into sec ond as the leaders battled through traffic, but Rudd’s spotter had been working with his compatriots on the other teams and the gaps opened up when needed and Rudd maintained a margin of approximately three sec onds during the dash to the chequer.

Terry Labonte had only qualified 19th, but was in the top 10 by lap 40 and, in the closing laps, he worked his way up to third.

PIT NOTES

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Coupled with Jeff Gordon’s problems - which saw him go a lap down when the #24 was off the pace following a pit stop, though Gordon eventu ally worked his way up to 12th - Labonte now has a 32 point lead over his teammate with two races left.

Jarrett helped his, cause with his pole position and also led the most laps (207) to close to within 76 points of Labonte - so the champi onship is still within his reach. - KEITH BURGAN

“Anyway, next race we’ll have our designated oval track engine back from Bob Rahilly in the states - it’s actually up a bit on horse power, so nobody will see which way WE went.”

FOOD FOR THOUGHT... Runner-up Faulkner tails winner Jane after the controversial late-race restart. (Thunder-Pics) engine specs is Ford AUS tage the Fords were going back up to speed for the “But what annoys me is CAR protagonist Marshall to have this year with the next round.” that the rule states that the Brewer. aluminium heads,” Brewer race shall not restart until said.

After spending the off the lead car has gone over Johnconvinced Faulkner the designated restart line was still not season building and devel “Well, I’m here to tell you Post-race, oping his new alloy-head that they’re of no advantage that the final restart of the and is shown the green flag. at all. We’re down at least NASCAR race was in accor Falcon engine with long “I’m pretty sure Kim start time engine-builder Ian 25 horsepower over last dance with the rulebook as ed so early that he wouldn’t Tate, Brewer will be return year and have no chance of written. have even seen the flag ing to a full steel head setup running competitively with “Taking absolutely noth it’s too late now, but I’ll be for the next round. the Holden’s. I’m off to the ing away from Kim, as he interested to see the “Everybody has been dyno now with one of our did a fabulous job,” Faulkner footage on Ten to see saying how much advan- older engines to try and get commented. whether I’m correct or not.

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One man smiling afterwas the AUSCAR race part-time JFR fabricator Lorence “Mr Charisma” Hill, who had constructed muf flers for the first and sec ond-placed cars of Wyllie and Abelnica.

Originally destined for the NASCAR category, a post ponement of the move to mufflers for that category until the November meeting meant that Hill’s highly regarded NASCAR mufflers were available to test on selected AUSCARs, includ ing that of Rodney Jane the Thunderdome results confirmed their competitive ness.

The special three-inch tall, low-profile high perfor mance mufflers can be sourced by phoning Lorence direct at John Faulkner Racing on (03) 9548 9022.

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THUIMDERDOIVIE sheets, but now Jane was second, dropping into the 27-second bracket for the first time.

Report by BRETT SWANSON The new alliance between Kim Jane and John Sidney paid immediate dividends in round one of the 1996 Australian NASCAR Championships at the Goodyear Thunderdome when Jane took a close-fought and slightly controversial win in his Bob Jane T-Marts Monte Carlo over John Faulkner during the Triple M Rocktober 200 on October 12.

Third place went to the Geoff Brabham/Max Dumesny combina tion, after substitute driver Dumesny had brought the #83 Bright Eyes Sunglass Stores Monte Carlo back from being two laps down.

Unluckiest man of the night was pacesetter Dean Wanless, who led the most laps and basically domi nated the whole weekend until an axle broke, robbing the Newcastle Metal Recyclers Ford Thunderbird driver of a certain podium finish.

George Elliot was an early victim when he fenced the Walter Gilesowned Holden Calibra on Thursday, the brush damaging the front of the Pennzoil mount.

“1 had a motor and no car and Walter had a car but no motor, so we put the two together,” explained Elliot. “On Thursday, the car was great, but we changed the setup and it didn’t work. The car spun and hit the inside wall.”

Practice From the time official practice started on Friday morning, it was obvious that Wariless was going to be hard to beat, though Faulkner was actually quickest in the Cummins TEC Oils Monte Carlo, ahead of John Maultsaid’s Couriers Please Thunderbird.

The next session saw Wanless up the ante with a quicker time, with defending champion Jim Richards in the Goodyear TyresA7alvoline Dick Midgley Pontiac Grand Prix second-quickest - Faulkner was consistent, slightly bettering his time from the previous session.

The final session for the day saw Charlie O’Brien on top in his #3 Bright Eyes Sunglass Stores Monte Carlo, with Neville Lance secondquickest in Bruce Peacock’s Meco Tools Thunderbird and Wanless third, although the times were gen erally slower than the previous sessions.

Ex-champ Dumesny, who had been doing the times in Brabham’s Monte, questioned his NASCAR mentor, John Sidney, who is now crew chief for Jane, about setups but, with a wry smile, Sidney did a “Bondy,” saying “I can’t remember.”

Qualifying

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BIG NIGHT... Third-placed Max Dumesny (left) and NASCAR winner Kim Jane.(Sean Henshelwood pic)

Kim cracks it!

Runner-up Faulkner less than happy, but Dumesny thrilled

ace team ... Crewed by John Sidney Racing, Jane’s Monte Carlo proved to be unbeatable. (Henshelwood) Brabham is set to do the remain der of the NASCAR championship but, as BMW wouldn’t release him to race super speedway until the current Super Touring champi onship is completed, a deal was done to have Brabham start the

BOSOM BUDDIES... Dumesny(#83) and O’Brien. (Henshelwood)

svvcuss

first race without qualifying the car - he would then do one lap, pull in and hand over to Dumesny, any points Dumesny scoring actually being credited to the starting dri ver, Brabham.

Meanwhile, Bright Eyes Team

boss and owner Ian Thomas was in all sorts of trouble, having blown a couple of motors and now obliged to hunt around for another one.

The final practice session on Saturday morning saw Wanless once again at the head of the

With the way practice times had gone, it was no surprise to see Wanless take the pole, with a time of 27.3651 seconds set on the first of his two flying laps.

Faulkner was only 3/lOOths slower, with Lance, Jane and O’Brien next, ahead of Ken James in the Toll Express/Pennzoil Monte Carlo.

“If Walter tells me that the car is the same as it was before we crashed, then I will go hard; if not, who knows what will happen when we get to turn one?” Elliot had said earlier, after missing all the prac tice sessions while waiting for the car to be repaired.

Obviously, the car was in reason able shape, or else it was just Elliot’s bravado that got the car around in seventh place, the last man into the 27-second bracket.

Rounding out the top ten were Kevin Schwantz (Talbot Fast Freight Monte Carlo), last season’s AUSCAR champion Terry Wyhoon (BP Car care ’Thunderbird) and Richards.

Last round winner Gene Cook had the screaming #13 Austoil Falcon in 13th place. Cook running a single exhaust system on the Falcon, which made the car sound totally different from the others.

“Seeing as how we are going to have to run mufflers on these cars, I started playing around with exhaust systems,” Cook explained.

“This one gained us 11 horsepow er on the dyno, but it makes it sound like it’s revving it’s head off.

“I ran a Ford Customline at Longford (Tasmania)in 1966 with a single exhaust and people laughed, but I ran it because it was fast.”

Daryl Coon (Simoco Commodore) and Paul Stocker (Consolidated Waste Oldsmobile Cutlass) both completed only one slow lap during qualifying.

Race (110 laps) As the field assembled on the gird for the season-opening race, the biggest surprise was that defending champion Jim Richards was unable to take his place in the line-up after hurting an engine.

At the drop of the green, Wanless led away Lance, Faulkner, Jane and Schwantz, as Brabham tailed the field around.

Brabham’s crew (the Nathan Pretty AUSCAR crew) were expect ing Brabham in straight away; but, as the team’s pit was before the starfffinish line, Brabham thought he better do two laps to make sure he was eligible for the points and came in on the second lap.

Peter Sportelli then literally threw Brabham out of the car as

WRITING ON THE WALL ... Pulp fiction becomes reaiity for George Elliot’s Pennzoii Calibra. (Thunder-Pics)

250cloter1996 Dumesny buckled in, the driver changeover losing two laps in the process - but being two laps down was nothing new for Max and he started his charge towards the front from 21st position.

Coon’s race ended on lap 3 and Rowan Harman soon had the Panelcare/Preston Motors/Shell Pontiac Grand Prix in the pits as well - Harman’s race would last till lap 18, which was two laps more than Stocker’s.

In between all this, Paul Kell had been lapped in the Ryco Filters/Mick Simmons Sports Pontiac Grand Prix and Maultsaid had also pitted.

A lap after Maultsaid stopped, Elliot lost the tail of the Calibra in turns 3-4 and backed it up into the wall, sensibly holding it up high until the track was clear - a small fire was burning at the rear of the l car, but Elliot resumed the race after a call to the pits.

After this first caution, Lance took the challenge up to Wanless and the pair of Thunderbirds ran side by side for two laps, before Lance hit the lead for the next thir teen laps.

Dumesny, though, was running just ahead of the lead bunch in an effort to pull back a lap, which he did at the next caution four laps later, when Cook spun down in turn 2.

“With the new Yates heads and exhaust on this motor, we’ve got an extra 60 horsepower over last sea son,” said Cook. “But, unfortunate ly, it’s upset the handling and the car is loose.”

A bit of light rain probably didn’t help too much, either.

With the caution period, Dumesny had managed to pull back

one lap and set off at the drop of the green to try and do it again, as Lance and Wanless exchanged some paint.

Trevor Oliver, meanwhile, had pitted the Kirkmans Transport Lumina with a vibration problem.

Dumesny was out in front of Faulkner, who had made the most of the Wanless/Lance clash and was determined not to let Dumesny get back onto the lead lap if another caution came out.

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and Robert Tinworth (Miller Beer Pontiac Grand Prix) both pitted, to be followed a lap later by Bob Middleton in the striking Whiteline Transport Oldsmobile Cutlass.

Dumesny was now back on the lead lap and was looking a possibil ity for a front-running berth.

Wanless led Lance, Schwantz and James until the next caution on lap 59, when Maultsaid spun down the front stretch grass.

As soon as the pits were open.

i^uEC

AMERICAN BREW... Robert Tinworth has found favour with brewing giant Miller. (Sean Henshelwood pic) Unfortunately, just after he got past Dumesny, Faulkner’s cabin began to fill with smoke and bits of rubber from the left-rear tyre, after the Monte Carlo’s fatigued body work began to collapse.

Faulkner immediately slowed to assess the situation and Dumesny regained the all-important place ahead of the leader, Wanless, who now had Jane behind him.

A couple of laps later, Wanless brushed the wall as well, but it had little effect as Jane had now dropped back to fifth.

On lap 46, the yellows came out again for some debris and Faulkner

the field came in en masse, which caused some problems, Faulkner barging past Wyhoon and forcing him to miss his pit and go around again - Schwantz also came out and went straight back in.

By virtue of his earlier stop, Middleton was now leading from Wanless, O’Brien, Lance, James, Jane, Faulkner, Graham Smith, Dumesny,Schwantz and Wyhoon.

As expected, the superior cars of Wanless, James, Faulkner and company soon passed Middleton after the restart.

Both Jane and Faulkner had tweaked their setups during their

ON A MISSION ... John Faulkner(ft46) rounds up Graham Smith’s Lumina. (Thunder-Pics)

an Thomas had roller rocker set up problems with his Bright Eyes Sunglass Stores Monte Carlo, both engines throwing pushrods past the rollers and dropping valves.

During Friday eveningand practice, both Max Dumesny John Faulkner suffered broken axles, Faulkner following up with a diff problem in Saturday morning practice, which left him only quali fying to do any laps prior to the race.

stops and their cars were now han dling a lot better, this pair and Wanless starting to pull away from the rest.

Faulkner moved into the lead on lap 83 and Jane moved to second on the next lap as Wanless started to drop back.

Faulkner and Jane were running in very close company and, when Faulkner had a slight moment, Jane tapped him as he went past.

Jane opened a two second lead

and was just seven laps from the flag when Maultsaid spun again, The yellows flashed on as Maultsaid recovered without stop ping and continued.

Then, for some unknown reason. the yellows remained on needlessly for a number of laps - the lights on the pace car went off in anticipation of a start, but the yellows cam e back on again.

By this stage, Wanless had broken an axle, which was hanging out two feet from the left rear wheel centre - O’Brien came alongside to motion to Wanless that there was a problem; but Wanless, believing it

him up the bum exiting turn three and nearly sending the Cummins

Prior the race, KenofJames was to having all sorts prob-

J

ohn Maultsaid had a left hand front wheel bearing destroy itself on his second flying lap of qualifying going into turn 3, the damaged componentry also tak ing out the brakes on the Couriers Please Thunderbird.

^ontrary John Faulkner to talk around didn’tthe hit pits the wail after he passed the Geoff Brabham entry driven by Max Dumesny and the damage was, in fact, on the left side of the car.

What did happen was that there seemed to be a structural failure of the bodywork on the Cummins Tec Oils Monte Carlo, which ailowed the guard to fall onto the rear tyre.

BURNING AMBITION... AUSCA R champ Terry Wyhoon looks good in NASCAR.(Sean Henshelwood pic) guard up off the tyre and left the same tyres on the car.

Then, near the end of the race, Kim got past John - after hitting

was a flat tyre, continued on any way.

At the restart, which occurred on lap 114 of the scheduled 110 lap race, Wanless went nowhere as the field swarmed past him.

Even more controversial, though, was the way Jane used the pace car to his advantage.

“I’ve seen plenty of restarts on American TV and, because I was two seconds in front prior to the caution, I thought it only fair to make up that gap on the restart,” Jane stated later.

Faulkner, left floundering and less than happy about Jane’s sud den move, chased hard but in vain, while O’Brien brought himself undone trying to keep team-mate Dumesny behind him.

Dumesny was making a move down low, which O’Brien tried to block; but, in his efforts to block Max, O’Brien moved down too low, put a couple of wheels on the grass and spun, actually crossing the line backwards as he hit the wall.

A dicing Schwantz and James narrowly missed O’Brien, James racing to the flag unabated - but Schwantz berated James after wards for his lack of foresight, the American deeming O’Brien’s smoul dering wreck a hazard that required drivers to back off.

With the yellows out once again, the field came around to get simul taneous yellow and chequered flags to finish the race, Jane taking the win from Faulkner, Dumesny, Schwantz, James, Wyhoon and Lance.

O’Brien, Thomas, Smith and Middleton were next, though a lap down, with Wanless grabbing 12th (two laps down) after clearly deserving a lot better result.

NEW MOUNT... Schwantz successfuiiy debuted ex-JSR Monte Cario. (Heansheiwood)

PIT NOTES John dropped back till the first pitstop, when the guys pulled the

31

car nose first into the back straight wall - and the cracked and battered guard obviously started to rub again.

lems with his handsome Toll Transport/Pennzoil Monte Carlo, including a loose rear mirror, intermittent pit communication, a faulty

carburettor, low fuel pressure, a leak in the rear-end....

Ken was actually pretty frustrat ed with the whole thing, as he couldn’t afford to put too many new tyres on the car.

He was convinced he could match the pace of the quicker cars, but not at the rate that they were throwing tyres at the cars.

Bearing in mind aWyhoon’s engine problems couple of weeks back, the team had little time to test the BP Car care Thunderbird and for Terry to get laps.

John Nissen was convinced that Terry needed a lot of laps in the car before he could actually give the team any valuable feed back.

After Saturday morning’s prac tice session, Terry finally con vinced Nissen that the car was very loose in the rear-end.

They left it that way for practice and made a semi-calculated guess prior to the race, which apparently paid off.

In fact, Terry was so happy with the car prior to the first stop that he was convinced he could have passed everyone in the field on the outside!

32 25October m

THUNDERDOIVIE

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Dd

Report by SEAN HENSHELWOOD

Tasmania’s Jason Wyllie threw down the gauntlet at the open ing round of the 1996/97 Australian Super Speedway Championship at Calder Park’s Goodyear Thunderdome on October 12, sweeping all before him to take a resoxmding victo ry over Eddie Abelnica and Nathan Pretty in the Simoco AUSCAR 150.

Driving the previous year’s championship-winning car of Terry Wyhoon, Wyllie set about demoral ising the opposition from opening practice on Friday morning, ulti mately breaking the lap record on his way to pole position in qualify ing, then blitzing the field in the run to the chequered flag, nobody able to match the track speed of the #26 Trust Bank/Computerland Hobart VS Commodore.

Entry & Practice A disappointing 15-car field was the initial call by Calder Park offi cials: however, at the end of the day, only 13 cars made the green flag for the start of the 82-lap race - despite this, it was a quality field which put on a fabulous show for the massed crowd and the com bined Channel lO/Optusvision net works.

Leading the list of entries was the ex-Wyhoon car of Wyllie, unde niably one of the favourites for this year’s title - Wyllie bought the Gippsland-based team’s car in July complete with a truck-load of spares, but did not turn a wheel at the track until Thursday morning.

“The thing’s a weapon,” said a delighted Wyllie. “On only my sev enth lap in the car, I put down a 31.1 second lap; I’m rapt.

“The time was just so easy to attain. I can see now why Terry was so competitive last season; this thing is just set up so well.”

Another of the young guns in with a fighting chance for the title is “veteran” driver Nathan Pretty, this year unfortunately without the support of earthmoving giant Caterpillar - the “privateer” Pretty Motorsport team was, in fact, field ing two cars, one VR Commodore for Nathan (#2) and one for sister Nicole (#12).

Placed fourth in the champi onship last season, Nathan was looking forward to a competitive year, having done some homework over the off-season.

“It looked as though we were going to be a fantastic chance this season,” he said, “especially with last season’s two most competitive cars out of the picture [Wyhoon and NASCAR/Group A driver John Faulkner], although the unfortu-

RECORD BREAKER... Jason Wyllie’s #26 Trust Bank/Computerlan d Hobart \/S Commodore blew the opposition away.(Thunder-Pics photo)

Wyllie wows'em

nate news about the loss of our val ued friends at Caterpillar makes life a little harder on our own per sonal finances.

“I’m pleased to say that Goodyear have committed to us again for the season, so we can afford to buy some good tyres; I just hope we don’t have any problems on the way, because we certainly can’t afford to fix them.”

Aside from Nathan, another of the elder statesmen of AUSCAR racing - Bruce Williams - was look ing forward to a good run in the #9 Bendix/Mintex VR Commodore, for merly run as BW’s faithful and reli able VP,“Betsy.”

“I’m here to have a good time and a good race,” said a visibly relaxed Williams.

“I’m incredibly disappointed at the poor field we have, but I attribute a lot of that to the ridicu lous nit-picking done by the official dom at the track.

“Not twenty minutes ago I had a standing argument about our radi ator shrouds, which are put on the car to direct some of the cool air from the spoiler into the radiator.

rather than around or under it.

“It was suggested that these alu minium shrouds, which sit a good 4-6 inches above the bottom of the spoiler, would act as aerodynamic aids! It’s just bloody stupid.

“Fortunately, they could see just how ridiculous a statement that was and have left us alone.

“An3Tway, I’m getting too old to be getting up on my soapbox all the time, so I think I’ll leave that to someone else this year.”

Leading blue-oval driver and 1994/95 AUSCAR champ Marshall Brewer (#02 Cigweld/Goodyear EF Falcon) was certainly discounting any pre-race advantages his opposi tion may have felt he had with the off-season addition of aluminium heads to the Fords.

“No way, not at all,” said Brewer.

“In fact, they have been a big disad vantage, having caused a loss in outright power.

