Quote:
Originally Posted by Holden308
That would have been interesting to see. Even at half to three-quarter throttle and only revving to around 5,300 they were still doing 280 during qualifying (driven hard they could safely take those 427 engines to around 6,200 rpm apparently). The unfortunate thing is that the Monaro's were never driven as hard as they could have been.....not even in the Nations Cup sprint races. They only went as fast as the opposition dictated.
In all honesty they should have lapped Bathurst in around 2:05 and their top speed on Conrod should have easily been around or over the 300 mark. And the reason for that was that (using the Le Mans class system of the time as a guide), they were a GTS car in a GT race/series. Sure there was the 8.0L V10 Viper in NC and the 6.0L V12 Lamborghini, but the Viper ACR was a very much watered down version of the GTS-R that had won outright at the Daytona 24 Hour and won the GTS class at Le Mans a few times, while the Lambo, unlike the Monaro, wasn't a pure race car.
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Shortly after the first Bathurst 24hr Motor Magazine got their hands on the winning Monaro still battle scarred and AFAIK running in race trim. With Garth Tander driving it hit 307kmh at Avalon airport. Unknown was the distance required.
In regards to the Monaro being a GTS car-not quite. It may have had the GTS class Corvette engine but the chassis itself didn’t have the aero or suspension that GTS cars had. No idea if the Monaros ever saw a wind tunnel like the Corvette did. John Bowe would’ve really had something to complain had the Monaro been running GTS level brakes aero and suspension. It also weighed far more then a GTS class racer by at least a couple of hundred kilos. A car faster then those NGT cars but nowhere near a GTS class Corvette/Saleen/Ferrari etc.