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1988 Tooheys 1000
The 1988 Tooheys 1000 was a 1000 km endurance motor race for Group A Touring Cars. It was held on 2 October 1988 at the Mount Panorama Circuit just outside Bathurst in New South Wales, Australia. The race was the opening round of the 1988 Asia-Pacific Touring Car Championship and was the 29th running of the Bathurst 1000.
The 1988 edition was the only race in the history of the Bathurst 1000 to have commenced with a rolling start.
The race was won by Tony Longhurst and Tomas Mezera driving a Ford Sierra RS500.
On the Friday afternoon immediately at the close of final qualifying, Holden Special Vehicles driver Tom Walkinshaw lodged a formal protest against the leading Australian Ford Sierras, targeting all three Dick Johnson Racing (DJR) cars, along with the Tony Longhurst and Colin Bond entries. No European-built Fords (or those with some European build/driver connection) were protested, Walkinshaw claiming it was only the Australian cars as they were the fastest, despite the presence of the Eggenberger Motorsport built Allan Moffat ANZ Sierra as fourth fastest qualifier (faster than Bond and the third DJR entry). Also left alone in the protest was the Sierra of teammates Andrew Miedecke (fifth in a car with a technical link to Andy Rouse, while Miedecke's co-driver at Bathurst was Steve Soper) and Andrew Bagnall (seventh set by co-driver Pierre Dieudonné), and the Team CMS Sweden Sierra (tenth).
The feeling among the protested Australian Sierra teams was that the protest was designed to severely disrupt their race preparations, with only Longhurst's team able to get their Sierra somewhere near its pre-protest speed. All three teams had to pull their cars' engines and suspension apart after Friday's qualifying for the scrutineers before having to put them back together again before Saturday's Tooheys Top Ten. This was particularly disruptive for Dick Johnson's team as they had all three of their cars protested, despite the #18 car only qualifying 12th compared to Johnson's pole and John Bowe in second. The protest prompted DJR team owner Johnson to say at a press conference that Walkinshaw would "Protest against the cut in his bagpipes if he could" and that "All he wants to do is win and he doesn't care how he does it".
The Walkinshaw protest was countered by DJR team manager Neal Lowe who protested the three HSV team Holden Commodores, calling on his knowledge of the Commodore from his time with the old Holden Dealer Team in 1986. The counter-protest by DJR focused on the front air dam, steering rack and the size of the rear spoiler on only the factory backed Commodores.
On race day, Walkinshaw advised the Australian Racing Drivers Club (ARDC) and FISA officials that should one of the protested cars win the race, his protest against that car was to be immediately withdrawn. His reasons given for this was so that the winner would be known on the day rather than months later, as had been the case with the 1987 race.
Ultimately the Walkinshaw protests were found to be invalid and was dismissed. The HSV team cars had been entered by Perkins Motorsport and not by TWR, therefore as he was only a driver at the meeting, the Scot had no authority to lodge a protest and the stewards of the meeting erred in allowing it to proceed (all it would have taken to rectify was the signature of Larry Perkins replacing Walkinshaw's). Eventually though, all of the Sierras were cleared by FISA (the winning Longhurst Sierra had the protest against it withdrawn while Bond's car was initially found to have an illegal turbo and was excluded from its 3rd place. It was Bond's team however who proved that Walkinshaw's protest was invalid, thus so was the ruling on their turbo. As a result, the 3rd place finish stood). However, the damage was done to the leading Australian Fords and it was only race winners Tony Longhurst Racing who managed to get their car back up to speed after being dismantled by scrutineers on the Friday before the Top Ten run off. For their part, the Caltex Sierra of Bond and Alan Jones had its original turbo impounded (the one initially found to be illegal), with the teams only spare being of inferior size and quality which Bond told dropped power from a claimed 500 bhp (373 kW; 507 PS) to around 450 bhp (336 kW; 456 PS), or around the speed level of the leading Holden Commodore's of Larry Perkins and Allan Grice.