“It really hasn’t given us a great advantage in weight distribution either, so those guys that thought we’d just race off into the distance are very much mistaken.

“My view and that of a lot of

other drivers is that Wyllie’s car will be the one to beat. Terry showed he had the complete pack age last year and Jason showed that he knows how to drive, so I’d be suggesting that their combined form will continue.”

Melbourne’s Cheapest Cars pro prietor and part-time race driver Eddie Abelnica was looking forward

to his debut run in the ex-Faulkner #4 VR Commodore, having destroyed his ex-Brewer champi onship-winning car in last season’s final round.

Eddie will certainly be out on the hunt this year, having lost the rookie’s championship to fellow Holden driver George Kyritsis by only a couple of points; he is eager

TRUST ME... Jason Wyllie, new force in AUSCAR.(Henshelwood pic)

NO QUARTER... #28 Matthew White and Darren McDonald, shoulder to shoulder. (Thunder-Pics photo)

/ TRUS'

25 October 1996 to make amends.

33

“We were down on power yester day; despite this, we had an over lem was that Wyllie decided to fol tow - the order at this stage was “We’ve done a lot of testing in the day and gave the car a leak-down cast but cold and dry track for the low him, the two creating a two-sec Wyllie, Ahelnica, Kyritsis, off-season and are matching lap for test last night,” said a confused race, which was now a lot cleaner ond buffer over the following Williams, Pretty, Jane, McDonald Abelnica. lap the times we ran in last year’s hordes. than the opening day of practice. and White. car, so I’d say we’re pretty happy,” “Based on those results, we From the green flag, Wyllie Meanwhile, Jane had found his Lap 64 saw Williams cop a short smiled Abelnica. “We’ll just see how decided to change from this ex-JFR jumped into an early lead followed rhythm and had passed White for back and sides from Abelnica and the race pans out.” engine to our spare [Ian Tate-built] closely by Williams and Brewer. fifth exiting turn four on lap 21.

Pretty entering turn one, the Flying similar colours, but differ to see if we could improve.

Behind them, Kyritsis was wellLap 23 saw the pack snapping at Bendix car caught in the middle ent support, was last season’s “Unfortunately, it’s made no real placed ahead of Abelnica, Pretty, the leaders heels again, Abelnica, and coming off second best with a championship third placegetter advances, so I think we’re chasing White, McDonald and Jane.

Williams and Kyritsis streaming bent steering arm after clouting Matthew White (#28), now backed the wrong thing. It’s too late now, (Joing into turn two at the start past on lap 25.

Abelnica.

by RMS Transport Solutions. so we’ll just concentrate on a good of lap three. Brewer stuck the #02 By lap 26, Williams was back in Williams valiantly tried to main Driving another John Faulkner race package and hope we’re there Falcon down the inside of Williams, front, ahead of Wyllie, Abelnica, tain the pace, but was finally forced at the finish.”

Racing-built'VR Commodore, White holding station till a lap later when Kyritsis, McDonald, Jane, Pretty, to concede his position on the track was looking forward to the race Just a couple of bays down was the two cars, still side by side, \i\^ite and Speers. as the race came to a close. after setting some blistering times the Howe Falcon team, also at an made it three wide into turn one By lap 31, Williams was The close racing for the crowd in testing a week prior to the race. absolute loss as to what was going and squeezed Wyllie back to third. was over and the serious stuff now swamped by first Wyllie into turn Rounding out the field were last on - the new car, fresh from the By lap five, Williams was leading one, then Abelnica and Kyritsis began. season’s championship runner-up workshop of Les Small, was under Brewer, Wyllie, Abelnica, a fast- going into turn three - two laps With fifteen laps to go, Wyllie, Rodney Jane in the Marshall going some minor teething prob moving Nathan Pretty, White and later, though, he was back, follow Abelnica and Pretty started to Brewer-prepared #7 AUSCAR lems, something that would come Kyritsis. ing Abelnica past Wyllie into sec stretch the gap to the rest of the Wheels EF Falcon, Kyritsis’ #41 VR as a relief to his opposition, as with On lap six, Wyllie decided he ond, then the lead again between field, Wyllie putting together a Commodore, Dick Howe in his out doubt the car has the potential wanted a closer look at the leaders, turns one and two the next lap. string of low 31-second laps in his brand-new #11 Ferntree Gully to cause a few headaches amongst running side by side with Brewer Lap 36 saw a continuation of run to the flag. the frontrunners.

Bolts EF Falcon, Darren McDonald Kyritsis’ fabulous In the end, though, nobody was in the #44 VR Commodore, Darryl Meanwhile, run, with the #41 capable of catching Wyllie, whose Speers’ #31 I&V Truck & Trailer down at the Wyllie car ducking inside margin over Abelnica at the flag Repairs VR Commodore and Leigh pit, it was a DIS the Williams car for was 3.1 seconds, with another 2.1 Watkins in the #47 Pennzoil- ASTER there the lead in turns seconds to Pretty, who was fortu backed EF Falcon. were loose grub one and two, the nate the race had not gone any fur By Thursday afternoon, screws in the rattle talented youngster ther, as just over a second behind McDonald and his team were hav gun, which surely holding the lead him was McDonald, who managed ing a time they’d rather forget. spelt trouble for until lap 41, when to improve his practice and raceThe #44 car broke a lower control the evening ahead.

Wyllie regained the long carburettor problem by arm as it went into turn one, send The team was front-running. increasing the fuel pump pressure ing the car up into the high side galvanised into At half-race dis during the pit stop. wall at speed, destroying the left action and, fortu tance, Wyllie led Behind them. White finally got front comer of the car and the pan- nately for them, Williams, Kyritsis, the better of Kyritsis and Jane, who elwork on that side of the car. they had had a Jane, Pretty, in turn were ahead of Watkins, Fortunately for the team, part- trouble-free run Abelni ca, Williams, Speers, Howe, Nicole time AUSCAR driver and former using the setup McDonald, White, Pretty and Brewer.

Sportsman champion Wayne Smith sheets developed and Watkins Wyllie was stoked to have given and son Brett were on site working by the Wyhoon Speers, all running the car its maiden Thunderdome with the Howe Falcon. team over a few very closely in for victory, dedicating his win to his The Smith’s threw the car on a seasons, the crew mation. hard-working crew. trailer and took it to their work spent most of the Lap 48 saw the “I’m over the moon,” he said. shop to straighten and repair the time lapping up “The car handled like it was on first and only cau the fabulous car for Friday’s practice sessions. tion of the night for rails all night; I was never con “They were fantastic,” said debris on the cir Melbourne spring cerned about the result, provided I Darren. “Brett’s handiwork is first- weather and pol cuit, later to be con kept out of trouble, because the car rate. All we have to do now is spray ishing Jason’s hel firmed as wheel is just so good.

NO LUCK Brewer Ford was sidelined with rear-end woes. the car and we’ll be back to normal. met! weights.

“Testament to this car’s suspen “We had to replace the front-end for well over two laps before taking The pits were opened on lap 50 sion package is the fact that the completely with the exception of the Qualifying second, then the lead again enter and all but Nicole Pretty were in tyres were so good at the pit stop, driver’s side guard, as well as all There were no prizes for guessing ing turn three on the tenth lap. for their mandatory stop, the Pretty that we’re likely to race on them the left-side panels back to the rear who was the main candidate for About this time. Brewer started team obviously tied up in another again.” quarter. pole, the only question was whether to suffer a power loss and pitted at lightning quick stop for Nathan, Abelnica and Pretty were both at “The hit was so hard that it the lap record would fall, or not? who was second in and first out. the end of lap 11 to find a rear-end a loss as to what they were going to crampled the firewall where it was Abelnica was first man out, post problem - the Falcon was ultimate Behind him came Abelnica, have to do to nobble the #26 car, hit by the wheel and bent the dash ing a time of 31.077, before being- ly sidelined after only 15 laps.

Kyritsis, Jane, White, Pretty and although both were quick to sug board. The scrutineers have followed by Williams, who backed much later Williams.

Abelnica and Pretty were now gest that a fair bit of testing was on checked it and okayed it, so we’ll up his morning session with a bril the big movers, Abelnica taking With new tyres all round for the cards prior to the next liant 30.956. get back out there and have a shot. both Williams and Wyllie for the most of the front-runners, the times Thunderdome meeting on Brewer showed a certain amount lead on the fourteenth lap, whilst started to plummet.

“It was a pity, really, because the November 16. car felt the best it had ever felt, of style, laying down a 30.880 on Pretty took all three in turns one Wyllie put together a 30.836 on turning in some very good times. I his second lap, whilst Wyllie stole and two on lap 16. lap 56, followed straight up by a The 1996/97 Australian Super just hope we haven’t upset any the show and the lap record with an Lap 18 saw the field stream past 30.886 and a 31.063, claiming the Speedway Championships AUS thing in the drivetrain. Only time opening lap of 30.679 to take pole Nicole Pretty for the first time, the fastest lap of the race on the way.

CAR pointscore after Round 1 is as will tell.” and eclipse Faulkner’s previous young ex-karter sensibly finding During this time, he was actually follows: 1 Jason Wyllie (175 points), From the outset, Wyllie was on mark of 30.721. her way and progressively turning running in the top six amongst 2 Eddie Abelnica (170), 3 Nathan the pace, leading the time sheets at The grid would line up with in quicker and quicker times, fin other cars turning in their quickest Pretty (165), 4 Darren McDonald every session, settling in on Wyllie ahead of Brewer, Williams, ishing the night with a best lap of laps of the race, including Williams (160), 5 Matthew White (155), 6 Saturday morning with a 30.839- K}oitsis, Ahelnica, Nathan Pretty, 32.997 seconds on lap 72. who was screaming through the George Kyritsis (150), 7 Rodney second lap.

McDonald, White, Jane, Speers, pack on his way to a sub-31 second Nathan had decided that the only Jane (146), 8 Leigh Watkins (142), Williams had sorted his car to be Howe, Nicole Pretty and Watldns. chance he had against the Wyllie time on lap 56.

9 Bruce Williams (138), 10 Darryl second-quickest (30.998), Pretty machine was to take the race away Speers (134), 11 Dick Howe (130), By lap 60, Pretty, Abelnica and third (31.061), then Brewer Race(82 laps) from the pack and race for the front Wyllie were three-wide across the 12 Nicole Pretty(127)and lucky 13, (31.078), Abelnica (31.237), White Race-day had threatened rain all - excellent logic, but the only prob- line, taking Williams along in the Marshall Brewer(124).

(31.525), McDonald (31.546), TOUGH L UCK... Bendix Mintex #9 Commodore of likely winner Bruce Williams was hamstrung with a bent steering arm.(Thunder-Pics photo) Kyritsis (31.606), Speers (31.803), Jane (31.968), Howe (32.121) and Pretty(er)(34.383).

But post-practice was a tale of woe - apart from Wyllie and Williams, most teams were suffer ing from the track’s changeable conditions.

“I’m lost,” was all Brewer could say. “We had the perfect setup the other day, but now the thing’s just impossible to drive. We’ll press on, as no doubt the track will be differ ent again come race time.”

Brewer’s right-hand man and suspension guru Jim Doxey was none too fussed.

“I’m not concerned,” said Doxey.

“There’s no need to set the thing up for individual sessions, they’re not the ones that count; pay day is tonight, we’ll be ready for that.”

Another team chasing its tails was that of“Fast Eddie” Abelnica.

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250Msfl9% The first laps raced in anger at the opening round of the ’96/97 Australian Superspeedway Championships were those by the “Pennzmans,” eighteen Sportsman competitors lining up in the Pennzoil-sponsored two-race season-opener at the Goodyear Thunderdome with event honours being evenly split between reigning champi on Shane Houlahan and Mark Vereker.

Houlahan was back to defend his title in his VL Commodore, but back also were most of his rivals from last season, including Jamey Hollier, Andrew Gillespie, Graeme Gilliland, Gerry Raleigh and John Umseher - during the winter break, Houlahan had considered moving up to the AUSCAR ranks, but decided to stick around for an attempt on back to back titles.

Qualifying at the first round is always a good pointer to who’s been doing their homework over winter and Gilliland was head of the class with a 33.00 in his VK Commodore.

Following close behind was Houlahan, ahead of Gillespie, Vereker, Umseher and Raleigh.

Stuart Morrison glanced the wall for the only qualifying incident, but still lined up in eleventh place for race one.

After three tightly bunched warm-up laps, the field was away The Holden Quality Parts HQ Series looks set for a year of big fields and great racing if round one was any gauge.

Thirty four Kingswoods lined up for qualifying in the season-opener, though both Tim D’Ombrain and Dave Wood were absent, the pair having decided to have a break and consider their options and put their trusty steeds on the market.

Qualifying was broken into two groups to avoid total chaos, John Spencer ultimately heading the field with a 36.57, followed by Steve Walker, Glen McDonald, John Agosta, Hayden Ivers, Andrew Koolen, Paul Bongiorno, Leigh Casey, Paul Fairbairn and Ken Leigh.

Race one, round one, lap one and things were already getting nasty and rounding turn four to complete the first lap was where the trouble started.

35

Vereker, Hollier, Graham Crawford, Kyritsis, O’Brien, Raleigh and Morrison - Gillespie, after setting fastest lap, had engine problems and finished at the back of the field.

5

PUNCTURED PRIDE... A flat front upset the plans of reigning champ Shane Houlan. (Thunder-Pics photo)

Gilliland top scores

for the race one 20-lapper with Gilliland leading, while Alan Polglase was push-started from pit lane after stalling on the line.

Gilliland led Gillespie, Houlahan, Umseher and Vereker and by lap five had pulled out a convincing lead, Houlahan and Gillespie hav ing their own battle for second.

Further back in the pack, Raleigh, Graeme O’Brien and Elias Kyritsis were also having a dingdong battle.

Houlahan used lapped traffic to move passed Gillespie on lap 8, Umseher following him through into third. By this stage, Kyritsis was having some handling prob¬

lems in ninth, which made for some moments.

By lap 12, Houlahan was along side Gilliland, pushing him hard before taking the lead and lap 15 saw Ian Smith saving a big loose in turn four.

The race one finishing order was Houlahan, Gilliland, Umseher,

Race two for the evening was held under lights and again it was Gilliland and Houlahan at the pointy end.

Hollier and Umseher had also joined the front runners, making for some great three-wide racing.

The hot pace took its toll and on lap 10 Umseher spun and headed for pit lane - Brett Campbell also had a spin as concentrations wavered, which brought on a cau tion.

After some sorting out the order was Houlahan, Vereker, Gilliland, O’Brien and Kyritsis at the front on lap 15 - but the pace was also about to deal Houlahan a wicked blow, a deflating tyre ending his hopes of a win.

The finishing order was Vereker, the consistent Gilliland, O’Brien, Kyritsis, Crawford, Ron Thorne, Raleigh, Polglase, Chris Robinson and,in tenth, Leanne Ross.

The overall pointscore standings are: Gilliland (340), Vereker (335), O’Brien (307), Kyritsis (306), Crawford (305), Houlahan (293), Raleigh (284), Thorne (280), Umseher(274), Hollier (267).

-TIM EMERY

Winning pace set by Ivers and Spencer at the Dome McDonald in car #13 got out of shape, forcing Koolen into the wall and further back the chain reaction caused other carnage and the yel lows were brought out on lap 1.

After the restart, Spencer jumped to the lead ahead of Ivers, Walker, Carl Trofa and Bongiorno.

By lap 5, Trofa had taken the lead and was being pushed by Bob Hepburn all the way down the back straight and the pointy end of the field consisted of a six-car pack.

By lap 13, the leading order had changed again, with Spencer now in front and being helped along by Trofa.

The finishing order in race one was Spencer, Trofa, Bongiorno, Ivers, Hepburn, Scott Walker, Michael Fitzgerald, Fairbairn, Simon Landrigan and, in tenth, Adrian Lauder.

The last race of the night was for the first time a genuine HQ race and the crowd wasn’t disappointed.

Team-mates Spencer and Trofa led the field away, Hepburn losing adhesion on turn 4 and spinning, bringing on a caution.

Bongiorno took second, pushing Spencer hard. By lap 10, Trofa was back in second with Walker push ing Bongiorno, the group running three-wide for complete laps.

Lap 12 saw a spin by Leigh bring on another caution and Bongoirno used this to slip into the lead on lap 15, while Ivers was on a charge and

up into second the following lap.

The race two finishing order was Ivers, Bongiorno, Casey, Agosta, Fairbairn, Lauder, Greg Aquilina, Fitzgerald, Richard Ireland and' David McSaveney.

Pointscore standings after round one are: Ivers (335), Bongiorno (335), Fairbairn (297), Fitzgerald (288), Spencer (284), Lauder (284), Trofa (255), Walker (253), Ireland (253) and McSaveney (252).

- TIM EMERY

In-form Jane has points lead

Top qualifier and reigning champion Rodney Jane took out the first of the Orix Australian Legends Series races ahead of rookie Matthew Coleman, Paul Freestone hold ing out Jane for the second.

Jane, who holds the lap record of 32.9529 seconds for the Dome front straight short course, set the first race quickest time of 32.9868 on his way to a victory over Coleman, Adrian Bartsch, Jody Freestone, exF500 star Peter Williamson and Alf

Bartsch, Paul Freestone and Peter White not finishing the 10-lapper.

Race two saw Paul Freestone quickest with a 33.1811 on his way to the win over runner-up Jane, White, Coleman, Jody Freestone, Williamson and Alf and Adrian Bartsch.

Orix pointscore standings are: Jane (345), Coleman (330), Paul Freestone (321), Jody Freestone (315), 'White (307), Adrian Bartsch (307), Williamson (305), Alf Bartsch - TONY GLYNN (296).

MOVE OVER... After a race one spin, #9 Matt Coleman charged back into contention.(Tony Glynn pic)

WINSTON CUP RESULTS AC Delco 400 - North Carolina MS, NC October 20, 1996. Rd 29

©

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

Ricky Rudd, #10 Tide Ford Dale Jarrett, #88 Quality Care Ford Terry Labonte, #5 Kellogg's Corn Flake Chev Ernie irvan, #28 Texaco Havoline Ford Jeff Burton, #99 Exide Batteries Ford Bobby Labonte,#18 Interstate Batteries Chev Mark Martin. #6 Valvoline/Cummins Ford

8. Rusty Wallace,#2 Miller Ford 9. Dale Earnhardt, #3 GM Goodwrench Chev 10. Jimmy Spencer, #23 Camel Cigarettes Ford

11. Hut Stricklin, #8 Circuit City Ford 12. Jeff Gordon, #24 DuPont Refinishes Chev 13. Sterling Marlin, #4 Kodak Film Chevrolet 14. Michael Waltrip, #21 CITGO Ford 15. Geoff Bodine,#7 QVC Ford 16. Brett Bodine, #11 Lowe's Ford 17. Ward Burton,#22 MBNA America Pontiac 18. Ted Musgrave,#16 The Family Channel Ford 19. Kenny Wallace, #81 Square D Ford 20. Todd Bodine, #33 Skoal Bandit Chevrolet

Current Points After Round 29 1. T Labonte 2. J Gordon 3. D Jarrett 4. D Earnhardt 5. M Martin 6. R Rudd 7. R Wallace 8. S Marlin 9. E Irvan 10. K Schrader

.4327 .4295 .4251 .4035 .3947 ,3582 .3540 ,3482 ,3426 ,3409

3S 3October m

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Report by STEVEN WHITE The new-look Adelaide International Raceway hosted the 1996 West End Spring Nationals on October 12-13 with astounding success, despite the fact that Friday night qualify ing was blown away, literally, gusting headwinds ending any chance of sending cars down the track.

