Group A Holden Commodores in Europe

[chunterer]

Interesting thoughts in that post.

As you say Delcourt did pair with Graham Moore in 1985 and 1986, so it is logical to think that the '87 WTCC car may well have been one of Moore's ATCC VK's upgraded to VL spec.....

You also mention Jeroen Hin's Commodore. Was he the guy who raced a Rouse built Marlboro & Playboy backed RS500 in Holland in 1988 or '89?

[Al Weyman]

Did I post this link before I cannot remember http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUSBcLhIqZY

[KA]

Originally Posted by chunterer

Interesting thoughts in that post.

As you say Delcourt did pair with Graham Moore in 1985 and 1986, so it is logical to think that the '87 WTCC car may well have been one of Moore's ATCC VK's upgraded to VL spec.....

You also mention Jeroen Hin's Commodore. Was he the guy who raced a Rouse built Marlboro & Playboy backed RS500 in Holland in 1988 or '89?

The Delcourt thing is interesting- He co-drove at least 3 times with Moore at Bathurst (if you count the abortive '85 outing in the leased Starion) as well as Moore sharing the Serge Power Holden at Spa. Don't know how the deal came about, but the story might be in one of the Bathurst annuals
If you've got a link with a driver and team down under, then getting parts etc for a Commodore in Europe must have been a bit easier!

Yep, that's the guy- his VL was Playboy sponsored as well. I know very little about him apart from the Holden and RS500 though- as well as the VL, he raced a Grp N Sierra in Holland in '87, so there was already a Ford link there

[GTRMagic]

Originally Posted by chunterer

As you say Delcourt did pair with Graham Moore in 1985 and 1986, so it is logical to think that the '87 WTCC car may well have been one of Moore's ATCC VK's upgraded to VL spec.....

Mr Moore only had one VK Commodore, ex-HDT, and the 'T car' that Allan Moffat test drove at Bathurst 1985 for the Channel #7 teev coverage.

This chassis stayed in VK form its whole life.. prepared and sometimes driven by Bob Stevens, and run at Bathurst in Australian Native Landscapes (1986) and Strathfield Car Radios (1987) colours.

Mr Moore moved his Strathfield Car Radios backing to a brand new TWR VL owned and raced with Tony Noske for Bathurst. The VK was onsold to Rick Scarf... and it was run in red paintwork for a number of years.

So I dont believe this chassis made it to Europe..

[KA]

Just noticed something else about the Hin and Delcourt Commodores- unless the Playboy car got a change of paintjob early in it's career, did Jeroen Hin use both cars? Frank de Jong's website now has these pics of the Hin/Fred Krab car at the Zolder ETCC race in June 87- plain white with red diagonal stripes at the back, the colourscheme usually seen on the Delcourt/Guyaux car...
http://homepage.mac.com/frank_de_jon...%20Zolder.html

http://homepage.mac.com/frank_de_jon...G-1987-151.jpg
http://www.racingsportscars.com/etcc...-09-06-023.jpg

rather than the white with two red stripes usually seen on Hin's car http://s271.photobucket.com/albums/j...06SSTT-102.jpg

[KA]

Originally Posted by GTRMagic

Mr Moore only had one VK Commodore, ex-HDT, and the 'T car' that Allan Moffat test drove at Bathurst 1985 for the Channel #7 teev coverage.

This chassis stayed in VK form its whole life.. prepared and sometimes driven by Bob Stevens, and run at Bathurst in Australian Native Landscapes (1986) and Strathfield Car Radios (1987) colours.

Mr Moore moved his Strathfield Car Radios backing to a brand new TWR VL owned and raced with Tony Noske for Bathurst. The VK was onsold to Rick Scarf... and it was run in red paintwork for a number of years.

So I dont believe this chassis made it to Europe..

Thanks for clearing that up- that fits with the suggestion made earlier in the thread that the two Belgian cars didn't come from Australia, but were acquired as complete cars, rather than being built by Serge Power...

Some background on Graham Moore, including a bit on the link with Delcourt:

Of all the drivers he shared a car with at Bathurst he is best-remembered for pairing with the jeweller from Brussels, Michel Delcourt. The Belgian also had Moore alongside in the Spa 24 Hour race on four occasions. In 1987 they teamed up with Alex Guyaux to race a Holden Commodore VL to a class 5th. After skipping 1988 they were back in 1989, the pair joined by Roger Visconti in a Carrera Motorsport Porsche 911 Carrera (DNF). Their final two appearance came in 1991 in an Opel Omega 3000 shared with Wolfgang Haugg (DNF) and in 1992 when the same driver line up raced a Porsche Carrera RS to 14th overall.
“I first saw Michel drive with Robbie Francevic in a Volvo at the Wellington Street Race in 1985,” said Moore. “He drove through the field and won the race and I thought this bloke is something special. Not only did I have him drive with me at Bathurst, but he gave the chance to go and drive alongside him in Europe. Michel and I would still speak every couple of months. He is a great guy and a very good race car driver.”

http://www.speedcafe.com/2009/12/11/graham-moore/

[KA]

