Robbed Of The Targa By A Stone
Sydney Morning Herald
Friday May 6, 1994
CRUEL luck robbed Neal Bates and Coral Taylor of victory in the third annual Targa Tasmania which ended after 2,000 km of unpredictability last Sunday.
A stone from a slower car zinged through the radiator of the Bates/Taylor Toyota Celica GT-Four just three special stages from the finish of the five-day grind.
Bates and Taylor were deeply disappointed. Targa first-timers both, the Australian rally champions had controlled the event right from the start, and were heading for a handsome win.
Their retirement two stages later put Andrew Miedecke/Alan Taylor, in a Porsche 944 Turbo, on target for an unexpected yet very popular win.
Operating on a tight budget of about $15,000, Miedecke had been fast and consistent throughout, although outgunned on the wet sections by the all-wheel-drive Celica, which, despite rumours, was far closer to stock standard than a Group A rally car.
Placed second after another impressive drive were Garry Waldon/Rod Horsley in a Mazda RX-7 Turbo. It was Waldon's first Targa outing, and Horsley said he came away with tremendous respect for his co-driver, a circuit racer who adapted quickly to rally-style pace notes.
Miedecke and Waldon both managed to see off former world rally champ Sandro Minari who manhandled the lumbering four-wheel-drive Lamborghini Diablo VT to third place.
Jim Richards/Barry Oliver took fourth, after coming back from a day-one setback when the turbo seal blew on their Nissan GT-R, necessitating an all-nighter in the workshop to fix it.
The Targa is bigger than the empire in Tasmania, where most of the population turns out to wave and cheer and gape and chiack.
But on the sports pages of newspapers on the bigger island to the north, groin injuries and the Menangle trots relegated Targa news to two pars, if anything.
Maybe sports editors don't understand what Targa is about. It is the only event of its kind anywhere. And it's difficult to explain the slightly crazy concept of 279 cars of varying vintages racing on closed-off public roads.
But the presence of many big names of local and international motor sport should count for something. Brabham, Richards, Minari, Bartlett, Johnson, Clark, Miedecke, Bates, Waldon ...
Touring car ace Richards told me he looks forward to driving in the Targa as much as he does the Bathurst 1000.
Returning to active motor sport, too, was another Bathurst legend, Bill Brown, who drove buddy Bob Craig's Mercedes SL500 with great verve and some brutality, even getting the computer-controlled rollover bar to pop up unexpectedly as the big roadster raced through a corner on the limit. A smitten Brown says he'll be back again. A still-twitchy Craig's not so sure.
But the unflappable Sir Jack Brabham and navigator Grahame Ward insist they'll be there again next year despite destroying a BMW M3 on the fourth day. Brabham had been going gangbusters when he slipped wide on a tightening left-hander and finished in the trees.
The brand-new showroom stock BMW 325i coupe which I shared with navigator Barry Lake proved to be a stayer over the five days, outrunning or outlasting all of the Ferraris and most of the Porsches to finish in the top 20.
As road tests go, the Targa was a huge challenge to any car's dynamics and reliability.
We were constantly amazed by the car's superb handling and braking, along with its forgiving nature, and were proud that every car ahead of us was modified to some degree.
After some serious detailing, fresh brake pads and new Pirellis, the coupe will go back on to the executive fleet at BMW Australia in Melbourne. I guarantee it is now well run-in.
The Lexus LS400 of Peter Pilkington/Brian Gelding, with which we duelled closely throughout, finished 16th, a splendid result for a near-standard limo with an auto box.
Rather than risk the wrath of the ladies at the school canteen, I should also mention that my wife, Sharyn McKay, and her rookie navigator, Michelle Murphy, were way out in front in the all-female category when their 14-year-old Ferrari 308 broke a throttle cable on the final morning. This relegated them to second behind the New Woman Toyota Celica, which had a different driver every day in a sort of talent quest on wheels.
The slippery road conditions on the second and fifth days caught out many competitors, many of whom managed to park in the strangest places and in hardly confronting circumstances.