With Adelaide’s last two events of last season cancelled due to inclement weather and the last complete meeting being run way back in February, Adelaide fans were desperate for some straight line action, which, on Saturday night, is what they finally got 12,500 spectators braved the cold and overcast conditions, but were rewarded by the high-rewing fac tory hot rods and support brackets.

Pro Stock Although the wind had died down from Friday night, there was still quite a breeze blowing up the track and, on a cold surface, times were expected to be slower.

Everyone struggled in the day time conditions; but, as soon as what little sun there was went down, the wind dropped and condi tions greatly improved, as did the elapsed times in the final qualify ing session.

Joe Polito was again setting the pace, a superb 7.791/173.01 - the second quickest Pro run in history earning him the top spot.

Rob Tucker drove into second spot with a 7.848, followed by the Pontiacs of Peter Rigdeway (7.880) and Tony Wedlock (7.896) - Bruce Leake was marginally behind with a 7.903.

The two South Aussies drove into sixth and seventh spot, respective ly, Rob Quattrocchi recording a 7.923 and Gerry Parente running a 7.987.

Perth’s Andrew Kostecki, con testing his first Pro Stock round in the east (or south!), drove the ’96 Mustamg into the final spot with an 8.076.

After qualifying, Hans Van Dyk, Craig Hasted and Tony Cosolito were on the outside looking in; but.

THREE IN A ROW... Tony Wedlock claimed his third straight West End Springnats title. (Steven White pic)

Wedlock three*peats

Quattrocchi fails in bid to secure Pro Stock championship title when Perente pulled out with engine trouble. Van Dyk also couldn’t front, so 10th qualifier Hasted moved in.

While Parente and Van Dyk were downed by annoying breakages, Cosolito wasn’t as fortunate - on a qualifying pass and shortly after the traps, the Buick engine in the former Warren Johnson-owned Olds Firenza let go, a massive fire erupting, engulfing the front half of the car. Needless to say, Cosolito’s day was done.

Hasted would have been extremely happy to have made the field, albeit as an alternate, although his mind may have changed when he lined up against Polito.

Hasted gave it his best shot, leav ing on Polito .449 to a .561 before running his best time of the day an 8.170/169.42. However, Polito’s tough 7.800/172.84 assured his place in the semi-finals.

Numbers four and five qualifiers Wedlock and Leake met in round one at the West End Springnats for the second year in a row.

Leake decided the outcome with a red light - as he did in the final of the Nationals against Wedlock the Queenslander advancing with a 7.877/168.95.

Kostecki was another with the red light bug, a .335 light against Tucker ending his day - it was a disappointing way to exit, after running a tenth quicker than he

had all day with 7.934/168.72.

In the last pairing, Quattrocchi needed only to make round two to clinch the 1996 Pro Stock Championship, but against reign ing champion Peter Ridgeway it was no guarantee.

There’s an old cliche, “a race is won and lost at the start line” and lose is what Quattrochi did.

Ridgeway was first out the blocks with a fine .402 light, although Quattrocchi was no slouch either with a .433 rt.

Even though the Optus/Valvoline car ran over two hundredths quick er, Ridgeway got the win light, a 7.907/169.26 taking the money over a 7.883/171.00.

The first semi-final saw Tucker

and Ridgeway slug it out for a finals birth.

Ridgeway had the slight advan tage off the line with a .441 rt to Tucker’s .450; Tucker, however, had the horses to drive around Ridgeway and into the final with a 7.848/168.57 to a 7.931/168.69.

Wedlock was looking to advance into his third successive Spring Nats final, while Polito, who is the quickest man in the class, had other ideas.

Wedlock was the first away with a .461 rt to Polito’s .491 and, although Polito had proven he had plenty of power. Wedlock was still in front as they crossed the line, the Hi-Tec Oils car advancing with a 7.878/169.30 to Polito’s quicker 7.866/171.72.

Number two and four qualifiers Tucker and Wedlock contested the final, both laying down plenty of rubber in the burnout.

Tucker staged first, while Wedlock took plenty of time before finally pulling into stage.

In 7.910 seconds at 169.45 mph, the experienced Tony Wedlock then took out his third West End Springnationals title in a row, downing the gallant Rob Tucker.

Pro Stock Motorcycle The Castrol-sponsored Pro Bike Eliminator was contested by the lowest number of riders in years, the bracket attracting just five entrants - this figure declined fur ther when Les Kennewell renomi nated for Competition Bike.

The Donnon/Birrell Castrol Bike struggled early, before finally com pleting a full pass under power, resulting in a 7.738/169.33 card and top spot.

Igor Krasnowsky reeled off sever al quick times, his best, a 7.798, earning him second spot, while Dennis Ackland sat in third and Roly Gill in the final spot.

There was plenty of controversy concerning Donnon and Gill.

In somewhat strange circum stances, both riders left the start line before the tree was activated, the final outcome a disqualification for both riders and a guaranteed event win for whoever won the next race!

The clash between Krasnowsky and Ackland was far less confusing, Krasnowsky advancing into the final when Ackland cut a .344 red

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250clober1996 light - Krasnowsky, meanwhile, carded a 7.886/166.23 for a spot in the final, where he had no oppo nent.

The event win earned the Melbourne Kawasaki rider his third win for the season and a great shot at claiming the title at Eastern Creek.

Competition Fourteen runners competed in the ICI Auto Colour Dulux Competition Eliminator, making it one of the biggest fields seen in recent years.

Kim Cooney made a welcome return to racing aboard his popular Donovan-powered AA/Altered, qualifying twelfth, while Scott Ferguson rolled out his Tonkins Audio-backed Top Alky Dragster, getting in some practice laps in readiness for the ’97 Alky Championship season.

Mike Stewart’s golden fingers wrenched John Handley and the Genie/Castrol BB/Dragster into the 6.4s for the first time with a 6.492/202.61 card and put them into the number one spot, while Ray Walker piloted his B/Dragster into second place, with Wayne Cartledge and his C/Altered in third.

Frank Intini’s BB/Altered Production WB Ute was fourth, his best qualifying position, while the always consistent Jeff During rounded out the top five.

Handley lined up against the Blown Sigma of Ricky Monserrat in eliminations, Ricky being forced to shut down on the line and allowing Handley to cruise into round two.

Anguel Athanasov was the great improver in his AA/P Commodore, yet failed to put it all together and went down to Wayne Cartledge.

Walker won the B/Dragster bat tle against Rebekah Stewart with an 8.151/125.27, while Cooney met up with During, who advanced over the fast finishing Cooney Altered.

Lui Raschella was starting to get a handle on his JP-1 combination, but a red light advanced Intini.

Ferguson lost the blower belt during his burnout and one lucky

spectator took home a unique sou venir - opponent Rod Rainford moved into round two.

The stunning A/Altered of Chris Soldatos was another to advance courtesy of a red light, with Denis Heraper leaving early.

Top qualifier Handley earned the round two bye, an easy 6.741/167.59 moving him into the semis.

Intini dipped into the sevens in the ute with a 7.982/169.36, Rainford finding himself on the trailer as his 8.061/163.13 wasn’t quick enough.

Soldatos wound up the roadster to a 7.347/161.00 to end Cartledge’s campaign and During was another with a early night, going down to Walker, whose 7.687/171.16 outran During’s 8.458/154.45.

The first semi-final pairing pro vided the upset of the bracket.

Stewart had the Dragster tuned to the minute, Handley reeling of a stunning 6.438/211.21 - Soldatos, however, was no slouch, his 7.270/182.44 seeing him home over Handley’s rapid dragster.

Intini and Walker contested the second semi-final, Intini’s race com ing to an end as he was forced to back-off, allowing Walker to advance with a stout B/Dragster 7.687/171.16.

The final was over in .376 sec onds, Walker breaking the beams early and Soldatos cruising to Spring Nats glory.

It’s well worth pointing out that in order to win Competition Eliminator, Soldatos defeated the number one, two and three quali fiers - he was a deserving winner.

Super Stock Caltex Bolivar Gardens Super Stock Eliminator was again as tough as nails, racers coming from Queensland, Western Australia and Victoria, while there was also a strong local presence.

From WA, Ian Johns qualified top of the tree with his Chev-powered Falcon and, like many, was a heap under his class index.

Les Heintz had the Camaro in second spot, WA’s Steve Flynn was

in third - yet, come finals time, none were to be seen.

The opening round was dominat ed by red lights, with five of the eight paired runs decided on the line - Joe Ceravolo, Michael Zotti, Grant Williams, Wayne Robson and even Peter Sammut fell foul to red lights.

In round two, Dave Tucker faced Johns, Johns beating himself with a .379 light.

An all-C/Gas battle erupted between Eddie Vodopivic and Flynn, Vodopivic advancing with a 9.506/139.29 over Flynn’s troubled 10.421/85.86.

Heintz paired off against local Bob Sherry, who was again left on the line; but, doing it the hard way.

Sherry came from behind to take the win.

Simon Butterworth looked dan gerous, advancing into the semis after defeating Shane Baxter after downing the top qualifier.

Tucker enjoyed the bye run into the final.

The other semi promised to be a real fight to the end. Sherry versus Butterworth.

Sherry cut a .450 light, while Simon was a week behind with a .635 and that’s where he stayed, losing to a 10.271/130.90 with a 10.281/131.31.

The Sherry/Tucker final was a repeat of the ’94 final, which saw Tucker red light - it was a sweet victory this year for Tucker, as Sherry handed him the victory on a .389 light.

Competition Bike Seven riders contested the K&M Motorcycles Competition Bike, Sam Scerri astride his A/Street Bike topqualifying in the bracket.

Scerri earned the round one bye, while red lights again plagued the field.

Andy Wilson ran a 9.20 on his A/SB, opponent Kevin Lehmann redlighting; Les Kennewell, who swapped camps from Pro Bike, found himself against the Harley of Danny Grotto, who also redlighted.

Scerri and three-time Nationals winner Wilson contested an all-

A/SB semi-final, Scerri riding to a 9.151/154.08 for a place in the final, while Wilson recorded a losing 9.424/148.78.

The other semi saw two Harleys do battle, Grotto taking the easy win, Mark Gedye cutting a .391 cherry.

Scerri looked the goods all through qualifying and elimina tions, but it all fell apart in the final, Grotto carding a 9.140/140.66 and collecting the Springnats title over the troubled Scerri.

Modified The Gepps Cross Auto Salvage Modified Eliminator saw Anthony Selva top qualify his A/Modified Dragster with an 8.529, though Selva was ousted in round two by Mark Mitchell, who enjoyed the semi-final bye.

In the other half of the field, it was Mick Utting who won through to yet another Modified final.

Utting, renowned for his reac tions, was out first with a .436 to .474 rt - t meant little, though, a double breakout in the dyo bracket giving Mitchell, the reigning Nationals Champion, the win with a 8.771/142.45.

Super Sedan Sponsored by Cartronics, Super Sedan Eliminator consisted of 24 runners and was an extremely entertaining and competitive bracket.

After four tough rounds, Johnny lenco and Jason Grima emerged to fight out one more run.

Grima had put in the hours, trav elling from New South Wales, but the ride home would have been an enjoyable one, Grimma’s XJ Jag emerging victorious with a 11.792/75.93 over lenco’s troubled 15.99/55.04.

Super Street The Pro Action Spares Super Street Eliminator became a battle between two of South Australia’s best, Mick Yfantidis and Victor Romeo.

Romeo top qualified his XY GT with a 11.246, while Yfantidis qual-

3/

ified a respectable third, the pair then taking all before them before meeeting in the final.

Yfantidis drew first blood with a .424 to .519 rt advantage, before crossing the line ahead of Romeo and adding a ’96 Springnats trophy to the one he won in ’95.

Junior Dragster On his first time out. Dean Bragg enjoyed instant success, top qualify ing in the Scotcher Petroleum Junior Dragster bracket with a 12.243, but unable to make round two.

Kerry Mellett and Wade Kisyma both byed in their semi-finals, Mellett winning his first Springnats title with a 17.494/27.92 when, unfortunately, the chain on Wade’s car broke.

Modified Bike

Former Pro Bike runner Graeme Bickle rode his Suzuki into top spot ' with an 8.970 in the B & B Powder Coaters Modified Bike bracket.

However, it was the number eight and ten qualifiers, Stephen Chapman and Lino Ruggerio, who contested in final. Chapman riding to a win with a 10.922/112.05 to Ruggerio’s 11.189/120.59.

Super Gas Victorian Des Woolstencroft was one thousandths off perfection in top qualifying for the Coca-Cola Super Gas bracket after running a brilliant 9.901.

Jason Durack qualified into sec ond spot with a 9.918, while Hugo DiGianvincenzo’s Statersman earned third spot wich a 9.947 last year’s winner Rob Azzopardi was in ninth qualifying spot, run ning a too-quick 9.737.

Azzopardi worked his way through the field, defeating Harry Earls and then disposing of DiGianvincenzo in round two - he was then greeted with a semi bye, assuring him a place in the final.

In the final, Azzopardi left ahead of Ollie Farrugia, taking his second consecutive Springnationals win with a 10.335/123.01 over Farrugia’s slowing 11.645/117.52.

Dynomax supports Pro Stock series The first positive signs of Drag Racing Australia Pty Ltd’s _ the company set up by ANDRA and the country’s leading drag rac ing promoters towards the end of 1995 - extensive marketing efforts have begun to show with the announcement last week that Dynomax, the high perfor mance arm of muffler manufac turer Walker, has signed to sponsor the 1997 Australian Pro Stock Series.

In announcing the deal, ANDRA and Drag Racing Australia (DRA) Marketing Consultant Vic Wood said DRA had been working hard towards securing sponsors for all of the official ANDRA series and the joint efforts of ANDRA and the pro moters, through DRA, had con¬

tributed to the successful signing of Dynomax.

“Over the past year, Dynomax had become a prominent name on the start lines of all of our major tracks and this deal now completes the picture,” Wood said.

“We’re now working in unity through DRA towards a goal of hav ing all the Group One champi onship brackets sold to naming rights sponsors and this is a great first step.”

Damien Mount, Dynomax’s Product Manager, commented at the announcement that “ANDRA Championship Drag Racing is one of the fastest growing segments of Australian motor racing.

“Dynomax is delighted to both aid and share in this growth and

we are looking forward to the part nership with ANDRA, DRA and the Pro Stock class.”

Dynomax has strong links to drag racing in the US, with the company sponsoring such notables as five-time Winston champions Kenny Bernstein and Joe Amato, new Pro Stock champion Jim Yates, ‘first in the fours’ Funny Car racer Chuck Etchells and Top Alcohol Funny Car champion Pat Austin.

The 1997 Dynomax Australian Pro Stock Series will be run over five rounds, beginning at Calder Park Raceway in January and end ing in Queensland at the season ending Winternationals at Willowbank Raceway in June.

The series dates are: Round 1 January 11

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Dynomax’s Damien Mount said last week the company was thrilled to be involved with South

Australia’s premier motor sports facility Adelaide International Raceway also announced that HTI Communications, a St. Petersbased mobile phone and Telstra dealer, has signed on to sponsor the track’s November 9 Top Fuel Challenge meeting.

The eventwill feature Adelaide’s Bob Sherry in the Ostashkevich Brothers’ NEC fueller racing recent Japan International Top Fuel Series winner Robin Kirby.

“The addition of HTI Communications to the sponsorship portfolio of AIR has given the track a ‘full book’ of sponsors for the 1996/97 series,” AIR Marketing Consultant Vic Wood announced.

- GERALD McDORNAN

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38

25 October m Famed American chassis builder Don Ness was ‘on hand at the Springnationals and Victorian Championship rounds of the Pro Stock Series.

Ness, who has built cars for many of the NHRA and IHRA’s best Pro Stock teams, was lend ing a helping hand to South Australian Robert Quattrochi, whose Beretta was built by Ness.

Unfortunately, Ness’ input couldn’t help the Valvoline team maintain the series lead, Quattrochi losing in the first round of both events.

Report by GERALD McDORNAN

Three-time Australian Super Sedan champion Graeme Cooper’s stunning victory in the prestigious Andrew Rowe Memorial Super Stock trophy race last Saturday night at Calder Park Raceway over shadowed the magic penulti mate round of the Australian Pro Stock Championship, which saw the top three points scorers swap positions in the battle for the title.

Cooper, making his debut in the Group two bracket at the wheel of Tony Busscher’s championship-win ning A/Street Monaro, set both ends of the national A/S record on his way to an emotional win over former Australian champion Peter Sammut in the final round.

While happily accepting the pres tigious Andrew Rowe Memorial trophy, along with the Christmas tree for winning the Victorian Super Stock Championship, Cooper said that the victory was a dream come true.

“Tony Busscher encouraged me to begin drag racing back in 1980 and, at the first meeting that we went to, I ran Andrew Rowe in the final roimd,” he said.

“Those two guys were an incredi ble influence on my career and to win an event named in the honour of such a great racer and at the wheel of Tony’s car is a dream that I just never thought would be possi ble to achieve... it just means so much to me.”

Cooper’s victory, after qualifying fifth in the strong 12-car field, came at the end of a string of sub-index runs and with a reaction time aver age ofjust .442 of a second.

In the final. Cooper, who defeat ed Super Stock champions Les Heintz, Dave Tucker and top-quahfier Sammut in winning the title, reset the A/S national record to 10.09/133.

Sammut, a two-time winner of the classic event, left with little turbo boost in his Nissan Genuine Parts-backed Sammut Brothers 300ZX in the final - the cautious leave was an attempt to not over power the cold track, the result giv-

II 1”

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MAGIC TOUCH... Super Sedan champ Graeme Cooper came up trumps in Super Stock. (Thunder-Pics)

Cooper's Super Stock gold at Vic Champs

ing him a .667 rt and leaving his sub-index 8.24/168 short at the topend.

Despite being a little overshad owed by the emotional Super Stock win of Cooper, Pro Stock was as magnificent as usual, with Joe Polito finally prevailing over the 10-car field and, in winning the event, placing himself atop the points table with just one round of the series remaining.

Polito again top qualified his Computer Engine Design Ford Probe and drove to the final, where he met up with championship con tender Tony Wedlock.

With a slight performance disad vantage, Polito having set the two quickest runs of the event in the previous rounds. Wedlock took a chance on the lights and came up one-thousandth of a second short the win for Polito proved to be a

lucky one, as his Probe spun th e tyres and got out of shape on the cold track, the Sydneysider coasting through for the win.

With just 40 points separating points leader Robert Quattrochi, Wedlock and Polito before the event, the championship picture looked totally different at the event’s conclusion, Polito now lead ing on 540 points, with Wedlock second (520) and Quattrochi, who lost in the first round of racing for the second week in a row, third (510).

Polito set the low elapsed time of the event in the first round with a 7.815, while former champion Bruce Leake claimed top speed with a 172.44 mph charge.

“I suppose we deserve a bit of luck, as we’ve had the quickest car out there for most of the year; but we just haven’t been able to get

BEST engineered ... Racetech Award for Murray Anderson-built VR Commodore of Des Woolstencroft.

through to the fi nal,” Polito said after the event.

“Today we ran good and deserved a win for most of the day, but in the final we spun the tyres on the cold track.

“That’s when our luck came into play with Tony redlighting.

“It’s not the way you like to win, but this sport is just so tough you take a win any way you can get it.”

