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Back to July 2012 Motorsports News Archive
| 02-07-2012: Two Days of Thunder a Roaring Success | |
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Many of the kids were invited to sit behind the wheel of the cars and went home excited about their future as race car drivers. The dedicated fans of Jim Richards travelled from as far afield as Perth to see and hear Jim’s ‘ new V8 AMC Javelin driven in anger for the first time in Queensland. Richards, who was the Patron of the meeting, signed hats, posters and even a competitor’s Mustang at the meeting. The weekend was his first chance to track-test the spectacular 360-ci 1972 Javelin in advance of Round 4 of the 2012 Touring Car Masters series, at the Ipswich circuit in early August during the V8 Supercar Round. The AMC Javelin was driven in a speed comparison with the Shannon’s road going Javelin. Despite the 15 second handicap given to the standard vehicle, Richard’s AMC clawed back time and only 0.07 seconds separated the cars as they crossed the line on the track’s National Circuit. The weekend was packed full of muscle cars on track with over 400 vehicles participating in a cruise during a leisurely Sunday lunch. In one of the biggest fields seen in Queensland’s history, the Historic Touring Cars fielded over 40 cars. To match them, the biggest ever field of Trans-Am V8s in Australian history hit the grid, with an 18-car field. The Porsche Centre Gold Coast provided fields for racing and fastest lap contests. These were backed up with Muscle Car Sprints and a Cobra/GT40 Group. An old favourite to return to the newly resurfaced track was the Australian Sports Sedans. These 700+ horsepower specials were the fastest tin tops on Australia’s race tracks in yesteryear and they still have the power to make grown men tremble. The raw menace of these tributes to Aussie ingenuity has to be experienced to be believed. The weekend wrapped up with the Tranzmile/Black Trucks Group N Historic Touring Cars and Russell Wright’s Mustang took its second win for the weekend. Darryl Hansen’s Mustang claimed second after a near race long dice with Cameron Black in the mighty Ford Escort. Peter Baguley was fourth in the first Torana XU1 ahead of the similar cars of Bruce Dummett and Nick Marentis. Martin White’s Falcon Sprint was seventh ahead of Gary Jackson’s Monaro, 70-year-old Harvey Black’s Escort with Bob Heagerty’s Mazda RX-2 just taking the last spot in the top ten over the Cortina of Gary Herron. John English proved the dominance of his long racing history and commitment to preparation by taking four wins from four starts in the #72 Camaro. John Samios was impressive on his return to the class in his #13 Camaro to be second all weekend. Thirds were shared between Ethan Lind in the #93 Falcon Sprint ahead of the Camaro of Grant Wilson and the Bartlett Camaro replica of Nigel Smeaton. Porsche Centre Gold Coast Races finished with a handicap race that virtually had four cars abreast at the finish line. George Foessel had driven the race of his life after being the second backmarker to launch to win from scratch marker Dean Croyden with the quick cars of Wayne Hennig and Ray Angus charging through to fall just metres short at the chequered flag. After a trying weekend, Mark Bowen did what he threatened to do all weekend in the Chev powered Holden VK Commodore by racing from rear of the grid to win the Australian Sports Sedan race. V8 Supercar Driver, Robbie Bolger, in the ex-Russell Ingall V8 Supercar Commodore, came in second ahead of Nathan Assaillit in the ex-1994 Kevin Waldock Falcon. Anthony Maxwell claimed fourth in the ex-Seton Capri-Chev ahead of Dwayne Taylor’s awesome LH Torana. |
Over 4000 motorsport fans soaked up the festive atmosphere, a huge show’n’shine and caught up with their heroes of the track and Queensland Raceway’s Two Days of Thunder. The wide open pits were full of youngsters as they watched in awe the powerful and exotic machines that went out to do battle on the track. ^ Back to top ^
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