Driving standards will need to be addressed again before next year. There are still way too many crashes. And I still believe roll cages and harnesses should be compulsory for anyone tackling the flat-out special stages where the faster cars top 250 km/h.
SENNA WAS BEST
THE jubilant mood among competitors at the comple tion of Targa Tasmania on Sunday night quickly went from upbeat to shock and disbelief at the news of Ayrton Senna's sickening crash and near-death condition.
The sadness was mixed with anger as the inevitable analyses of the reason for the crash hit the newsprint and small screens.
Suggestions that Senna was a victim of the new Formula One regulations are simply rubbish.
Senna died because those in charge of the San Marino Grand Prix refused to acknowledge the obvious perils to drivers posed by the Imola circuit.
The corner where Senna crashed is blindingly fast. And yet there was nothing but a too-close concrete barrier to slow down a wayward car. Where were the sand traps? And if the concrete wall needed to be so close, why not change the shape of the corner to slow down the cars?
Gerhard Berger's miraculous escape from a fiery crash at Imola in 1990 should have been the trigger for change. Now, four years on, it has taken two deaths over a race weekend to prompt an investigation. I'm off to the Monaco Grand Prix next weekend but for me and many others, the absence of Ayrton Senna will be difficult to accept.
He was the greatest ever, I believe. Better than Juan Fangio and Jimmy Clark because of the demands of the power, braking and blinding speeds of the modern grand prix car. His rare gifts managed to shine through the technical complexity that invaded Formula One in the last decade or so.
His death is even more crushing because, for me, Senna was one of the most fascinating and complex humans on earth. When he was in the mood to talk, he was a journalist's delight. Enigmatic and deep, the man who was capable of running a fellow competitor off the racetrack could go misty-eyed with emotion while talking about his love of children.
The poetry of his language and his ability to analyse his own performance in an almost trancendental fashion never failed to fascinate.
Senna was very special, as a driver and as a person. His loss, inexplicable and unnecessary, is considerable. Just as I remember where I was when President Kennedy died, I'll never forget last Sunday night/Monday morning.
CORSER
THE new Wollongong Whiz motorcyclist Troy Corser had mixed fortunes in the opening round of the 1994 World Superbike Championship at Donington, England, crashing out in leg one but then bouncing back to take a strong fourth in the second 25-lapper.
Riding a Ducati, Corser qualified a respectable third in his world championship introduction, charging to the lead midway through. He was then embroiled in a thrilling battle up front with four other riders, with positions changing constantly.
But Corser was tossed from his machine after clipping the rear wheel of Aaron Slight's Honda when the Kiwi missed a gear two laps from the finish.
Sometime British 500cc grand prix rider Carl Fogarty won that leg with American Scott Russell taking the second race. Corser finished fourth to be ninth overall on the day.
JAPAN TOPS
JAPANESE cars have domi nated the first official British customer satisfaction survey conducted by the US company JD Power.
Topping the poll was the Toyota Corolla, followed by the Mazda 323, Toyota Carina, Honda Accord, Honda Civic, Mazda 626, Toyota MR2, and in eighth, Germany's Mercedes 190.
NEW EDITION
THE 1994 edition of the motoring industry's most- thumbed reference volume, the Black and White Data Book, is now available through Marque Publishing(phone 02 546 5521), priced at $49.95.
The updated book reveals major changes in the brands and types of vehicles being bought are reshaping the market.
Some Korean cars are outselling their increasingly expensive Japanese rivals, and a whole new class of mid-sized V6-engined cars has emerged. In fact there are now 30 different V6 engines available locally. Still, the traditional Aussie six remains the dominant choice of Australians.
Other facts and figures proffered by compilers Tracy Gilholme and Eric Blair include these choice cuts:
* Thirty-three car marques and a dozen motorcycle brands are sold in Australia.
* Some 398 different makes and models of passenger cars are available here.