In other brackets contested on Saturday night at the Victorian Drag Racing Championships, the winners were Theo Pavlomanolakis (Competition Eliminator), Colin Linney (Competition Bike), Scott Fitzpatrick (Modified), Graeme Murphy (Super Sedan), Juan Kudnig (Super Street), the irre pressible Terry Emery (Modified Bike), Des Woolstencroft (Super Gas) and Scott Bettes (Junior Dragster).

The ANDRA Racetech Best Engineered Award was pre sented to Super Gas winner Des Woolstencroft for his beautiful Murray Andersonbuilt VR Commodore.

It was the first time that a car built by Anderson has been awarded the ANDRA Christmas tree.

The Melbourne chassis builder, who is about to relocate to Brisbane, has built a number of the nation’s leading cars, includ ing the world’s quickest and fastest doorslammer of Victor Bray.

Super Stock winner Graeme Cooper not only drove in the tin top’s premier sportsman bracket, but he also contest ed, as usual, Super Sedan with his infamous Bricklayer EH Holden wagon.

Despite being the only driver in Super Sedan history to have ever won more than one Australian title, Cooper didn’t last past the second round in the dial your own bracket.

Legendary Australian spare parts outlet Repco has taken over the naming rights to the famous drag racing lane, lane two, at Calder Park for the 1996/97 season.

The “Repco Lane” is the quick est and fastest aU-asphalt lane in drag racing in the world and it was the site of Australia’s firstever four second run, a 4.985, by Graeme Cowin in December 1993.

- GERALD McDORNAN

SMOKIN’JOE... Polito Probe now heads the points. (Thunder-Pics pics)

J

liOOY 'MOVa -

1996 NHRA TOP FUEL, FUNNY CAR & PRO STOCK CHAMPIONSHIP AFTER RACE 18 OF 19

PENHIDII T HERE

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1996 Top Fuel Standings 1361 Kenny Bernstein 1 161 2. Blaine Johnson 3. Cory McClenathan 1 136 1 121 4. Larry Dixon 1 102 5. Scott Kalitta 1024 6. Joe Amato 984 7. Mike Dunn 951 8. Connie Kalitta 934 9. Shelly Anderson 882 10. Eddie Hill

1996 Funny Car Standings 1909 I. John Force 1291 2. Tony Pedregon 1255 3. Cruz Pedregon 1067 4. Al Hofmann 991 5. Chuck Etchells 864 6. Del Worsham 862 7. Mark Oswald 742 8. Whit Bazemore 739 9. Kenji Okazaki 706 10. Gary Densham

1996 Pro Stock Standings 1648 I. Jim Yates 1341 2. Warren Johnson 988 3. Mike Edwards 955 4. Kurt Johnson 930 5. Steve Schmidt 884 6. Rickie Smith 883 7. Chuck Harris 787 8. Tom Martino 764 9. Jerry Eckman 718 10. Bob Glidden

1996 Pro Bike Standings 1047 I. John Myers 1025 2. David Schultz 900 3. Matt Hines 631 4. John Smith 542 5. Rick Ward 508 6. Hector Arana 456 7. Ron Ayers 442 8. Angelle Seeling 417 9. Steve Johnson 373 10.. Geno Scali

DRAG RACING Steve Barker became the quickest and fastest alco hol racer in Australia at the October 5 WiUowbank Raceway’s Whale Motors Pro Stock Challenge, Barker - wdth the help of good friend and Top Alky wiz Gary Phillips, record ing an unbelievable 5.811 at a huge 247.39mph.

Barker said that he has had the power available for quite a while with his PSIequipped 526 ci TFX engine, but has now got on top of the new clutch setup - as the 5.81 was recorded in less than ideal conditions, quick er times are now expected.

V

25 October 1996

39

Marker sets Alcohol pace

Rob Tucker top qualified in his Oldsmobile Cutlass ahead of Tony Wedlock, Craig Hasted and Mark Marchetti - unfortunately, Marchetti was unable to return after his round one solo as his engine had lost a number of rods.

On completion of the three rounds of racing. Tucker emerged victorious after

recording a string of 7.90s throughout the night and disposing of Wedlock in the last round with an 8.00/170mph to Wedlock’s 8.11/167mph.

The Tucker family success story continued when broth er Dave took out the final of Supercomp in his Camaro, defeating Jeff Watson in his Austin Healy Sprite.

The Top Alcohol dragster of Bob Brackam, driven by Dave Glenwright, also com peted in the Supercomp bracket, the team stepping up its act to record a best of 6.005/235mph during quali fying -Glenwright, however, was defeated in the second round by Dave Tucker.

Winners and runners-up in other brackets included

Aris Kontoleon over Steve Tatturn in Super Sedan, Russell Schafer over Paul Beauchamp in Modified, Ricky Steffens over Damien Howbrigg in Super Street, John Adin over Glenn Prowse in Comp Bike, Steve Krahe over Maurice IGng in Modified Bike, and Luke Crowley over Jodanna Pullen in Junior Dragster.

Graeme Cowin again brought his Shell/No Fear Rocketship up for testing and laid down a few hard launches trying to cure the tyre shake problem - his third tester was to be a full pass, but fuel problems resulted in rods letting go and Cowin crossed the line on fire to record a 5.28/228mph.

- KEN FERGUSON

This 318.69mph Bud is for you!

Dallas title stunner as King Kenny brains'em

When the famed Texas Motorplex opened back in the mid-’80s, track-owner and former child prodigy Funny Car racer Billy Meyer said that he built drag racing’s first super track because “major league baseball players play in major league base ball stadiums and so too should major league drag racers play in major league drag racing stadi ums.99 Ever since then, the drag racing world - even during the time Meyer had his much celebrated split from the NHRA while he owned the rival sanctioning body, the IHRA - has looked forward to its annual trip to the all concrete quarter-mile just outside Dallas.

In the past, the track hasn’t disappointed, with many of the world’s quickest and fastest runs - including Eddie Hill’s historic firstever four second run back in April, 1988 - being per formed at the facility.

And the 1996 Chief Auto Parts Nationals was just the same!

Kenny Bernstein came into the season’s penultimate event on October 13 holding a commanding points lead over his nearest rival, Larry Dixon in third place (the late, great Blaine Johnson still sat in second) and only needed to qualify and advance a round to claim his first Top Fuel title.

Qualify Bernstein did, tak ing out the top spot on his last effort with a 4.60-second elapsed time and storming to the fastest pass in the histo ry of drag racing - a stun ning 318.69 miles per hour!

Bernstein’s amazing pass, which converts to a terminal speed of 512.88 kilometres per hour, overshadowed twotime ’96 event winner Shelly Anderson, who reset the national speed record to 316.23 mph pass in her Parts America fueller - Anderson’s mark, though, survived the event, as Bernstein failed to back up his run within the required one percent.

Missing the record wasn’t too hard to take for Bernstein, though, as despite losing in the second round of eliminations, the Bud King secured his first Winston Top Fuel Championship and gave the native Texan the honour of being the only racer in his tory to win titles in both Top Fuel and Funny Car (four from ’85 to ’88).

Finally securing event honours at the Chief Auto Parts Nationals in Top Fuel was Cory McClenathan in the Joe Gibbs-owned McDonald’s digger, Cory Mac downing a tyre-smoking and outgoing Winston champion Scott Kalitta with a 4.746/301.91 to take the win.

In Funny Car, the big runs also came with the top four qualifiers, Tony Pedregon, John Force, Chuck Etchells and Cruz Pedregon all

recording four second elapsed times and the top six fuel coupe qualifiers all top ping 300 mph.

Tony Pedregon led the charge in his Force-owned Pontiac, running the second quickest et for a flopper in history, 4.909, to just head his boss.

On a championship basis, though, it was a race for sec ond spot, with Force having already secured his sixth Winston title a couple of months back.

Despite all the quick runs, though, none of the first four qualifiers was able to win the event, although Cruz Pedregon went closer than the rest, making the final round before being defeated.

Event honours went to stand-in driver Dale Pulde in the Smokin’ Joe’s Mustang, Pulde running his best run of the event - a 5.009/303 - to defeat the Cruzer’s tyre-blaz ing efforts in the mobile hamburger stand.

Pulde’s run in the Smokin’ Joes car, which next year will be labelled “Team Winston,” has been amazing since he stepped in to replace an injured W^it Bazemore Pulde has driven the car to its quickest and fastest runs ever, along with taking the team’s first win.

Perhaps the unluckiest driver in the fuel coupe ranks would have to have been A1 Hofmann, who lost in the second round to Cruz, despite redlighting.

TOP OF THE CLASS... Bernstein fought hard for the Top Fuel title. (Dave Ostaszew/ski)

Hofmann’s rapid Parts America/Havoline Pontiac, well-known for its spectacu lar wheels-up launches, looked like a 747 reaching for the heavens, before the sleek carbon-fibre body was blown off.

Hofmann’s mount then crashed back to earth, break ing the front wheels off and sending him into Pedregon’s lane - an automatic disquali fication!

Up to that point, Hofmann’s car had looked as though it was capable of tak¬

ing out the event, running consistent 5.0s at over 300 during qualifying.

In Pro Stock, Jim Yates took his McDonald’s Pontiac all the way through to the final round, his appearance in the final giving teamowner Joe Gibbs the honour of being the first to have team cars in the final of every professional bracket at the one meeting.

Yates not only defeated Kurt Johnson, who has won two out of the past three Chief Auto Parts Nationals,

but he also set low’^elapsed time at 6.97, while claiming his and Gibbs’ first Winston Championship.

In the alky brackets, new Winston Champions Bobby Taylor (Top Alcohol Dragster) and Tony Bartone (Top Alcohol Funny Car) both claimed the wins in their respective classes.

The final round of the 1996 NHRA Winston Drag Racing Series takes place at Pomona, California, this weekend.

- GERALD McDORNAN

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40 25October m A

II the Pro Stock chassis builders are busy at the moment as teams prepare for the 1997 season.

Jerry Haas is building Pontiacs for Steve Schmidt and Warren Johnson among others, while W.J has another car coming from Rick Jones’ R.J. Race Cars in Illinois and Schmidt also has a Ness car on order.

W.J. debuted a new Ness car in Dallas and the first full pass was a 7.032/196.76 that put him at the top of the initial qualifying list.

The Friday evening session saw the car make a hard right turn off the line and get out of the groove - Johnson fishtailed his way downtrack to a 7.05 effort and kissed the wail with the righthand door and quarter panel on the top-end.

The damage appeared to be only cosmetic, but the team scaled the chassis before Saturday’s final qualifying sessions.

that Schmidt’s leasing program is detrimental to Steve’s own inhouse race operation that fields son Troy Coughlin’s Olds.

Schmidt has always maintained that his customer motors are at least as good as his own and that fact, combined with the expertise of crew chiefs like Mike Edwards and Ken Sloan (Ray Franks), has often seen Steve eliminated by motors from his shop.

Jeg would prefer to have Troy and Steve as the only runners on the program and is evidently will ing to front with $1 million to see that happen,

Although Ingersoll missed the show with a best of 7.070, the motor made enough power that he ran nearly 196mph, despite the fact that the new intake manifold requires a different carburettor configuration that was not ready in time for the event.

The NHRA planning introin duce a ProisStock truckto class the near future.

In 1997, a limited number of trucks will make exhibition passes at approximately ten national events to test the waters and the following year will see the intro-

SFI 25-1 spec and the body rules will probably follow those for the Pro class, as existing currently.

The NASCAR truck series has proven the viability of racing a style of vehicle that nearly every household has at least one of and it is obvious that any further venue to showcase trucks will meet with approval from the manufacturers.

Two other truck classes are in the works as well.

One is for lightly modified trucks and the other is for a full blown (literally) funny truck with a nitro burning motor.

In the fuel class, the percent-

I

ark Osborne has sold his Pro Stock operation in its entirety to Adam Landolfi, who has recent ly been competing in one of the few Pontiac Grand Prix entries on the NHRA tour.

Osborne has made a few recent guest appearances iti the Kirk family’s IHRA Dodge Avenger, but will evidently be get ting out of Pro Stock completely.

The problem seems to be the cost of being competetive lately.

Osborne has some support from Mama Rosa’s Pizza, but even with help from local associ ates who retail the frozen pizza line, the dollars are not there to support the sort of operation it takes to be successful.

R

-M-A were planning to debut the latest edition of their own engine at Dallas, as they feel that they are finally getting back to the point where they will have enough power to make the show.

If the initial attempts at the Motorplex are unsuccessful, Morgan hopes to have a new bul let available for the team that was once the horsepower leader in the category.

The R-M-A team recently con fided to another of the leading crew chiefs that the variations between motors are so subtle now that, even if they had the Morgan bullet apart in their shop, they would probably not be able to define the differences that make that motor competitive and theirs an also ran.

R

umours are circulating lately that there may be a split approaching between Steve Schmidt and the Jegs crew.

The earlier story had both cars running under the Jegs banner in 1997, but evidently the Columbus speed equipment honcho feels

Late news fromhis Dallas has Jerry Haas getting gorgeous A/A ’Vette upside down on the top-end during the first round of Comp.

Evidently the car was not heavily damaged, but it will probably not be at Pomona for the World Finals.

Jerry had carded a 6.78 effort at Topeka to put the index under competition committee scrutiny again.

Hurley Blakeney’s AA/AT Thunderbird was also hooked up with a 6.67 clocking and before Dallas the indexes had been adjusted down to 7.30 for AA/AT and 7.39 for /VA, with the result that both cars qualified well down the order in 14th and 18th places, despite the Angio Laz Ford’s stout 6.768 and the Vette’s 6.870.

G

M

Former Comp elim runner Krisher debuted a new Ron Pro Stock Firebird at the US Nats, but was well off the qualifying pace due to a lack of horsepower.

Attempting to remedy that defi ciency, he headed to Topeka with a bundle of cash and made moves to purchase some power.

He eventually talked Larry Morgan out of the motor that has been in the Rehr-Morrison-Allen Pontiac of late, but if cost him $125,000 - an attempt to pur chase a motor from Richard Maskin was rebuffed, despite an offer of $200,000.

Krisher’s company manufac tures wiring looms for General Motors and evidently does it well enough that he can effort to go racing first class.

With Force in the fours every round and Tony joining him there in the semis with a 4.922 to 5.027 defeat of his brother, it was probably the best flopper action seen in several seasons,

ina Trett recently announced that the family will continue with the Trett’s Speed and Custom business, following Elmer’s tragic death.

Gina was a major part of the business, as well as being the crew chief on her dad’s bike and will continue to supply compo nents to both two and four wheel racers.

Elmer’s good friend Jim Head has been using Trett Speed com ponents on his Top Fuel dragster and recently increased the size of the signage on the car denoting that fact.

LAST PASS... Trettfamily business will continue, despite tragic loss ofElmer(above) at US Nats. (Keith Burgan pic)

STRAIGHT LINES

by Keith Burgan,USA The problem is that Schmidt currently has 10 of his frontline engines out in the field and, at $200,000 for a season lease, that adds up to double what Jegs is will ing to put up.

Crew chief Mark Ingersoll is one of the best out there, but with two cars to look after he is obviously not going to be able to spend the time on each that an Edwards or Sloan is able to devote,

o

duction of the category on a full schedule if the reaction is positive.

Currently, trucks are the biggest-selling vehicles in the US, with Ford and GM moving approxi mately half a million full-size pick ups each per year.

The new class will feature the mid-size trucks (Ford Ranger, Chevy S10, GMC Sonoma and Dodge Dakota), with small block engines running a single four bar-

I

age of notro will probably be restricted to slow the trucks down. as even a modified truck is somewhat lacking aerodynamically.

I

f you take John Force out of the equation, the current parity in Funny Car is apparent, especially on a good track.

At Topeka, 5.0 passes were the order of the day in elimina tions, with four pairings in the opening round lighting up the display boards with sub-teen efforts from both lanes.

Two were decided by holeshots, with Worsham’s 5.075 holding off Pulde’s 5.054 and Tony Pedregon also dump i ng Hofmann, 5.099 to 5.092 Wilkerson over Oswald (5.071 to 5.088) and Skuza over Okazaki (5.010 to 5.069) completed the

n the subject of Ingersoll, the son of former comp elim stand Both the out Buddy, Mark Pedregon broth has again been ers were in the back in the drizone in round ver’s seat of a Pro two, with Tony’s car, as he used 5.005 outrunning the team’s 1995 W i I ke rs 0 n’s car to shake down BACK ON TRACK... Pro Stock returnfor Mark Ingersoll.(Burgan pic) 5.105 and Cruz a prototype of Schmidt’s 1997 engine combo at rel carburettor. The chassis will getting the holeshot win over have to comply with the current Skuza, 5.067 to 5.063.

Topeka.

Lots withof the rumours announcement were put to rest in Dallas that Alan Johnson will field a Top Fuel entry in 1997 with backing from R. J. Reynolds.

The Smokin’ Joe’s logo will not adorn the car, however, as R.J.R. will switch the signage to the Winston brand, which will see both the digger and Whit Bazemore’s flopper in red and white next year.

Although Cory McClenathan did not get the nod as the shoe of the Johnson car, another TAD driver will be graduating to the major league, as Gary Sceizi will be at the wheel when the team debuts at Pomona in February.

Tony Schumacher proved that his Indy final round appear ance was no “one hit wonder” deal when he stopped the clocks at 4.77/310.77 in the first round at Topeka.

He lost to Jim Head, who was a hair quicker at 4.75, but it was by far the best outing ever for the Peek Brothers La-Bac entry.

The StarSeeling Racing teama lot and Angelle copped of flak at and after Topeka.

Angelle’s decision not to con test the final against team-mate John Myers, despite the fact that she had run quicker than Myers in every round, was greeted with boos from the fans on hand and a torrent of debate on the online news sen/ices.

Anyone else may have not raised as much response, but Seeling has been an instant hit with the fans and the media since her debut.

The fact that she holds the national record and has outqualified the toughest-ever fields at the last two races has only added to her aura and it will be interesting to see if she can win the champi onship next year.

As it is, she will be in the 1996 Top 10, despite only running a small part of the season.

1

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250cloberWS6

A breathtaking finish to the Beechwood Homes Super Sedan Top Gun Premiership opening round at the Wynn’s Newcastle Motordrome saw Australian champion John Pyne take an early lead in the eight round series.

John Pyne had to battle it out in a great duel from the rear with his brother Ron Pyne, whose race fin ished early after he climbed a wheel on Glen Russell’s Camaro and hit the concrete wall on the back straightaway.

Driving the Teterin Engineering Camaro, John Pyne went on to snatch the feature win on the last corner of the last lap from Wagga driver Garry Curran (Pontiac), who tried everything to hold out the champion, but to no avail.

Finishing in third place was Weston driver John Lodge in the Kurn Wreckers Commodore, with last week’s feature race winner Robert Carrig driving the Manual Transmission Commodore in fourth place.

John Pyne showed his supremacy early, winning his first heat from Ron Pyne, Carrig and John Brown

■V

A IT AIN’T EASY... Sprintcar action at Premier Speedway. (Swanson pic)

Once again, the highlight on the The Victorian Speedcar Drivers Association kickstarted its 16plus meeting season at the media day scheduled for Geelong’s Avalon Speedway last Sunday.

The event was held in conjunc tion with the SRA and was followed by a practice session in the after noon.

Redline Speedway Ballarat will host the first race meeting at mid day on Sunday, November 10, fol lowed by a welcome return to the Bendigo track on December 7.

Other meetings are listed for Nyora, Bairnsdale, Simpson, Avalon, Wangaratta, Corowa, Swan Hill and Redline, with the Australian titles being run in Adelaide on February 12-15.

