Bathurst: the Island Years Pt 1
Australia's Great Race, the annual endurance classic for touring cars, didn't start at Bathurst. It was originally intended for the Albert Park track in Melbourne and eventually the first race was held at Phillip Island.
Bill Tuckey's excellent book Australia's Greatest Motor Race: The complete History published in 1981 by Lansdowne Press, provides a great deal of detail on the early years. From the perspective of a further twenty years on some of the contents and conclusions are interesting in themselves.
According to Bill the Albert Park track was "shut down the race circuit ostensibly because its use two or three times a year abrogated the right of the people of Melbourne to drive around it." He also complained of the loss of, "That wonderful circuit around the lake (that) would have become the most world famous circuit in Australia and not Bathurst." The Touring cars have eventually made it to the Albert Park circuit, only it as a support to the Australian F1 Grand Prix meeting. In a different time the benefits of an international showpiece have outweighed the objections of protesters.
Without Albert Park the only other circuit near Melbourne, at the time was Philip Island. So in 1960 this is where the legend began, as the Armstrong 500. The race was open to exact showroom specification cars that were either assembled or manufactured in Australia and at least 100 had to have been registered for road use.
One notable entry was the Volkswagen 1200 Beetle of the 1955 round-Australia Redex Trial winner Eddie Perkins; that's right Larry's Dad.
The fastest car was a Mercedes 220SE of Tasmanian open wheel racers Gavin and John Youl who took time out from the family farm, Symmons Plains. Later a track was built in a corner of the Youl's farm and it was named after the farm. They were the early leaders until the car rolled after a blown tyre caused by the track starting to break up.
As this was a one-off race most of the drivers were regulars in other categories. Some notable names were Bib Stilwell, Bob Jane, Harry Firth, Norm Beechey and the Geoghegan brothers.
These cars weren't exactly high performance machines; rather they were the everyday models that were common on the streets. These were the days before special performance models such a HSV Commodores and Tickford Falcons. The intention was that the race was a chance to showcase the
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