* Australia has the third-highest consumption of automotive fuel in the world, but retail outlets have slipped from 16,450 in 1975 to 9,165 in 1993.
* Auto executives deal with no fewer than 77 Federal and State government departments. Bet that's pure joy.
* There are 50 museums in Australia devoted wholly or partly to motoring subjects.
* Australia's best year for car exports was 1973 when 71,684 were shipped. Last year the figure was 26,621 cars.
* The ratio of people to cars here is now 1.74: 1.
* A total of 816,369 km of road is in general use in Australia. Sixty three per cent is sealed.
NO 2L NISSAN
NISSAN definitely won't be participating in local 2.0-litre touring car racing this year.
Gibson Motor Sport boss Fred Gibson, who has been negotiating a 2.0-litre involvement with Nissan, confirmed this week that Nissan's managing director, Leon Daphne, had told him the company would not be returning to racing.
Gibson, whose driver Mark Skaife comfortably leads the 1994 Shell V8 series, has been a strong supporter of the international 2.0-litre formula.
Now Gibson, whose team has the best win rate of the 1990s, is actively seeking links with another manufacturer with a view to a late-1994 entry.
12-HOUR MOVES
IN a controversial move, Ferrari and Lamborghini supercars are likely to be eligible for next year's James Hardie 12 Hour race for showroom production cars at Bathurst on Easter Sunday.
The inclusion of the famed and very expensive Italian marques would certainly further enhance the growing image of the race.
However, it may also price many potential competitors out of participating
It also further destroys the idea of the 12 Hour being a high-speed shopper's guide for consumers.
A Ferrari 512 TR or Lambo Diablo would be at least twice the price of the most expensive car in the '94 race, the $220,000 Maserati Shamal, and at least five times pricier than the race winner, the 80K Mazda RX-7.
Following its successful national telecast, the Ten Network is planning to expand its live Saturday television coverage of practice and support events by 90 minutes.
Ratings were up again this year in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth.
GRAND SAVING
AUSTRALIAN Subaru buyers are to benefit from a worldwide product pricing policy change which slices $905 from the recommended retail of the smart Impreza hatch.
The reduction means that the the hatch prices have been aligned with those of the Impreza sedan range. With the reduction, prices of the Impreza GX hatch start from $26,575, including air-conditioning, central locking, power steering, electric windows and Subaru's three year/100,000 km warranty.
BIG CHANCE
MICHAEL Doohan hopes to extend his reign in Spain this weekend, when the world 500cc championship moves to Jerez, where he has already won three times over the last four years.
Honda ace Doohan holds a slender nine-point lead in the '94 championship over Cagiva's John Kocinski. World champ Kevin Schwantz (Suzuki) and Yamaha's Luca Cadalora are also in contention.
A two-day test session at Jerez, one of his favourite circuits after Phillip Island, has put the Gold Coaster in a confident frame of mind.
Fellow Aussie Daryl Beattie, languishing on just six points after a frustrating start to the current season, is more than keen to score a confidence-boosting result aboard his Yamaha tomorrow.
Beattie finished sixth at Jerez last year, in his first season in the 500s
SHORT BURSTS
* Four-wheel-drive rally cars are to be banned in the world championship from 1998, to be replaced by a 2.0-litre front-drive formula.
* Research shows that 42 per cent of BMW buyers in Australia pay cash. Many are Asians who like to deal in dollars.
* World championship leader Michael Schumacher has acquired a new Bugatti EB110 ES, which joins a Ferrari F40, Mercedes 500SL and a Harley-Davidson in his garage.
* Reports of the death of HDT, the operation once headed by Peter Brock, have been exaggerated, according to Len and Ed Pennisi, who have taken over the company and are in the process of setting up an HDT special vehicles headquarters in Sydney.
* Former F1 driver Rene Arnoux is to race a Dodge Viper in the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
* ABC Television's very worthy Attitude program next week focuses on the driving habits of young motorists and is certainly worth a look. It comes up on Wednesday night at 9.30.
© 1994 Sydney Morning Herald
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