'The VSDA ’95/96 Rookie of Year, Paul Farrell, will continue to drive for Bob Southouse’s #22, but the JSR/Volvo unit he drove successful ly last season will be updated to a very potent Fontana/Beast chassis combination, Farrell joining six time and reigning Victorian

over Sydney drivers John Kennedy and Scan Barnett in the Tony’s Auto Parts Litrecar Final.

The Pitcrew Handicap Feature was won by Jeff Pickering, after a great drive through the pack Jason Begg, Barnett and Kennedy claimed second, third and fourth, respectively, with Mel Guy finish ing in fifth place.

In Streetstock Sedans, Garry Morris drove the Bulleye Parts R Us Commodore to a great win in the Marathon Tyres Jackpot Final, ahead of John Perkins and Bruce Johnson.

MOTERS Assoc

Ryan Sullivan (above right, Mike Patrick pic) from Adelaide has enjoyed a busy time in Europe this season, having also ridden for Torun in the Polish League in between racing for Peterborough in the British League.

The young Australian may have been disappointed not to qualify for the Grand Prix via the Challenge Round, but he has helped his club team to the play-off final for the Polish Title, where they will meet Czestochowa - they beat Gorzow over two legs in the semi-final, with over 12,000 watching the second leg where Jason Crump (10 pts) was -TONY MILLARD joint top scorer for the losers.

Premier calendar

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5*'

A 12-race schedule has heen reJeased for Warrnambool’s Premier Speedway’s 1996/97 racing season.

The club’s annual general meeting saw Bill Hicks chosen as the new President and the Racing Director will be Jamie Nicolsen.

mars

John Pyne Top Gun and repeating the win in the second heat, this time from Carrig, Brown and Allan Starling in the McGuigan Wines Pontiac.

John Pyne, now on 11 points, leads the Beechwood Homes Top Gun Premiership Series by three points from arch-rival Brown in the Terry Olsen Transport Camaro and John Lodge, both drivers on eight points with Carrig.

Brown had earlier won the Tooheys Stars dash in brilliant form from Pyne, Lodge and Carrig.

In other events, local Litrecar driver Mel Guy had a runaway win

41

club’s program will be the 25th running of the Grand Annual Sprintcar Classic on the Australia Day week end, January 25-26, which will include the annual Kele & Associates Australian-American Challenge Cup, which is a joint venture between Premier and Knoxville Raceway in the USA.

An open practice will be held on November 9 and the first meeting will be round five of the touring World Series Sprintcars on December 7, followed by the TriCity Super Sedan Challenge on Boxing Day - January 1 sets the scene for the club’s busiest month and the return of World Series Sprintcars, while the January 4 event will feature A Modified Production Saloons and Sportsmans.

A week later. Premier hosts Round 5 of the Hoosier SRA Series for Victorian Sprintcars.

The track’s unique Photographic Exhibition will be held at the

Warrnambool Regional Art Gallery until February 2, highlighting this famous track and the highlights of the Grand Annual Classic.

The weekend of January 17-18 sees the A Modified Production Saloons contest their Victorian title round and there’s also the possibili ty of a Challenge Series round for FSOOs. Then it’s the main event on the Sprintcar calendar, the 25th anniversary of the Grand Annual Classic.

The annual fan appreciation day and free barbecue will be held on Saturday, January 25, as well as heats for the GASC later that

evening, with the final the follow ing day.

The Classic will be supported by the Super Sedan Blue Ribbon, as well as Super Rods.

On February 15, the club will host the Victorian Sprintcar Title and again be supported by the pop ular Super Rod division.

One month later on March 15, National Rods, Standard Saloons and the three-litre Production Saloons will be in action.

The finale for the club is the annual Easter Sprintcar Trail on March 30, which also includes the ever-popular fireworks display.

- GEOFF ROUNDS

Bumper season ahead for Victorian Speedcars

Champion Ray “Noddy” Bishop in the #0 car - Bishop has updated to a new Stealth chassis with the rebuilt Gaerte of last season.

Mark Brown (#33) - who has a new Stealth/Duggan combination is the third member of the Merc Bits team, which took out the trifecta in last season’s pointscore championship.

Ray Bishop’s sons, Damien and Haydn, will continue to share the drive in last season’s JSR/Autocraft #10 car, also owned by Southouse.

John “Silver Fox” Mills will con¬

Max Dumesny Motorsport

Colin Patterson will steer his potent 4# D&F Turbo Camira.

The Smith brothers, Shane (#55) and Craig (#88), will continue to campaign their twin Smeast/Mazda rotaries, their dad, Eric, piloting the #11 JSR/Nissan SR20-powered car owned by Bert Parker.

Graham Summers (#23) hopes to improve upon his Most Improved award last season in his JSR/Volvo and Rob Winstanley (#43), will be in yet another JSR/Volvo.

Making a return is Allan “Butch” Nankerville who, driving his new

JSR/Mitsubishi Magna and carry ing his dad’s old #18, will join Mitsubishi-powered Kevin Spark, the #17 Rick Saunders Mazda, the new Pearce/supercharged Nissan #51 of Paul Bignell, Richard Emmerson’s JSR/Mazda #37 and John Fitzgerald Jr in the #94 Pearce/V6 Volvo.

Mark Newnham’s Lewis/Toyota #99, Tony Oates’ Smith/Mazda #77 and Mark Patton in the JSR/Toyota round out the impressive Speedcar line-up.

- DAVID PARKER

1996 WORLD OF OUTLAWS/SKOAL OUTLAW SERIES

agents for

J(bo$irr j ^ ^ RACING TIRE

tinue with #9 Pyroil/Power Racing and enjoy the power of a V4 Scat engine in a coil front-end Beast chassis - Craig (#5) and Darren Power (#59) will also drive V4 Scats, but swap the team’s Mongrel and coil chassis with each other.

There is a very strong rumour that Ian “Fly” Lewis will drive the very quick #13 Canaday/Stewart owned by Bob Boast, while Wayne Pearce continues to recover from his horrific last-season prang.

Recently-married Peter Ghent will be in his #03 JSR/Gaerte and

®

for more information on Hoosier Drag and Speedway Tyres call 02 9679 1990

POINT STANDINGS TO OCTOBER 20, 1996

I.

Mark Kinser

2.

3.

4.

Dave Blaney Sammy Swindell Steve Kinser

5.

6.

Jeff Swindell Stevie Smith

7.

8.

9.

10.

Andy Hillenburg Joe Gaerte Johnny Herrera Jac Haudenschild

10,002 9,630 9,407 9,390 9,313 9,134 9,106 8,894 8,801 7,939

I I. Joey Saldana 12. Lance Blevins

13. Jim Carr 14. Greg Hodnett IS. Brian Paulus 16. Danny Lasoski 17. PaulMcMahan 18. Dion Hindi 19. Jeff Shepard 20. Donny Schatz

7,928 7,832 6,938 S,87S S,449 4,161 2,363 2,3S0 2,071 2,041

I.

23RD WINTER NATIONALS A-MAIN (30 LAPS) DEVILS BOWL SPEEDWAY - OCTOBER 19 Mark Kinser

2.

3.

Jeff Swindell Steve Kinser

4.

S. 6.

7.

8.

9.

10.

Dave Blaney Andy Hillenburg Joe Gaerte Johnny Herrera Danny Lasoski Jim Carr Tommie Estes, Jr.

I I. 12.

13.

14.

IS. 16.

17.

18.

19.

Joey Saldana Greg Hodnett Sammy Swindell Jac Haudenschild Stevie Smith PaulMcMahan Tim Shaffer Mike Peters Lance Blevins

20. Van Gurley, Jr.

42 25October m DARWIN SPRINTCAR CHARG ER PETER McIVER, pictured left by Brad Steele, was the winner of last month’s Red Centre Shootout, NT Title and KFC Sprintcar Spectacular.

As reported in the last issue of Motorsport News, Mclver was the fastest time trialler during the KFC Sprintcar Spectacular at Darwin’s Northline Speedway and a heat winner on both nights.

After winning the top six shootout, Mclver poled and was never headed in the feature.

Then it was off to Alice Springs for the Red Centre Shootout and the Northern Territory Title at Arunga Park Speedway.

Mid-week, Mclver level-pegged Dave McFadden with heat points and then led the troubled feature to take the flag ahead of McFadden, South Aussie Mark Gilbert, David Greatz and Brett Spiers.

The following weekend’s speed fest kicked off with McFadden tak ing two heat wins to Mclver’s one, though a poor draw saw top pointscorer McFadden in position four and Mclver on the front row for Friday’s feature, which Mclver led all the way.

The next evening, Mclver expe rienced handling problems, but seized the lead from Wayne Bunker after a yellow and headed the field till the flag.

Second home was Gilbert, then Tony Connor, Charlie Camilleri, and Greatz.

-BRAD STEELE

VIC Compact season

A thirteen race calendar and increased prize money are fea tures of the Victorian Compact Speedcar Club’s upcoming speedway season.

With the Australian Compact Speedcar Championship being held in Victoria this season, the club is expecting an increase in local car numbers, with fields of 15 to 20 cars per race and between 50 and 60 cars for the Australian Title.

Defending Australian champion Julie Murphy (nee Vine), her broth er Darren Vine and Garry Hudson are expected from Queensland, along with Rob and Mick Rawlings from Canberra and, of course, local guns Gordon and Brian Cardwell.

In a change from normal title procedure, the event will be a single Gold Coast Super Sedan driver Jamie McHugh scored his maid en feature race victory with a gutsy, if somewhat controver sial, performance at Archerfield Speedway on October 5.

Organisers couldn’t have hoped for a better start to the inaugural Hi-Tec Oils Super Series, with a thrilling 25 lap feature event that wasn’t settled until the final turn when McHugh - who inherited the lead with just six laps remaining after a broken axle sent Paul O’Neill to the infield - withstood a desperate last corner lunge from veteran John Leslight to clinch vic tory.

These two had clashed earlier whilst fighting for the lead in an incident that sent McHugh’s Miami Smash Repairs Falcon spinning to a halt against the back straight fence - stewards correctly judged the clash to be a racing incident and reinstated McHugh in the lead for the charge to the chequer.

Leslight’s impressive showing aboard his new American Truck Parts Camaro was soured some-

day format, with scrutineering from early morning and racing commenc ing at about 4.00 in the afternoon.

The Australian title is to be held at Bendigo’s Prince of Wales Showgrounds on Saturday, January 25.

Victorian Compact Speedcar Club Calendar Oct 26 Myrtleford Nov 2 Bendigo Nov 16 Myrtleford Nov 30 Rosedale Dec 14 Rosedale Vic. Championship & Curren Memorial Dec 26 Bendigo Dec 28 Swan Hill Jan 25 Bendigo Aust. Championship

Feb 8

Simpson Presidents Cup Mar 1 Bendigo Mar 9 Wattle Park Mar 22 Wangaratta Apr 6 Ballarat(Redline) - BRETT SWANSON

Kinser tour Dates for the upcoming summer season tour by American sprint car legend Steve Kinser have now been finalised.

Kinser, who is being brought to Australia by the influential Mike Raymond, will confine his appear ances to east coast venues in a four week whistle stop tour during December and January.

Kinser has been booked for 11 shows, commencing on December 21 and concluding on January 11.

The 14-times World of Outlaws titleholder will commence his tour at Avalon Raceway in Geelong Victoria, following up with appear ances at Canberra’s Fraser Park Raceway, Newcastle International Motordrome, Wagga International Raceway and Brisbane’s Archerfield Speedway - Sydney will be the busiest stop-off for Kinser, where he will compete in five race meetings.

Kinser will again be accompanied Down Under by long-time associate Brian Healey, who will fill his cus tomary role of team manager.

Steve is leaving nothing to chance for this latest Australian campaign and will bring two facto ry-fresh Maxim sprintcars with him, several spare engines and a container full of spare parts.

Since his last Aussie jaunt during the 1992-93 season, Kinser always pledged that if he “found time” he would include another Australian tour into his packed schedule.

It’s taken four years to eventual ly become a reality and word is Kinser is approaching this tour more seriously than any other pre vious southern commitment.

Kinser heads to Australia fresh from another big season on the American World of Outlaws sprint car trail.

Driving his own Quaker State Maxim, Kinser has again been a

prominent runner on the trail and consistently rates among the top five runners in the World of Outlaws point standings, though it’s been cousin Mark Kinser who has won the accolades as the stand out performer on the 1996 champi onship trail.

Since we last watched Kinser race in Australia, his career has taken a few notable twists and turns.

He moved from the elevated sta tus of Karl Kinser’s driver to International Race of Champions (IROC), then became a Winston Cup racer, enjoyed a stint of IndyCar testing for the AJ Foyt team and eventually finished up as the owner of his own sprintcar team.

During all this shuffling, there have also been a few lows as well.

His stint with the Kenny Bernstein NASCAR team was hardly the highlight of his career before he returned to what he does best- and that’s drive sprintcars.

The 1996-97 Australian tour was discussed earlier this year prior to the running of the Knoxville Nationals.

Kinser agreed in principle, before the tour was rubber-stamped a few weeks later.

Earlier plans tentatively had a West Australian date, but the hec tic schedule did not allow for the long haul for the equipment across the Nullabor.

The tour dates are as follows; December 21 (Avalon, Vic), December 26, (Parramatta City Raceway, NSW), December 27 (Fraser Park, ACT), December 28 (Newcastle NSW), January 1 (PGR), January 4(PGR), January 5 (Wagga), January 7 (Newcastle), January 8 (Archerfield, Qld), January 10 PGR,Januar}^ 11 PGR. - DENNIS NEWLYN

Kelly tops Lindberg at Archerfield

Former Queensland champion John Kelly was in vintage form at Archerfield Speedway on September 28 when he stormed to victory in the Sprintcar fea ture race ahead of Paul Lindberg and Toowoomba’s Andrew Scheurele.

Despite a small field of just eleven cars at the season-opener.

Kelly had to work overtime to make his way to the front, provid ing his new sponsor Hi-Tec Oils with the perfect initiation to Sprintcar competition when he took his glistening black Tognotti into the.lead with just four laps to run.

Lindberg moved into second spot a lap later when Scheurele mis-

cued his entry into turn one and bounced over the cushion, leaving a gap on the inside that was quick ly filled by Lindberg’s brand-new red Hi-Tec Tognotti.

Scheurele (Pennzoil Tognotti) remained in third, ahead of a hard charging Barry Lawrence (FAI Insurance Gambler).

- CHRIS METCALF

McHugh breaks through what by his unsportsmanlike behaviour after the race.

Although only 15 cars fronted, the heat racing was top notch, with wins recorded by McHugh, O’Neill, Shane Paulger and Tim O’Shea.

A notable absentee was former national champ Allan Butcher, who parted company with car owner Barry Pearce prior to the event.

O’Shea topped the pointscore and looked likely to grab pole position for the final until his immaculate Cooroy Auto Wreckers Falcon broke a con rod as he prepared for his run against the clock, inflicting some serious damage to the engine.

With John McGeorge and Wilson Boyd also failing to take their place in the field, just 12 cars faced the green in the feature, with O’Neill and Paulger sharing the front row.

McHugh and Ian Marshall were next, followed by Peter Warren, Leslight, Wayne Randall (substitut ing for Butcher in a new Pontiac), Graeme Lehmann, Don Birt, Darryl Dimmick, Robert Baker and John O’Mara.

The first half of the race was very straightforward, with O’Neill estab lishing a 100 metre lead over Paulger’s Pontiac within six laps.

Randall exited the action very early on lap 2, leaving Paulger, McHugh, Marshall and an impres sive Warren in a five-car scrap for the minors.

McHugh demoted Paulger to third on lap 10 and then Leslight pushed the Gympie dairy farmer back another spot six laps later.

The race continued until lap 19, when a track marker was pushed

onto the circuit in turn two - at the ensuing restart, O’Neill slowed dra matically with a snapped axle, as McHugh dived underneath to assume the front running.

Several cars made contact as they swerved to avoid O’Neill’s stricken John Chant Motors Camaro, prompting officials to halt the race again.

Only one more circulation had been completed when the two lead ers made contact in turn two, bring ing about the final restart with five laps to go.

With no power steering at his disposal for the final laps, McHugh’s speed dropped consider ably as he struggled to maintain control of the race.

Leslight kept looking for a gap on the inside when an outside run may

have been more productive, but couldn’t find any room whatsoever until the chequered flag was in sight.

Exiting the final turn, Leslight drew alongside McHugh, but was unable to edge ahead before the line.

Paulger’s retirement late in the race promoted Marshall into third, with fourth-placed Warren the only other runner on the lead lap.

Lehmann, O’Mara, Dimmick and Baker also made it to the finish, collecting valuable series points along the way.

Michael Gee took out the Litre Sprintcar feature event, ahead of Col White, Keith Blatch, Bruce Ayers and newcomer Sean Hannigan.

- CHRIS METCALF

25 October W96

Vintage year for Aussies abroad It has been something of a vin tage domestic season in England for Australian riders, even if many are still bedevilled by the problem of work permits to allow them to race at all in the British League.

Steven Johnstoii has topped the averages for unfashionable Long Eaton and was named by their sup porters as “Rider of the Year.”

Jason Crump won the British Round of the Grand Prix series and finished top of the average for his club Peterborough.

Craig Boyce, at Poole, proved to be that club’s top rider, as did fol low Sydney rider Leigh Adams at London Lions.

Shane Parker topped the scorers for Middlesborough in what looks like being that club’s final season, following their Cleveland Park track being sold for development.

The qualification by Adams for next year’s Grand Prix proved as unlikely as it was unexpected after

his form in the overall series; but it was nevertheless very welcome, as he’s the only Aussie to make it there for next season.

“I was really lucky with Simon Wigg’s engine failure when we met, but I’m not really worried now I’m through,” Adams said of his perfor mance in the Grand Prix Challenge in Prague.

“I feel I have a had a lot of bad luck with injuries this season and I’ve also messed up a lot. I guess it started coming my way as the year went on, though and now I’m delighted to be there for next sea son.

“I am going back home to Australia soon to have my damaged shoulder looked at and I am getting married on November 30 - that should be a great day.

“I think my year’s experience in the Grand Prix will be good for me next season. It is great to be back in it. I can’t say I have enjoyed it, as it’s been a real uphOl battle for me

this year. But it is going to be good now. I will sit down and plan ahead, after opening the wedding presents of course,” Adams added.

For Craig Boyce, it is ‘start all over again’ in the Grand Prix.

“It has been a long struggle for me in the last two years, but I won’t be struggling next year,” Boyce said with a smile.

“I hope I will enjoy my speedway more again. Sometimes it becomes a pain in the neck.

“It’s great to be in the Grand Prix and it is good for sponsors, but mentally it does get you down.

“I am not sure I would not prefer to go back to the old-style World Final. The GP has had good TV cov erage and that’s good for the sport, but it certainly does not have the unique atmosphere of a one-off

1

final.

“I will be trying my best to get back into the GP next season ... it’ll be tough, but I’ll give it a go,” Boyce concluded.

-TONY MILLARD

NOT SOLO... Leigh Adams is going down the aisie. (Mike Patrick pic)

UK promoters step Positive response by back from '97 GP Great Britain’s Speedway pro moters have said they do not want to stage a Grand Prix next season, as they lost money in promoting the Hackney event where under 5,000 turned up to watch.

Each staging nation has to guar antee the FIM around $50,000 to stage a Grand Prix meeting and the British promoters says it is simply not worth it.