A few more shots of the Michel Delcourt/Serge Power VL- '87 TT, with production saloon and future BTCC racer Jerry Mahony bringing his Arquati sponsorship. Think this must have been Mahony's first 'proper' Group A drive- he did the BTCC race at the British GP meeting earlier in the year, but that was in his regular production Sierra Cosworth

http://www.flickr.com/photos/richard...in/photostream
http://www.flickr.com/photos/richard...in/photostream
http://www.flickr.com/photos/richard...in/photostream

[Spen Again]

Are we assuming the Rallycross Commodores were built up from complete cars here in Europe? Eddy Goossens ran one in Dutch Rallycross (orange VL) in 88 & 89, I remember a white/yellow car with the body kit running in Holldand, could be the same car modified, then Jack (or maybe Jaques?) Franzen was running a red VL in '92 for the whole Euro season, famously parked it gently on its head at the Portuguese round. If these are relevant I'll dig further in.

[KA]

I haven't got a clue about the origin of the Guffens/Franzen rallycross Holden, but I'd love to know more about it. Think the Belgian 'Car Glass' team were involved somewhere along the way- pretty sure it ran in their colours at one point.
There are a couple of pics earlier in the thread IIRC.

More of the Serge Power cars at the '87 TT

The Jeroen Hin/Playboy car, with either Vic Covey or Andrew Jeffrey exploring the Silverstone gravel
http://www.flickr.com/photos/richard...in/photostream

and the Delcourt/Guyuax/Mahony 'Arquati' car
http://www.flickr.com/photos/richard...in/photostream

[HDT423]

Originally Posted by rdmdog

Does the info here help at all?

Hi Guys, Have read some of your info on the 1988 TWR Walkie. It is my belief and I have good evidence that this car now belongs to me. I have owned it for about 20 years, some of the earlier history of the car pre TWR I do not have but all the build No. and CAMS history point to this car being the 1988 TWR car at Bathurst. Their were two TWR cars in europe and which one this was is a little unclear but we believe it wast the one that Allam drone at Donnington Park as the first full bodied walkinshaw to be seen at a race track. The car has some very identifiable modifications to it that only european cars had.

Cheers

[david5]

Originally Posted by HDT423

Hi Guys, Have read some of your info on the 1988 TWR Walkie. It is my belief and I have good evidence that this car now belongs to me. I have owned it for about 20 years, some of the earlier history of the car pre TWR I do not have but all the build No. and CAMS history point to this car being the 1988 TWR car at Bathurst. Their were two TWR cars in europe and which one this was is a little unclear but we believe it wast the one that Allam drone at Donnington Park as the first full bodied walkinshaw to be seen at a race track. The car has some very identifiable modifications to it that only european cars had.

Cheers

Are you refering to the VL that dropped it's back axle whle being driven by TW in 88 ? If so this car was rebuilt by HRT & was the 90 Bathurst winner.

[JohnRX8]

My friend here in Bergen (Norway) owns one VK commodore

Chassisnr. 0020
Plate above the chassis nr. says HOLDEN`S MOTOR COMPANY VK19 RACING UNIT

Car was last used for about 6 years ago in Norwegian Rallycross Championship.

John

[racerVK]

Hi John
I have PM you

[KA]

A short piece in Autosport's 'From the Archive' column this week about Mike O'Brien's ex-Grice VK in 1987. A couple of quotes from Mike:

'It was far from new and we were on a tight budget, but we had a go. Everything was late, so the first time I sat in the car was in free practice at Oulton. It was a big car, but it was nice. It didn't have power steering, so it was heavy to drive- it was an exciting car. People talked about the power, but I didn't feel like I had an advantage'

The Holden led at Oulton, until the engine went off-song: 'I felt comfortable and was sure I was going to win, but it jumped out of gear and buzzed the engine'
Not only did this lose them the Oulton race, but with apparently no spare engine available, they struggled to find form after Oulton: 'For a lot of the season we struggled with power delivery. It was very frustrating'

It wasn't until Snetterton in August, when some testing turned the season around a little: 'We had a bit of testing, and got it ironed out so it was where we needed it to be', resulting in a win, and a couple more decent late-season results.

This apparently persuaded O'Brien the Commodore was worth persevering with into 1988:

'I had the chance to drive an M3 for 1988, but I thought the updated Holden was going to be good, and we had a partnership. We were faster round the corners than the Cossies, but they could just point and squirt- in terms of power we were outclassed, and the M3s were more nimble. It was probably the dumbest decision of my life!

[chunterer]

Hmmm, interesting that he said he 'didn't feel like' he had a power advantage...

Even though Mike had prior experience of big V8's with the Vitesse in 1986, he didn't go that well with that either.

I can't help but think that if Grice or someone more accustomed to that sort of car had pedalled it, it would have had a much better year considering the opposition.

[Alfie72]

Mmmm...For tight budget read "no money"! It really was a shoestring affair and performance was compromised as a consequence.

At Oulton Park we did indeed break a camshaft and since the replacement had to come from Oz and we had no engine builder who new the engine; we were learning as we went. Even daft things like firing order were a**e about face!