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1988 Tooheys 1000
The 1988 Tooheys 1000 was a 1000 km endurance motor race for Group A Touring Cars. It was held on 2 October 1988 at the Mount Panorama Circuit just outside Bathurst in New South Wales, Australia. The race was the opening round of the 1988 Asia-Pacific Touring Car Championship and was the 29th running of the Bathurst 1000.
The 1988 edition was the only race in the history of the Bathurst 1000 to have commenced with a rolling start.
The race was won by Tony Longhurst and Tomas Mezera driving a Ford Sierra RS500.
On the Friday afternoon immediately at the close of final qualifying, Holden Special Vehicles driver Tom Walkinshaw lodged a formal protest against the leading Australian Ford Sierras, targeting all three Dick Johnson Racing (DJR) cars, along with the Tony Longhurst and Colin Bond entries. No European-built Fords (or those with some European build/driver connection) were protested, Walkinshaw claiming it was only the Australian cars as they were the fastest, despite the presence of the Eggenberger Motorsport built Allan Moffat ANZ Sierra as fourth fastest qualifier (faster than Bond and the third DJR entry). Also left alone in the protest was the Sierra of teammates Andrew Miedecke (fifth in a car with a technical link to Andy Rouse, while Miedecke's co-driver at Bathurst was Steve Soper) and Andrew Bagnall (seventh set by co-driver Pierre Dieudonné), and the Team CMS Sweden Sierra (tenth).
The feeling among the protested Australian Sierra teams was that the protest was designed to severely disrupt their race preparations, with only Longhurst's team able to get their Sierra somewhere near its pre-protest speed. All three teams had to pull their cars' engines and suspension apart after Friday's qualifying for the scrutineers before having to put them back together again before Saturday's Tooheys Top Ten. This was particularly disruptive for Dick Johnson's team as they had all three of their cars protested, despite the #18 car only qualifying 12th compared to Johnson's pole and John Bowe in second. The protest prompted DJR team owner Johnson to say at a press conference that Walkinshaw would "Protest against the cut in his bagpipes if he could" and that "All he wants to do is win and he doesn't care how he does it".
The Walkinshaw protest was countered by DJR team manager Neal Lowe who protested the three HSV team Holden Commodores, calling on his knowledge of the Commodore from his time with the old Holden Dealer Team in 1986. The counter-protest by DJR focused on the front air dam, steering rack and the size of the rear spoiler on only the factory backed Commodores.
On race day, Walkinshaw advised the Australian Racing Drivers Club (ARDC) and FISA officials that should one of the protested cars win the race, his protest against that car was to be immediately withdrawn. His reasons given for this was so that the winner would be known on the day rather than months later, as had been the case with the 1987 race.
Ultimately the Walkinshaw protests were found to be invalid and was dismissed. The HSV team cars had been entered by Perkins Motorsport and not by TWR, therefore as he was only a driver at the meeting, the Scot had no authority to lodge a protest and the stewards of the meeting erred in allowing it to proceed (all it would have taken to rectify was the signature of Larry Perkins replacing Walkinshaw's). Eventually though, all of the Sierras were cleared by FISA (the winning Longhurst Sierra had the protest against it withdrawn while Bond's car was initially found to have an illegal turbo and was excluded from its 3rd place. It was Bond's team however who proved that Walkinshaw's protest was invalid, thus so was the ruling on their turbo. As a result, the 3rd place finish stood). However, the damage was done to the leading Australian Fords and it was only race winners Tony Longhurst Racing who managed to get their car back up to speed after being dismantled by scrutineers on the Friday before the Top Ten run off. For their part, the Caltex Sierra of Bond and Alan Jones had its original turbo impounded (the one initially found to be illegal), with the teams only spare being of inferior size and quality which Bond told dropped power from a claimed 500 bhp (373 kW; 507 PS) to around 450 bhp (336 kW; 456 PS), or around the speed level of the leading Holden Commodore's of Larry Perkins and Allan Grice.