Poland, who will have three rid ers in next year’s series, has offered to stage two meetings at Bydgoscz and Wroclaw, with Wroclaw stag ing the opening Grand Prix of Poland in May and Bydgoscz run ning a Grand Prix of Europe at the end of August.

But television companies are far from keen on this and are suggest ing that they might absorb the

costs of each Grand Prix, instead of the staging nations.

In return, the TV people would expect the advertising and sponsor ship rights, with the staging nations keeping the attendance receipts.

Meanwhile, the TV rights them selves are being disputed, Danish company TV3 who has held the rights for the last two years is con sidering withdrawing from the con tract after riders refused to wear helmet cameras in the final meet ing in Vojens.

Production company Nordisk Film and the multi-national British company Chrysalis TV are under stood to be interested in taking up the rights - Chrysalis has secured the contract for the production of FI car racing for next year.

-TONY MILLARD

VIC Mod Prods to new fuel and injection regs A number of Victorian A Modified Production competi tors are taking advantage of the new rules which allow unlead ed fuel and fuel injection on certain models and are busy building new cars.

Portland’s Rod “Squid” Smith has an immaculate new VR Commodore nearing completion, featuring an expensive MoTeC engine manage ment system - rumours suggest that this car is putting out 300hp on the dyno.

Darren Cockerill has also built a new VR Commodore with fuel injec¬

tion, but it differs from Smith’s in that it runs the standard Holden computer and engine management system, though with a Chev Off road Marine Engines (C.O.M.E.) non-programmable modified chip.

Trevor Mills is updating from his highly successful VL Commodore with the ex-Jason Flanagan VN model from Canberra.

Mills has stripped the car down to a bare body shell for a complete rebuild and intends to build it up with a fuel injected motor.

Mildura’s Peter “Spider” McCarthy, who along with business

partner Harold Brennan is promot ing the opening round of the SRA Hoosier Sprintcar Series at Timmis Speedway, has brought a brandnew VS Commodore body shell, but will stick with his immaculate look ing VK Commodore for the current season.

Ricky Clark has built a new VN Commodore but, unlike the rest, it will be powered by methanol through a carby.

Andrew Blackwell also joins the A Modified ranks, with a newlybuilt VN Commodore.

-BRETT SWANSON

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44 25October m

Oceania Champs for Melhourne The 1997 Oceania Championships will be held at the Melbourne Kart International Raceway located in Port Melbourne from January 22-26,1997.

The annual Oceania Championships were award ed to Australia after intense lobbying from Australia’s delegate to the CIK, Pat Clarke, who was accompa nied by John Pizarro to the CIK meeting After applying to host the event earlier in the year, the CIK firstly rejected the appli cation put forward by the GoKart Club of Victoria - how ever, the club put forward a reviewed and ugraded pro posal which was approved in Paris on October 14.

The Go-Kart Club of Victoria has received out standing support from the Lord Mayor of Melbourne, Premier Jeff Kennett(who is an honorary member of the club) and, according to club spokesman Peter Rowsell, the club is “absolutely delighted to be hosting such a significant motor racing event.

“Despite the enormous workload we have ahead of us, we are relishing the task of hosting the very first international kart race of the

A

s we draw closer to Christmas - and it’s only eight weeks away - we must all be thinking that the sporting seasons should just about be finished.

Well, this is certainly not the case with Sprint Karting.

While The Nationals and State Championships have already been run and won, in this economic climate most clubs around south east Queensland and north ern NSW are trying to attract as many entries as possible to their events to boost their individual earn ings.

Europeans, who certainly are 1997 Championship season.” not used to and do not appre Support has also been forthcoming from newly- ciate travelling large dis elected AKA President, Mr tances to and from race cir cuits.

Bob Edjwean.

An added bonus is that “We are pleased that our Australian drivers have a private testing will take chance to match their skills place at the circuit, both prior to and after the event. against world class competi All three major tyre com tors on their own soil,” he said. “We are delighted that panies (Vega, Dunlop and the Go-Kart Club of Victoria Bridgestone), along with will host the event and know many of the manufacturers, that our karters will get will utilise this opportunity behind the event to make it while they are in Australia.

The manufacturers are successful”.

At the recent World especially keen to test, as Championships held at 1997 is the start of the three South Garda in Italy, many year chassis homologation period - at this stage, it is of the top teams were excited about the prospect of racing unclear whether spectators will have access to these test. in Melbourne because of the A major sponsor is close to tremendous publicity gener being signed for the event, ated by the Transurban which is the first interna Formula 1 Grand Prix held tional kart race to be held in at Albert Park.

Interest from the world’s Melbourne.

Bridgestone Australia, one greatest kart racers and fac of Australian karting’s tory racing teams is extreme ly high and Tony Kart, CRG- strongest supporters, has Kali, PCR and Top Kart, already confirmed that it will along with Jollykart, Birel be supporting the event.

Motorsport News will keep and Swiss Hutless, have all you informed of events relat indicated that they will be attending and bringing their ing to the 1997 Oceania best drivers and new 1997 Championships, including full coverage of the race equipment to the event.

The fact that the circuit is meeting, in future editions only a five minute drive from leading up to and following the centre of Melbourne City the event.

- IAN SALVESTRIN also appeals to the

N

orthern Rivers Kart Club in Lismore is promoting Clubman Light at its November 3 meeting, with $1000 in prizemoney up for grabs, including $100 for the driver who can record the highest speed on police radar during the Final of the event.

T

he Queensland State Titles will be held at Warick in 1997, so the members are busy prepar ing the circuit and surrounds for the influx of karters at the meetings up to and including the event.

Also event preparing is the for Gladstone a major Kart Club, which hosted the 1996 QLD State Titles and will host the 1997 Australian Sprint Kart Championships at Easter.

Located about 550kms north of Brisbane, the Gladstone area is a nice place to visit and, for any one interested in karting, this will be a weekend not to be missed.

The Gladstone circuit is somewhat difficult to get used to at first and provides the driver with a tough chal lenge.

Report by EDWARD KRAUSE The final CAMS-organised Australian Karting Championships were held two weekends ago where they first began, at Sydney’s Oran Park, bringing to an end the farcical situation of hav ing two national champi ons for each individual category.

The sad thing for the dri vers who achieved their dreams of a national title is that they may not get to run the green and gold plate next year - reverting back to the AKA means that the AKA champions may be the only ones to run their champi onship plates. Time will tell.

All that aside, deserving drivers were the champions and CAMS’ farewell champi onships saw some truly great drives.

Piston Port While Merlin driver Joshua Pontello took pole, Daimen Caudo was always the driver most feared, as he NSW won the had Championship at this track in 1995 and was considered an Oran Park specialist.

It was another Top Kart driver, Dean Harvey, who had pole for the pre-final, with David Burch in the Hesse next to him.

Unfortunately for Burch, his strong run would end firstly, a brand-new spark plug lead wouldn’t connect properly, pushing him to the back and then, in the final, he snapped a carburettor mixture screw after a strong early drive.

Racing at the State Titles earlier this year was very close in most classes and those who succeeded really proved that they had what it takes to be a champion, making passing moves where others may not have thought it possible.

Keep to see watching who the this current page stars are in the sport and also those who will reach further heights in motorsport in the years to come - more info and coming attractions in upcoming issues.

- JULIE-ANN HOWE

Oran Park hosts last CAMS title But it was Caudo who was the aggressor, moving through the field after his own share of heat problems.

Harvey won the pre-final, but Caudo had the horsepow er to go past over the bridge early on. Caudo opened a small gap, but Harvey closed that mid-race and hounded Caudo all the way.

A slow run out of the horseshoe section on the last lap had Harvey in a prime attacking position, but Caudo held his line and took the win for a Top Kart 1-2; Daniel Gadd in a Tony Kart took a comfortable third.

Junior Clubman Troy Hunt finally claimed a national title, the young Top Kart driver having to fi ght every inch of the way after an early four-way dice developed between Hunt, Michael Caruso, Shaun Atherton and Mark Winterbottom - Atherton seized early on and Caruso dropped back, leaving the battle between Hunt and Winterbottom.

Mid-race, the Tony Kart driver moved into the lead and it looked like Troy would once again be denied, but he bravely screwed in the mix tures and shot past Winterbottom over the bridge and then held on to take a well-deserved victory from Winterbottom, with Caruso in another Tony Kart a distant third.

Clubman Light Robbie driver PRD Williams withstood the early pressure from a gaggle of young chargers before taking a comfortable victory.

Teenage sensation Bradley Brown, having a guest drive for Top Kart, was the main challenger, with fellow

teenagers NSW champ Troy Farley and former national champ Jon Metham right behind. On lap 4, Williams took Brown for the lead and these two began to pull away, helped by Farley going out on lap 8.

At the end of the final, Williams was setting his fastest laps of 36.79s and then 36.75s, with Brown unable to respond and finish ing second, Martin Lawes in a Kali putting in a great drive to come from mid-field to finish third.

■i"

Clubman Heavy One of the pre-race favourites, Cid Maroun, was out on the very first lap after a hectic start.

Zak Floyde-Smith shot to the lead in the CRG Aero kart and was never headed, despite the abundance of pressure from Wayne Stoddart in the Gold Kart.

Queensland Tony Kart dri ver Luke Van Doom made his way through the field after a troublesome run in the heats and closed on Stoddart, but had to settle for third.

Junior National Light This race was always between Nail McFadyen and Peter Hamilton, as the oth ers were just not in the hunt this time out.

McFadyen in the Excell eventually triumphed in a race that had the crowd on its feet, passing moves occur ring either off the bridge or at turn one.

Hamilton in the Dino had his chances, hut McFadyen, keen to make up for his dis appointment at the NSW championships earlier this year, was not going to be denied, winning narrowly.

Continued on page 49

KARTING in OZ Karting in Oz taiks to the peopie from rookies to stars, and takes across the country to may differe tracks and events.

You wiii hear the costs as we take you through the purchase, running and maintenance of a kart Meet famines that race together

45 minute video is $30 (inc postage)

KARTING IN OZ

Make your cheque or money order payable to Australian Karting Association and send it to PO Box 1183 East Victoria Park WA 6101

■karting in

^

25 October im

N

ICKY GRIST has been signed to a two year contract to co-drive for 1995 World Rally Champion Colin McRae. McRae also signed with the Subaru World Rally Team for a further two years.

“I’m looking forward to working with Nicky - he’s one of the best and in two years we should be able to reclaim the World Championship,” a confi dent McRae said.

Grist, 34, has compet ed in the World Rally Championship since 1991, most recently with Juha Kankkunen, the four-time World Drivers Champion.

“Colin is a gifted driver and once we work out each others accents we’ll have an exciting time," Grist said.

The formidable duo will debut in the Monte Carlo Rally in January next year, when they will debut the all-new Subaru World Rally Car.

New ZEALAND Rally Champion Joe

McAndrew has confirmed he will be a starter in the 1996 FAI Rally of Canberra.

It will be McAndrew and co-driver Bob Haldane’s second trip to Canberra and both are keen to make up for their 1994 non-finish in a Group A Subaru Legacy.

McAndrew will drive his trusty Prodrive-built Group A Legacy, which was orig inally driven by Colin McRae back in 1993.

McAndrew’s team will be putting a total effort into running the car, and he has just one goal in mind - victory.

- PETER WHITTEN

Possum Bourne and codriver Craig Vincent are the new Australian Rally Champions after domi nating the Bridgestone Rally at Coffs Harbour last weekend.

After unsuccessfully trying to win the championship on two previous occasions in 1992 and 1993, Bourne dedi cated his win to former co driver Rodger Freeth, who died tragically in an accident at Rally Australia in 1993.

Bourne’s Subaru Impreza WRX hit the lead on the sec ond stage of the 14-stage event, after Neal Bates spun his Toyota Celica GT-Four and dropped a time margin he was never to recover.

In the end, the Subaru’s winning margin over the Celica of Bates and Coral Taylor was a minute and three seconds, with Ed Mitsubishi Ordynski’s Lancer Evo 3 well back in third place.

Bates could match times with Bourne on most stages, but the spin and an over shoot at a junction on the second last stage of day one proved costly and he finished the first day 49 seconds in arrears - try as he might on the second day, he couldn’t reel in the flying Kiwis and, after holding the Australian Championship title for three years, he finally gave it up.

Ordynski was the only dri ver in with a realistic chance of defeating Bourne for the championship, having to beat the New Zealander to stay in touch.

But a broken driveshaft on the very first stage, a flat tyre one stage later and other niggling problems pre vented him from making any sort of challenge and he was well off the pace for the whole event, finishing four

45

Other retirements includ ed Graham Alexander (crash), Mark Griffith (engine), John Goasdoue (crash), and Rick Bates (crash).

The Bates brother was headed for victory in the NSW Rally Championship until he crashed on the first stage of the second day, leav ing John Long and his Lancer to take the honours.

But, as Rod Salmon beat Long home for top points.

Bates and Long tied for the 1996 crown, a fitting result.

Now all that remains for the year is the FAI Rally of Canberra next month, an event at which Bourne promises he’ll have a real go, given that he’s already won the championship - it’ll be an event not to be missed.

NEW ARC CHAMPIONS ... Possum Bourne/Chris Vincent. (Peter Whitten photo)

Possum takes 96 ARC title and a half minutes in an'ears.

Fourth place and first in Group N went to Stewart Reid in his Lancer Evo 3 but he can count his lucky stars, as he trailed David West’s Lancer for the whole event, only for West to roll his car out of the rally on the third last stage.

Reid held off the similar Lancer of Rod Salmon in fifth place, running in the event while regular team mate Michael Guest stayed away, having already sewn up the Group N Championship at Rally Australia.

Retirements were plenty, particularly on the last day.

as the tricky and vei'y dusty Coffs Harbour roads took their toll on crews.

Bob Nicoli was the first major retirement after his Daihatsu Charade GTi caught fire on the second stage.

The under-bonnet blaze was quickly extinguished, but Nicoli was out.

RESULTS 1 Possum Bourne/ Craig Vincent Subaru Impreza Ih43m42s 2 Neal Bates/ Coral Taylor Toyota Celica GT-Four Ih44m45s 3 Ed Ordjmski/ Mark Stacey Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 3 Ih47ml0s 4 Stewart Reid/ Craig Lee Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 3 Ih50m42s 5 Rod Salmon/ Lyndal Drake Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 3 Ih52m26s 6 John Long/ Damian Long Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 3 Ih52m53s -PETER WHITTEN

McRae holds off Sainz in Sanremo Colin McRae beat off the ferocious challenge mounted by Carlos Sainz over the six stages to become the first British driver to win the Sanremo Rally.

With a small lead to defend, McRae was under pressure from the drop of the flag; but, although Sainz reduced the lead to just six seconds during the morning, the Scot powered his Subaru to victory by 22 seconds over the last two stages.

“I needed this win,” declared McRae. “Some rallies in the World Championship are nice to have on your record and this is one of them.”

The Spaniard lost time on the early part of the event, running first on the road in slippery conditions.

Over the closing stages, Bruno Thiry in the second factory Escort fought through to beat Kenneth Eriksson’s second Subaru to give Ford a strong result.

Belgian Freddie Loix starred on the final day, win¬

ning two stages in his Toyota and stealing fourth place from Eriksson over the clos ing stages - this was an exceptional result for a non factory driver.

The Subaru team hit trou ble at the start of the day when their defending Sanremo winner, Italian star Piero Liatti, failed to get his car started in pare ferme and was out.

The first stage of the day was a 41km blast over Monte Ceppo, where Sainz took just four seconds back from leader McRae. On the second test, just 10 kms, he reduced the lead by fifteen seconds.

Sainz closed the gap to just six seconds, but McRae still held the advantage and over the final 30 km test extended his lead to finish 22 seconds ahead - the result gives Subaru a very strong advan tage in the Manufacturers Championship over opposi tion Mitsubishi, who will be less than happy with their result.

The Spanish former world

champion gave his all in pur suit, but was hampered by a lack of experience of his Ford Escort on tarmac; there have been no tarmac rallies this year and fast-changing weather conditions made tyre choices difficult.

Thiry’s Escort stormed past Eriksson to support Sainz’ second place.

Acknowledged star Didier Auriol was short of match practice and had no experi ence of the Lancer.

He might have finished a few places higher without transmission problems - the team is hoping for better in Spain on the final round.

However, Mitsubishi’s biggest disappointment came from new World Champion Tommi Makinen.

The man who has domi nated 1996 crashed out just 500 metres into the very first stage of the rally.

Makinen’s co-driver Seppo Haijanne has a cracked 12th vertebra and is doubtful for the next WRC event in Catalunya.

The Group N category was

LOW ORBIT... McRae withstood all challenges from Sainz to convincingly take Sanremo. won by Gustavo Trelles in a Mitsubishi and Uwe Nittel’s failure to score means that the World Cup for Production Car Drivers will be decided in Spain.

The result gives Subaru a lead of 33 point over Mitsubishi, with Ford a further 30 points behind.

FINAL RESULTS 1 C McRae/D Ringer Subaru Impreza 4b26m57s 2 C Sainz/L Moya

3

4

5

6

7

Ford Escort 4h27ml9s B Thiry/S Prevot Ford Escort Cos 4h29m06s F Loix/S Smeets Toyota Celica GT4 4h29m48s K Eriksson/ S Parmander Subaru Impreza 4h29m51s F Cunico/P Scalvini Ford Escort Cos 4h30m41s G Pianezzola/L Roggia

Toyota Celica GT4 4h30m58s 8 D Auriol/ D Giraudet Mitsubishi Lancer 4h31m50s 9 A Medeghjni/ B Medeghini Subaru Impreza 4h34h59s 10 P Bernardini/ D Savignoni Ford Escort Cos 4h34h59s -PETER WHITTEN

4S

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Sedans

Austin Healey Bug-Eye, rebuilt for Historic racing.

Two meetings only. Road registered. $13,500ono. Ph: 055 711 335. S7

Commodore VC rolling body shell. Very straight, would be ideal base for ROH car or Chev-engined Club 2E car. Offered in unmodified form. $1,250ono. Ph: 048 722 622 or 0419 406 760.

Mustang 1968, California special RERE car, red on red, 302 auto in exc cond, very smart car. RHD with NSW rego GT499. $24,500. Ph: 049 515 756. 67

AUSCAR VP Commodore, new caged and strength ened bodyshell, professionally jigged, seam welded.

Comes with bladder tank, spares etc. Extra bodyshell available - urgent sale. Ph Neil 08 8244 3821

Ford Sierra RS Cosworth, 1987 3-door, moon blue, 62,000 miles, 100% excellent condition. Priced to sell at just $34,000. A real head-turner. Ph: 07 3348 8354 or 015 269 986. 86

Ford Falcon EB GT, 7,000kms, 5-speed manual, sun roof, CD stacker, full leather, pearl black, garaged, rarely driven, showroom cond, collector's item. GT 0440. $65,000. Ph: 049 515 756. 07

Thunderdome HQ 71 completely rebuilt car. 1 meeting old. Finished 4 Dec meeting best lap 36.66. Well presented and very competitive car. Sold with 2 complete cars and many spares. $7000. Ph David 087 372 526 ae ZH Fairlane, power steering, reg 11/96, good interior, V8 motor, straight body with rust, mechanically good, ren ovator's delight. Ph: 03 9873 5201 or 014 859 174. 86

VW 1500 Beetle 3-litre Sports Sedan. 300ltp 13B pport engine, tricks by Oz Developments, Micro-Tech, Race Injection. Engine adaptor & rear disc brakes by John Sherman. Kennedy Clutch, Transform close ratio LSD gear box. KYB racing shocks, K-Mac stabiliser bars, new Yokohama A008Rs. $11,000ono. Ph Mark 02 9820 9307. 85

Commodore Sports Sedan, new, never raced, 6-litre, Top Loader, Harrop brakes. Group A 9 inch diff, fuel injec tion. Must sell or trade anything due to Ick of funds. Cost $50,000 sell for $30,000. Ph 018 781 671. ee I

Mustang 1969 Fastback, 302 Windsor, auto, red with black interior, LHD, good clean car, no rust. In going order $12,000. Ph: 049 515 756. 87 Mini Clubman LS. Short circuit touiing car, CAMS log book, 8-point alloy cage, disc brake front, 998, c/r box.