Although we were told we could expect 450hp we never saw more than 420 and generally ran around 410 which would have been adequate had we been given some of the enhancements that persuaded us to commit to the Holden route again for 1988 - TWR were supposed to be getting this and that homologated to make the car more competitive, but along came the RS500 and with it went any hope the Commodore had for competition. And precious little came of any of the TWR developments. One or two individuals tried to help us "outside" but could not do much.

I think the only area where we felt we did have an advantage was in tyres, for the car could run the Dunlop front from the Jaguar Gp C project all round, and this did give us some seriously good rubber.

But here again, for 1988 we lost Jaguar to Goodyear and the 1988 Dunlops that were available in the UK were just not up to the job - until we found through the Mazdaspeed links, a source of Japanese radial Dunlops and here again, these proved to be a big step forward, but expensive to ship over from Japan. However, since we had now spent two years bumming around in the 3/4/5/6 places, listening to promises of what was to come and then being disappointed, we decided to leave it there.

I enjoyed working with Mike as a driver - he was very slight, and did find the physical effort of driving the car a challenge - but one he took to quite nicely. I still remember having to "escort" him across the paddock after one particular coming together with Laurence Bristow at Snetterton. Of course there were drivers who could turn a quicker lap. But he found the budget, put the plan together and got the car on to the track. The others didn't!

As someone once said - It seemed a good idea at the time!

[paul craymer]

Just picked up on this thread,i can remember doing the JDC Anglo German Saloon car championship in 1989 and in that series Bryan Litherland from Mkt Drayton, in a Holden Commodore was among the entries, it was a Grice or Brock car in white with 5 stud wheels,i have photos will post when i find them.
His name has come up on a few occasions, will try to remember more,the series was for Group A cars,also on the list was Nigel Smith in an ex Hans Stuck BMW 635.

[Andy Clegg]

This is from Silverstone in about 1986 I think. Grice Commodore

[Spen Again]

Thanks for that Alfie72! I always cheered on Mike in the Holden when Grandstand showed the races, having watched Bathurst for a few years I knew what a Holden was, unlike my car-mad mates who barely understood what "V8" meant in our youthful ignorance. I remember the incident with Lawrence Bristow, the camera's missed the start of the incident, you only see Lawrence bouncing off the tyres while Mike drives past, I guess Mike was on much better tyres for the conditions at that point, was he excluded for that race afterwards? The best part is, the production team for the BTCC used soundtrack recording from the 1988 season as filler for several years after, so even in 1991 when cars where 2litre only, you can sometimes hear the distinct V8 sounds of the Holden and Dennis Leech's Rover in the background soundtrack.

[Spen Again]

Alfie, what happened to the two O'Brien Holdens?

[Alfie72]

http://www.flickr.com/photos/alanlon...n/photostream/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/alanlon...n/photostream/

A couple of photos I found.

First photo shows "The Team"

L-R
Frank Adamson. Now a technical officer with CAMS on V8s. Poacher turned Gamekeeper!
Mike O'Brien
Tony Di Genaro. Lost contact with Tony, but a super mechanic who always had a lone number at the end of all his job lists - the list never ends was his response to any questions about this. Brother-in-law to Paul Anthony, who engineered many of Alan Dockings' F3 drivers.
Me.

In the photo in #318 I can see Jim in the Mazdaspeed jacket. Sorry Jim, but I've forgotten your surname. Truckie who went to work for Gordon Spice on the European Sports cars.
I think the mechanic bending down to the front wheel could be Adrian Gamble.
Note that the second driver was Mark Galvin, Docking's then F3 driver who is now in Canada and an occasional contributor to "the other forum".

Happy Days!!

[darren2012]

did Mark Galvin who was the F3 driver at ADR at the time of the O'Brien Commodores co-drive with Mike O'Brien at races like the Donington 500, the 1 hour 2 driver BTCC round and/or Tourist Trophy which in 1987/88 would have made sense given that the former was also employed by ADR for the F3 team

[Alfie72]

Originally Posted by darren2012

did Mark Galvin who was the F3 driver at ADR at the time of the O'Brien Commodores co-drive with Mike O'Brien at races like the Donington 500, the 1 hour 2 driver BTCC round and/or Tourist Trophy which in 1987/88 would have made sense given that the former was also employed by ADR for the F3 team

Not as I recall.

Gary Brabham drove at Oulton Park with MOB in the two driver event - we broke a halfshaft IIRC.

As for TT etc, we really did not have the budget so we just decided to focus on the BTCC.

Mark was much more focussed on Europe and Le Mans in particular - we were well into the Mazdaspeed programme by that time and certainly by 1987, Mark was in the "European" Mazda with Kennedy and Dieudonne.

[KA]

IIRC Galvin did have some race mileage in the Commodore before Mike O'Brien took it over for '87- wasn't he one of Grice's late-season co-drivers in '86- (at the TT I think?)

[chunterer]

Yes that's right, Galvin shared the VK at the '86 TT.