Spare motor, box, shell. Trailer. Needs minor panel repairs. Proven winner. $3,750. Ph: 018 700 228. 87 Subaru Legacy RS-R. Full group N spec rally car.

Bilsteins, Compmotives, lamp-pod. Prodrive computer, strut-brace etc. Package includes spares. No sign-writing. $29,500ono. Ph:088 384 4112 or 0411 176 160.

Holden HR Rally Car, Y, Terra head, roll cage, bullbar, towbars back, front driving lights, bucket seats, registered, ready to rally or perfect for restoration. Good original con dition, low kms. $3,700ono. Ph 074 976 576. BC AUSCAR VP Commodore. Ready to race, 100% legal car. Fire system, electronic timer, remote oil system, Shane Lowe top hp engine. Spares include gearbox, tailshaft, suspension components, big brakes, shockers, springs, heaps of spare panels, 3 sets of tyres and rims, fuel churn & lots more. $30,000ono the lot. Ph: Owen 059 776 455 or 015 534 058. ee

Group N/B Cooper ‘S’ 1293cc S/C/C/R gearbox, s/c drop gears, 648 cam, gas-flow head, 48 DCOE Weber. $6,500ono. Ph: 085 225 541. 87

Appendix J Group N EH Holden. Ex-Bruce Stewart.

1 meeting since complete mechanical rebuild. New Hoosier tyres. Current class lap record holder Eastern Creek. $9,800 with trailer. Ph: Craig 02 9894 2609. 8?

AUSCAR Sportsman, VL Commodore #01. Ready to race. Fresh engine, full floater diff, new seat, in-car extin guisher, spare set wheels & tyres. Must sell. $10,000ono.

Ph 03 9568 7804. as Rally Car Datsun 1600. Needs to be reassembled.

List of spares. Sell as a unit or will separate. Ph Paul 019 938 084 anytime, es

HQs. Dave Wood offers for sale two of the fastest HQs currently on the market. 1. Circuit car, has won too many events to list. Has best bits, incI Iresh engine. $10,500. 2.

Car used to win 95/96 Thunderdome Championship and over $10,000 in prizemoney. Fresh engine. $8,500. Ph: 03 9587 3226(BH)059 987 358(AH). 87

J

Torana ‘76, genuine SS, dark blue, gold Simmons V5s, new tyres, Alpine CD player, worked 308, A9X spoiler kit, new interior, M21 gearbox, lull ground-up rebuild, vgc, reg 8/97. $11,500. Ph:07 3348 8649.

VKSS Commodore Brock 10/85 Group 1, upgraded to Group A specs by HDT, security systems, numerous, modifications, genuine 25,600 kms. Original owner, forced sale. $23,000, offers considered. Ph 02 9558 4377 or 0418 648 034. 86

BMW 318 E36 Super Tourer. Inci spares & trailer.

POA. Ph Miles Pope-NZ 0011 64 25 935 659 bh 0011 649 233 6159 ah. >s

Subaru Legacy RS-R. Full Gp N spec rally car.

Bilsteins, Compomotives, Lamp pod. Prodrive computer, strut-brace, etc. Price includes spares package. No sign writing. $29,500ono.Ph 088 384 4112 or 0411 176 160. 86

Mini Cooper S Mkl original, YKG2S2/4649, 1275 block, 1 year rego, will make excellent Targa entry, hydrolastic, BRG, new Falken tyres, Hopkirk seats, great price $9,000.

Ph Tim 07 3289 1840. es

Sunbeam Tiger conversion, 1964 LHD, 289 Ford motor, has ID tag etc. Make perfect Historic racer. $16,000. Ph:02 9525 7410. 87

/.I

VW Baja Bug, 1968, 1600 replaced engine, $3,000 in repair receipts. Body sound, engine robust, front end in good state. Needs 3 tyres and indicators. Repaired for rego, $1,800. Ph 02 9386 1303. ae

Toyota Corolla SX/GTi, maintained regardless of cost.

Suit road, rally or racing. Currently in Production car trim.

Great start for a 2E Club Car. Spares include wheels, sus pension, gearbox/LSD, brakes, driveshafts, exhausts. $16,000 neg.Ph:02 9638 6151. ar AUSCAR VS Holden, complete car $21,999, or will sell in parts. Alloy head engine, Sach clutch. Super 10 gear box, floating rear end, Harrop brakes front. Ph: Leigh 0418 500 287. 87

HQ, ready to race. Raced twice, everything new when built, pole 1994 Nationals, Lakeside. Set up by Kev Hayes. $6,000ono. Ph: Willie Taylor 075 5498 6600 (BH) or 075 5495 8769(AH). 8?

XB Fairmont Falcon, straight body, with rust, reg 6/97.

Metallic blue, vinyl roof. Been in no accidents, 2nd owner.

Runs well. Ph:03 9873 5201 or 014 859 174. eo Triumph 2500 Sedan, Sebring orange, white interior, new auto and more. Excellent condition, reg, RWC. $3,800. Ph 03 9689 6031 or 015 312 918. b6

-

AUSCAR Bruce Williams offers his successful Auscraft VR, Sub 31 second car, fully rebuilt, in race-ready condi tion, with fresh 9.5:1 top hp engine, Harrop brakes, T10 gearbox, fully adjustable Harrop/Quadrant front end. With spares, inci one set wheels. Ph: 053 358 788 or 018 349 555. 86

continued over page

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48 25October m Speedway

Formula Ford lease. New Zealand International series,

13B Bridgeport Seiectmaz race motor,51 IDA'S, light steel flywheel and comp., button clutch, 5-speed close ratio g/box. $6,000ono. Ph:03 9818 2103 or 039853 5061

starting January 12, every weekend until February 2. Four weeks. Many options avaiiable. Ph: Dave Templeman 00 11 649 443 3930. er

Chewy II Speedcar motor, Duggan injection, magne to, dry sump kit, gear drive, TRW, Crane etc. Complete with exhaust and spares. Can hear running. $2,950. Urgent sale needed. Ph: 07 3204 5786. 65

Kart - CRG Kali chassis and new spec Yamaha LT100S engine, fully blue-printed, oniy purchased in May. Proven race winner, suitable for Clubman Light and Fleavy.

Immaculate cond. $2,800ono plus spares. Ph; 02 9326 3237. 87

Formula Vee Selby, complete car, ready to race, new tyres, ported carby and manifold. Fully enclosed trailer, new seat, numerous engine parts. $5,800ono. Ph: 02 9899 8264 or 015 957 576. er Speedcar. Race ready, fresh 2400 Scat, Stanton chrome-moly chassis, low bar FBI JFZ Schroeder, PRO deadlocks, new belts. $11,000. Also enclosed trailer to suit. $3,000. Ph:07 3397 1335. sr

Kart - Arrow AX5, brand new Yamaha 100J engine, just run in, competitive chassis for Clubmans Light/Heavy, pur chased from DP Karts, comes with helmet, suit and some spares. $2400. Ph: John 03 9807 6040. 87 1981 March 81A Formula Atlantic rolling chassis.

Excellent condition throughout. Rocker arm suspension.

FT200. March magnesium sump. Spare body, panels and wheels. CAMS logbook. Eligible Group Q Flistoric 1998.

Modified Production. Trevor Mills offers for sale his

Mazda RX-7 Super Sedan. Quick change diff, 13B pporl. injection, rev limiter, 4-bar rear end, coli-.overs, torque link, aluminium wheels. $7,000. Ph: 054 223 098 (BH), 054 241 804 (AH). 86

Parts

Trailers/Transporters

Crown wheel and pinion, FT200, 7:31 $800. FG400 9:31 $1,000. Gear ratios Hewland FT200, FG400, $150 each. 1st gears 13:31, 12:31, 17:30, many others $150 each. Ph; Chris 07 3849 2866(BH)or 015 127 150. 87

Coach, 38' rear engine, V8 CAT, 5-speed Eaton, high speed diff, stripped inside, ready for fit-out with shower, fridge/freezer, h/water, stove/oven, pump sink, cupboards, switches. Suit transporter, motorhome. $15,000. Ph: 076 915 833 or 018 700 228. er

Holden/Ford parts. Holden Torana L34 pistons, pins, rings. Brand new, -r.030". $280. Holden Commodore fuel pumps, part no 92017845, 2 only, $150 the lot. Ford BDA ring sets (std), 12 sets, $330 the lot. Ford Sierra oil pan gasket sets, 10 sets, $140 the lot. Ford Sierra special head gaskets (double bore binder), 3 only, $300 the lot. Ford Escort Mkl bonnet and boot lid, as new, $500 the lot. Ph: Harry 03 9802 4597. 87

Commodore Super Sedan. 350 engine with Carillo rods. Dart heads, quick-change diff, cone clutch, coil-over shocks. Heaps of spares, ready to race. $12,000ono. Ph: Kevin 052 753 733 or 018 385 339. 87 multi-feature-winning VI Commodore, ready to race with fresh panels, fully adjustable Bilstein susp, 202 roller motor, spare motor, lots of spares. Will separate.

S12,000ono. Ph: 060 331 064. 87

Competition Ciass dragster, complete with trailer, annex etc. 355cu.in. injected Chev, all;oy heads, titanium valves, caps, new springs. Cola crank. Speed 167mph, 8.10 secs. Harrop rear end and axles, Powerglide + TCI short kit, convertor and transbrake. New Goodyear slicks (3 meets) MSD ignition, PSB, steering, foot brake. Some spares. Ph; Ian 03 9749 1341 (AH). 83

Chevron B34 1976 European Fomula 3 with Cams historic logbook. 2 litre novamotor with recent total rebuild, new wets and some spares. Outright winner of recent Leyburn Historic Sprint meeting. $53,000 Ph 07 33961624 m

Super Sedan spares Bert g/box c/w drive flange & shifter. New. Vertes magneto fully rebuilt by Bill Dudley not been used since with cap & leads. Winters Q/C diff, mag nesium centre. Aluminum tibes, gun drilled axles, wide 5 hubs, dlynalite brakes ready to bolt in. Many spares avail able. Ph Peter Logue 051 339993 bh or 051 339532 ah bs

Ford D400 351 V8. Enclosed 12' annexe, new tyres, 9 months rego, al. pan, ramps, elec winch, Cliplock flooring, 240v/12v lighting, tyre rack, cupboards, 2 bunks, new clutch, recc'd gearbox, $8,800. Will sell to good home only! Ph: Peter 02 9597 6393 or 018 117 070. ar Bedford transporter, reg'd March 97, completely rebuilt Chev motor, good tyres, 21' fully lined pan with beds, complete with tyre racks, winch, ramps. Suit any car. $6,500. Ph: 051 568 391. 86

450 HP Cont. air-cooled electronic controlled Sun chassis dyno, 28"(71cm) rollers. Fitted with 40HP electric motor and brake balance testing (front and rear). Complete with 2 engine colling fans and exhaust extractor fan and wheel chocks. $20,000 Ph: Phil 03 9338 4133 or 0414 338 413. ee Motec 2D electronic fuel injection and ignition computer o/w calibrator and loom, regulators, map sensor, air and water sensors and injector connections. $1,250. Ph: Ray 03 9314 2255(BH),03 9748 0957(AH), ea

Super Sedan Torana, coilovers, professionally built, 308 engine, 11.5:1 comp, electronic ignition, Yella Terra flywheel, Centreforce clutch, 750 cfm carby, Hoosier tyres, $7,900ono complete, $4,950 motor only. Ph: 070 922 532 or 015 160 537. ee

Ultimate GTR Club Car or Sports Sedan engine: 650 genuine hp, Nissan RB30 DETT, new RB26 GTR cylin der head, RB30 block, Nismo rods and bolts, heat-treated crank, Nismo oil pump, water pump, Cosworth pistons, with or without Motec M8 controiler, with or without dry sump system. Featured in Commodore Crazy edition #19.

Professionally built by ORGA engines and Nizpro Turbocharging. Cost $30,000, selling $15,000. Ph: George on 03 9478 0121 or Simon (Nizpro)03 9736 1060. 85

Van Diemen RF92, rebuilt for 96 season regardless of cost. Car comes with spares package. $22,000. Ph; David Clinton 042 298 117 or 0419 225 740. ee

Dunlop Formula R 235/45/ZR 17.2x new, 4x near new, 4x used. $1,100 the lot. Ph: David Whitehead 0412 539 300 or 03 9268 2222, 86

Trailer, to suit off-road buggy or similar open-wheeler car. Side door, internal shelving and winch. Front locker. $2,900. Ph; Frank 03 9587 4000 or Peter 03 6428 3111. as

Genuine XU-1 manifold and linkages, with SU adaptors, suit Group N. Ph: 03 9687 4653 or 015 312 918. as SAAS racing seat, black only, in car for one week. Cost $800, sell for $200. Ph; 03 9687 4653 or 015 312 918. ee

'Wjj

Slicks, 16" radial Dunlops, only 8 laps Calder, sell for only $75 each. 3 sets left. Ph: 03 9687 4653 or 015 312 918. ae Cleveland heads, open chamber, 4V valves, guide plates, manifold bolts, Manley hardened push-rods, camshaft to suit. All new. Ph: Dave 03 9687 4653 or 015 312 918. 86

Sprintcar: hi-bar Gambler, injected 366c.I. Chev 010 steel crank, Ferea rods, JE pistons, magneto. Dart 2 heads, roller rockers, spare wings, wheels etc, reg tandem trailer. $10,000 Ph: Rick 056 268 376(AH), ae

Open Wheelers

Benson 250 International TZ250B Superkart.

New Keihin carbys, new Dunlop tyres, slicks and wets, Kelgate brakes, butterfly gearshift, Andreson glasswork, various spares. Cost over $30,000 to build, will sell for $16,000. Ph: 08 8340 2099. ae Van Diemen RF86. Car has been rebuilt with many new

1972 Elfin 622 Historic Formula 2 Car. Currently running Group Q, Historic Racing log book. Hart spec Lucas fuel-injected 1600cc Ford twin-cam engine, 215 bhp, no miles since Peter Molloy rebuild. FT200 gearbox with spare ratios, 2 sets wheels, 1 set wings, all necessary set-up info. Fully enclosed all-aluminium trailer also avail able if required. Make me a sensible offer. Ph: 02 9692 0055(BH),02 9449 3847(AH), or 018 403 582. 87

Speedcar quick-change diff, Ray Allech type, complete from hub to hub, includes inboard brakes and disc. $1,500 firm. Ph: Richard Emmerson 03 9725 5339(AH), x

parts, fresh engine, very competitive 96 Vic series - top ten placings. Many spares incl body panels, 2 sets wheels, full set ratios, stands, wishbones etc. Also comes with covered-in trailer and annex. Ready to race, all for $15,000ono. Ph: Tony Jory 018 130 133 or Ray Cutchie 03 9558 1246. bs

Detroit locker to suit Banjo Torana $1,000. Plus, solid cams to suit red motor. Ph: 046 772 417 (AH), 046 772 203 (BH)or 018 673 025. es

Formula Vee Phantom. Maurie Fordham-built.

Unsealed 1200cc motor, V.G. chassis. Hillclimb car? $2,000ono. Ph;03 9882 9343. as

Quad Webers, 48 IDFs, manifold and linkages to suit Cleveland. $1,800. Ph: Scott 018 594 964. 85

»nMi^'unJuu, wuutTi

Formula Holden. Dome F102 91/92. Ready to run with spares package (8 wheels with wets, ratios, suspension, nose, wings, shocks, springs, floor trays, drive shafts etc) $80,000. Also Lola, ex Skaife/Ken Smith car, complete with huge spares package $80,000. Engine (buiult by Bryan Hartley, 2nd in Asia Pacific series with Shane Drake, com plete with wiring loom, computer, ready to run, done LOOOkms $26,000. Engine, ex-Perkins, never run since rebuild $23,000. F. Holden engine kits (x2) - $15,000 ea.

Ph: Bill Farmer 00 11 649 443 0073 or Bryan Hartley 00 11 646 355 5066. ae

Formula Ford clearance. SA team closes shop, stacks of new and used F/F parts cheap. Lightweight wheels, 5 engines, ratios, ratio boxes, pit gear, VD parts etc. Ph: Neil (08)8244 3821. b6

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Fuel churn, 11 gallon to suit AUSCAR/NASCAR, brand new, never used, only $100. Ph: Michael (AH only) 03 9553 3383. 85

Stack ST8100 digital dash system, with sensors. Used in AUSCAR (then banned), has built-in shift light, preset oil/water warning alarm, data logging, wheel speed, lap time options etc. With manual. Save at least $600 on new price. $1200. Ph: 053 358 788 or 018 349 555.

Engines Chev big block, 4-bolt, fully studded block, Carillo rods, open chamber heads. Strip dominator manifold, electronic distributor, much more. $6,000. Ph: 02 9828 8837(BUS). 87 Formula Holden SPA002. Win the Silver Star series next year, cheap intro into F. Holden. Spares incl wets on rims, corners, running gear etc. Trailer also available. $39,000ono. Ph: Owen Osborne 03 9798 3680. ss

Drag Racing GTR/XU1 Torana LJ V8 - has run 11 sec pass at Calder. Now has NOS fitted, but never used. Street Registered. Ph: 014 824 350 for more details, as Torana Drag car, 3/4 chassis, 6-point cage, narrowed 9" diff, ladder bars, track locator. Rolling car, unfinished pro ject. Only $3,500ono. Ph: John 07 3206 0368 all hours, so

Tandem Karl trailer, 12 mth rego, shelving for spare parts and 2 karts. Monoco Kart and J engine. Over $3000 new and used parts/tools. Ready to race. $9,000. Ph: 07 3818 2871 or 0419 729 435. 65

Other Autocourse 95/96 IndyCar annual autographed by over 20 drivers including champion Vasser, both Andrettis and Fittipaldis. Rahal, Boesel, Tracy. Unser, Gordon, Herta, Gugelmin, Sullivan, Pruett and Moore. Ph: 0412 055 730. m Free sites available for the next Geelong Auto Spectacular on January 26. Ideal for vehicle owners or clubs to promote sponsors. Be part of Australia's largest one-day show. Details Ph: 052 222 608. ea Badges. Collector's metal badges, old, rare in mint condi tion, eg Herald Touring Club Vic, 40s, 50s, 60s, ring for list.

Ph:03 9687 4653 or 015 312 918. 6G Grand Prix International 1981 to 1986, includes Le Mans/Endurance special issues, Indycars, rallying. 73 issues $730. Also "Prix Editions" and "Chequered Flag”.

Ph: 068 422 185. so Old motor magazines, Racing, Hot Rod efc. All in mint condition, 30-page catalogue available. Private collector had them all from new. Ph: Dave 03 9687 4653 or 015 312 918. 86

650 Genuine HP Nissan RB30 dett. New RB26 GTR cyi head. RB30 bock, Nismo rod & bolts, head treated crank, Nismo oil pump water pump, Cosworth pistons. Beryllium copper valve seaats, Del west titaniym inlet valves. Inconel exhaust vales, Isky dual valve sprints, Del west titanium restainers & collets, solid lifter buckets & cams are late spec Gibson Motorsport items. With or without Motec M-8 controller ,with or without dry sump systes. Featured in Commodore craxy edition no 19 (double blow out).

Professionally built by Orga Engines & Nizpro Turbcharging.

Cost $30,000 sell $15,000. Ph George 03 9478 0121 ah es

Slot Car Newsletter. HO scale. Four issues $20 per annum. Minimum 30 pages. Contact Rod Thurgood, 11 Perrins Lane, West Kempsey, NSW 2440. Ph: 065 628 209 before 2pm. Fax: 065 626 319. 85

Holden 3.3 bolock red methanol head, roller rockers,

Wanted

straight cut timing, gears. Sell complete $1000. 202 bock bored 60' & deck heighted, new ACL pistons with starfire rods, crankshaft. $900. Ph 015 847780 es

Formula Ford drives available - Bathurst supporting races (incl test day). Old Championship balance of 1996, 1997 DTE, Qld, NSW Championships. Join a champi onship-winning team. Or, just drive a Formula Ford lor just $450 a day. Ph: Greg 074 467 611. 85

Camber/Caster gauge unit or portable wheel alignment kit. Ph: 057 621 266 87

Tell'em you saw it in Motorsport News

INDUSTRY NEWS

250clobefW96

^9

Craggill's Swissauto

jem

Continued from page 15 On the Swiss-built engine, which employs its own programmable digital ignition system, the firing order is 180 degrees apart, with the left-hand side cylinders firing together and then the right-side pair.

There was a 90-degree Big Bang motor with a dramatically closer firing order available, but both Borja and Craggill used only the conventional units.

An external water pump is driven by a toothed belt from the right-hand end of the crankshaft.

The quickly detachable clutch is located outside the crankcase on the other side and can be replaced as a unit in some 30 seconds.

I pl'

S<huey's F1 Ferrari: For sale at Sant's World of Model Cars FERRARI FANS:it’s here - the ultimate collectihle die-cast Formula 1 model, a limited edition 1:8 scale of the classic low-nose Ferrari F310 as raced hy Michael Schumacher at the 1996 Melbourne Formula 1 Grand Prix.

'The car, which is complete with all spon sors decals, but no driver, is made by

Minichamps/Paul’s Model Art, who are arguably the best mass-production model makers in the world.

If you want one of these fantastic, detailed Ferrari F310 models, you’ll have to move quickly, as there is a limited run of only 50 individually numbered pieces worldwide and Australian stocks are in short supply.

For further information on this mas terpiece, call Sam’s World of Model Cars on:(02) 9897 3431. Sam also carries a complete range of Minichamps/Paul’s Model Art 1996 Formula 1 cars, as well as a range of DTM/ITC cars, including that of 1997 Stewart Formula 1 driver Jan Magnussen.

Oran Park hosts last CAMS title Continued from page 44

Winterbottom made it a 1-2 finish for the green karts, with Tim Moylan in a Dino tak ing third from McFadyen.

pace, initially edging closer and then startingto take hunks out of Hunter’s lead.

With five to go, both King and Walters were past. Hunter dropping back to fifth with an obvious problem.

King had developed a small buffer and, after several podium finishes, he had finally bagged the big one.

Walters in a CRG was next and a distant third was Dean Lockeridge in a Swiss Hutless.

Defending national and state champion Brendan May showed great pace in coming back from near last after misfortune struck him in the pre-final - driving a Dino, he made his way to third and would surely have been a major player for the title had he start ed from the front.

Junior National Heavy 'The first start was aborted and the second time around Mark Winterbottom took the lead from Brendan May, Alan Gurr and Michael Caruso. Neil McFadyen got a bad start and fell back, before slowly making his way back through the field.

The early dice for the lead was between Winterbottom and May, with Gurr sitting just behind waiting. May then spun on lap four and, on the following lap, Gurr took the lead from Winterbottom.

By lap 8, McFadyen was up to second; but the following lap, the Excell driver ran off and fell back to fourth. By this stage, Gurr in the Tony Kart had a healthy lead and most interest centred on the fight for second.

Murray Waiker-from Page 21 In Brazil - which is famous for its sudden storms - there was one year when I tried to keep London informed about whether or not it was raining. It became so confusing that Wilkin finally asked rather bluntly: “Is it raining or is it not raining.”

“Both,” was the only reply I had.

Murray his uncanny knack is offamous sayingfor something like “and all he has to do now is finish” and the driver in question immedi ately crashes or blows up his engine.

W^at a lot of people do not know is that he also had a talent for saying something which the TV director who had no way of knowing what was being said - would miraculously switch his cameras to cover. You can call it luck, but I prefer intuition, knowing what a good director will do.

When Murray said: “The Japanese fans are going crazy and waving

Senior National Light Last year’s runner-up Chris Cox went one better this year, Cox having a race-long bat tle with Alan Hunter and Anthony Petrilli, with any of them in a position to win on the last lap.

Petrilli in the CRG led on the last lap, only for Cox in a Tony Kart to pass him over the

bridge.

Cox then held on from Petrilli, with Hunter having a last lunge at the line and taking third in the Arrow kart.

Senior National Heavy Adam Hunter had this race shot to pieces only a few laps into the final - second-placed runner Adam Clark was out after an alterca tion and the Arrow driver had taken the advantage and pulled away, helped by the dice between Darren King and Cameron Walters, who were now fighting for second.

But then, with ten laps to go. Hunter dropped off the pace and, sniffing half a chance. King- aboard a Top Kart- upped his

their flags”, moments later the pic tures would show that. Magic...

In the later years, as the audi ences grew, the BBC invested in its own “Grand Prix” truck - a million pound pantechnicon into which was squeezed all kinds of exciting video machinery.

This meant that the BBC team could expand to include a pitlane commentator as well. Jonathan Palmer got the job. And then came Tony Jardine. What few people know is that there was another BBC pitlane reporter between the two. My wife.

After James Hunt died in June 1993, Wilkin decided to put Palmer into the commentary box with Murray and asked me to do the pitlane work. There would be no pitlane camera team,just a big heavy radio with which the pitlane reporter would send messages to the com mentary box. Wilkin asked if I would do the job. I had other commitments, but as my wife Amy was with me

Clubman Super Heavy The first start for the final had to be red flagged, after a huge accident left one kart on top of another driver.

Upon the restart, Allan Bower took to the lead, but his stay at the front was short-lived, Jeff Cooper quickly moving into the lead.

After a slow start, defending champion Wayne Hodgson in a Top Kart moved through to the lead, while Blair Kerr and Christopher Skinner followed suit.

This looked to be the way they would fin ish, until a last comer collision between Kerr and Skinner put them both out, the incident moving Bower up to second and Cooper in the Azzuro into third.

that weekend she was available. She had been the PR lady for Ligier before we were married so she knew a lot of people in the pitlane and could get the necessary information quickly.

As it turned out she had better access than we had imagined.'When Mark Blundell crashed his Ligier at the first corner - having qualified really well - he disappeared into the motorhome and wanted to be left alone. Knowing how to open the right doors, Amy simply walked into the motorhome, told Blundell that he would feel better if he talked about it and led a meek but mystified Blundell up to the BBC commentary booth. Johnny Herbert was given similar treatment when he retired.

Taking drivers to the commentary box was the emergency plan for when James failed to turn up. It happened once at Spa when he was laid low with food poisoning. Murray was fed a steady procession of dri vers to fill in.

The gearbox is an extractable six-speed cassette type with a wide range of ratios available, Swissauto manufacturing the whole shooting match in-house.

“The engine is a little bit like a light switch in terms of its power delivery,” Craggill said.

“It revs out to 13,300rpm, but when you come out of a corner at maximum lean you may have only OOOOrpm.

“As you open the throttle, it doesn’t respond very well up to 8500 rpm, but it then it just suddenly takes off.

“Now that’s a problem, as you’re on the side of the tyre and the bike doesn’t have a lot of grip.

“You have to try to pick the bike up before you open the throttle quickly, which means you’re losing a little bit of time on every corner around the circuit but that’s just a characteristic of the engine and there’s nothing you can do about it.

“Compared to a Superbike, these engines don’t feel very torquey, but the power band from 8500-12,000rpm is very useful, though it’s important to keep with in that rev range.

“We shift gears at 12,000-12,200 rpm, the engine revs dropping about lOOOrpm during each shift, which I reckon is pretty good.

“The engine doesn’t feel anything like a Yamaha to drive, though” Craggill explained.

“The Yamaha was really quite driveable, but this thing isn’t and requires a totally different riding style. But it’s only its first season and the other V-four facto ry bikes have been around and refined for ten years now.

“The Big Bang engine I had last year in the Yamaha was more driveable than this, but it probably had 30 horsepower less than the Swissauto engine, which has a lot to do with driveability.

“The team is trying to develop and race the complete bike package at the same time, which just doesn’t work, as you keep i-unning out of time,” Craggill added.

“But, on a personal level, the experience this weekend has been fine for me - let’s hope that something further develops.”

On another occasion - we were in Japan as I recall - Wilkin came on the line and explained that James’s alarm clock had not gone off and that we were going live without him. He had promised to get to the studio as fast as possible.

It was some strange hour of the night in London and for a few short minutes Murray went solo while James drove what must have been one of the fastest ever rans between Wimbledon where he lived and the BBC in Shepherds Bush. He had his foot flat to the floor the whole way and jumped all the traffic lights.

Out in Japan, James’s mad dash caused as much excitement in the BBC box as the race itself, although to this day I am not sure whether I believe that James arrived with three police cars chasing him - as Mark "Wilkin insisted...

In Portugal this year, FI circus had a party for thethe BBC boys.

Damon Hill, Ken Tyrrell, Johnny

Herbert, Eddie Jordan, David Coulthard and Martin Brundle all made speeches.

Bernie Ecclestone presented Murray with a splendid silver trophy to say “Thank You” for nearly 20 years of great coverage. Everyone in FI was there. As he made his speech, Murray asked if perhaps he was rambling on a bit too much and suggested that perhaps he should stop.

“Don’t worry, Murray,” came a voice from the crowd,“There’s a com mercial break coming up soon.”

A couple of days later ITV announced that it had signed a twoyear contract with Murray to have him become their commentator.

“It’ll come as no surprise to anyone that Grand Prix motor racing is my absolute passion,” he commented.

“Naturally, I’m overjoyed that I’m going to be able to communicate my enthusiasm to the English-speaking world as part of ITV’s Formula 1 team.” n

50

COMMENT

250dot&m

General Manager Chris Lambden Editor David Hassall Technical Editor Tony Glynn Assistant Editor Phil Branagan Advertising Manager Sean Henshelwood Advertising Representative Gerald McDornan Graphics and Advertising Co-ordinator Viv Brumby EDITORIAL AND ADVERTISING OFFICES 89 Orrong Crescent Caulfield North VIC 3161 Phone 03 9527 7744 Fax 03 9527 7766 Correspondence: PO Box 1010 Caulfield North VIC 3161 Contributors FI: Joe Saward Europe: Quentin Spurring, Ian Bamsey US: Keith Burgan NZ: John Hawkins Speedway: Dennis Newlyn.

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Correct Catchpole?

Vi

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Post or fax to address above.

ADVERTISING WORKS. IT’S THAT SIMPLE! Call Sean or Gerald on

03 9527 7744

Dear Sir, Gee, wouldn’t the “Classic Catchpole” cartoon in the 11th October issue been even “funnier” if the stupid person cUmbing the pole was, say, an aboriginal, or an Asian, or a woman, or a cripple, or a homosexual? Or all of the above!

Oh, you mean it would be consid ered stupid and offensive - and probably illegal - to portray anyone but an Irishman is stupid on the basis of their ethnic origins!

Perhaps you could explain to your readers just how it is funny to portray someone as stupid on that basis? Most of the rest of us fail to see the supposed humour of it. And if you can’t, perhaps you could explain why you gave space to that sort of rubbish?

TORQUE CONVERTER

Dear Sir, Being a supporter and sponsor of NASCAR, I feel that there is an anomaly in the rules that allows a Readers letters and faxes are welcome. Send to address or fax driver to gain championship points number in left-hand panel. Preference will be given to typed, even when he does not drive his brief, mailed letters. The staff of Motorsport News does not nominated car in the race. necessarily agree with opinions expressed by readers.

Point being; Round one of the ’96/’97 NASCAR season at Thunderdome, October 12; Geoff Brabham Frost, Mansell or Hill, then the last went to the grandstand and found drove a couple of green flag laps and thing I would be doing is discarding every seat was under a pigeon’s then put Max Dumesny in the car nest. There was not one clean seat. and Max drove to a third place fin them because they deserve a few Then it was $5 for a pit pass. ish, the points for the placing going bob more in the pay packet.

Hill now goes into a new future Well worth it for the able-bodied, to Brabham’s credit.

It seems ludicrous to me that you and like the song says, it could be but the steep stairs into and out of heaven or it could be hell. If it is the tunnel are not for everybody. don’t need to drive the car to get the points. Does it mean that if you the former than it would be poetic The food in the upstairs lounge was have enough money you can buy a justice if a Hill-driven Arrows was pretty disgusting as well.

Also, the 5-litres need to be sort driver and earn the points for your to prove more than a thorn in the side of Williams in ’97. ed out now. Turf out the wings and self? Maybe Bryan Sala could hire After all, Damon has carried away undertrays and let’s see the driver Brad Jones or, perhaps, Terry Gordon Drennan Wyhoon could bring Ernie Irvan out 21 GP victories from just 67 starts, a actually change positions occasion ally. I don’t care what brand of from the States.

Ultimo, NSW winning ratio that is only bettered Saturday night’s debacle is even ED; ‘Classic Catchpole’ is a by the legendary Jim Clark and tyres they use, but let’s not have worse than it first appears because reproduction of a famous series Fangio himself. It will be interesting another boring year where tyres Geoff Brabham was interviewed by in Britain’s ‘Autosport’ maga- to see if H-HF or Jacques will be are such an advantage. track side radio at about lap 46; if zine from the pre-Politically able to top that in the years to come.

Correct days. And,if one is to be he was still at the track, why A question for the guys at MN. Terry Matthews wasn’t he in the car? totally PC,the terms ‘aboriginal’ Does Frank Williams ever smile or Normanhurst, NSW and ‘cripple’ should be replaced do they only show him on TV when How about getting the playing by ‘indigenous Australian’ and he has just had an injection or field level and giving the genuine Wayne-free zone rookies a fair go, and treat the sup ‘mobility-challenged’. Lighten something? Surely he couldn’t look up, Gordon. go Dickensean in real life. porters and sponsors to a fair Dear Sir, night’s competition. After all, these Regards end keep up the fine Just a quick response letter to are the people who make the whole Speaking Frankly standard of what is a great mag. your wording on the bottom of the picture, ‘The finger’, on page 24 of thing possible.

Dear Sir, issue number 85, Jim Thom Neil Harrison The caption read,“A group of fans Congrats to Damon Hill on a well Chapman, ACT deserved World Championship, Won Eaglehawk, Vic. with a sizeable margin by any stan ED; To be fair, Brabham did dard and even won without the need start the car and then stepped to biff other contenders off the track! out on lap two. The reason is What I don’t understand though is that BMW Motorsport will not release him from his exclusive the strange attitude of Frank Will iams towards his star drivers. He contract and allow him to race NASCAR until the Super has now had four world champions that have all been terminated after Touring series ends on m November 9; that’s their discre winning motor racing’s grand prize. tion.

Piquet, I suppose in all fairness, The driver substitution rule is a was already heading elsewhere, long-used one in the USA; dri though the shameful treatment smil vers such as Dale Earnhardt ing Frank doused out to Mansell and and Bill EUiott have used it just Prost leaves one wondering what his this season. true motives are. Sure they are going to cost more than a backmarker but And; we would LOVE to see Ernie Irvan come out here ... isn’t that their due? Now Damon has also been discarded at a time when you would have thought he would Aussie, Aussie, Aussie have been a marketing goldmine for Williams.

Dear Sir, Looking back on ’93, would So, HRT want to replace Lowndes Mansell had performed better than with a Kiwi! You have to be kidding, David Coulthard? Will HHF do bet Mr Grech!

PROOF POSITIVE... Frank Williams does laugh. Here the F1 team owner shares ter than Hill would have next year if How about giving a go to one of a giggle with the fastest man on earth, American track star Michael Johnson. he had been re-signed to Williams. the many young Aussies who have The answer is obvious and if I lets Wayne Gardner know they are proved they can do the job?

A plea to Ivan-apolis not Holden fans’, etc. It should read, were Villeneuve and I win the crown How about Jason Bargwanna? He ‘they are not Gardner fans’. in ‘97(as he probably and justifiably Dear Sir, certainly brightened up the other Just for the record you should will) then I would certainly watch Now that the ARDC have the wise boring Formula Holden race at know that only two people standing Sandown, didn’t he? And, weren’t my back as it is obvious that he will rights to manage Eastern Creek also be discarded by smihng Frank.

Raceway, I hope something will be there are Ford fans. The rest support you watching the Formula Ford It all seems so strange to me. I done to accommodate the paying Holden as is evident by the Larry series this year?

Perkins cut-out held by myself.

Come on HRT, get serious and do run a highly competitive business public, something for Australia!

I was there recently for the fabu and put a lot of time into ensuring Dean Paterson my people are performing well and lous Jack Brabham historic meet Canterbury, NSW George Stockman are motivated. If I had a racing ing. After paying $15 entrance Mulgrave, Vic. team and a winner of the calibre of (good value for a day’s racing) we ‘The Gardner Hate Stand’.

CLASSIC CATCHPOLE

By Barry Foley

World ofModel Cars

The complete range of 1;43 scale die-cast Minichamps 1996 FI cars as pictured (Ligier also available)

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A full range of ^ Minichamps 1:8 scale

1:43 and 1:18 scale also available^^i

BrutuOe #12 (left), BaricbeUo #11 (right) I W IS

ViUeneuve #6 (1eft),HiU #5 (right) Current ITC cars in stock, 1:18 scale Klaus Ludwig Mercedes Benz (1994) and 1:18 scale Jan Magnussen Mercedes Benz (1995). Also, Ford Escort R5 Cosworth 1994 1000 Lakes Rally Delecour #6, 1:18 scale die-cast Minidiamps

Currently available, 1:18 scale die-cast Minichamps Ayrton Senna McLaren MP4I4 1988 World Championship tar (as pictured), MP4/5 B 1990 & MP4I6 1991, Alain Prost McLaren MP4IS 1989 World Championship Year and, Gerhard Berger McLaren MP4I6 1991. Also available, 1:18 scale die-cast Minichamps Schumacher Benetton B19S World Championship Year, & Schumacher 1996 Ferrari launch, also Aiesi Benetton 8t Jordan launch.

Michael Schumacher #1 Irvine also avail

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Katayama #18 (left), Salo #19 (right)

Herbert #14, Prentzen also available

We have access to the full range of Minichamps FI and DTM/ITC cars

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Brad Jones 1:43 scale diecast Audi A4 Minichamps models

1:18 scale die<ast Kyosho Honda N5X, Mazda RX7, Toyota Supra & Burago Porsche 911 Carrera Cabriolet and Dodge Viper

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1:18 scale die-cast Minichamps James Bond 007 Z3 BMW CouUhard #8 (left), Hakkinen #7 (right)

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Burago die-cast

Phone 0298973431

Fax: 02 96^7 44R0 JVn 2 R/axrFfll .StrFiFit

2142

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