1974 was an excellent year for young Brock. He won five of the seven rounds of the series with his worst result being a third at Sandown. Moffat was his only rival but only was capable of two victories. Moff upset many of his fans by electing not to attend the final round at Adelaide. Mostly because Brock had an untouchable lead in the championship.

Focal Photography

CF: looking back on the Australian Touring Car Championship, Peter, do you feel completely satisfied or would you have preferred to have had more competition?

PB: Well…. until the last two rounds, of course, we did have Allan Moffat there - and that's certainly tough competition, isn't it. We were all that bit quicker than last year…..about two seconds a lap or so at most places. There was certainly no bludging, that's for sure. Being a pointscore and having to score pretty well all the way in order to finish up well, you see people starting off with a big bang and then get disheartened part way through. It's easy enough to say, "We're not doing too well "and give it away. I think people should still treat each round as a race and keep on going just to win the race - then we would have had more top-line starters here today. I think (Bob Morris) has gone very well. This weekend he's had his dramas but his car's flying and he's flying. He certainly keeps you on your toes. Then we've just introduced the new car and it's been hellishly good. Being a new car, though, we're a bit afraid to work it to hard - we do want to win, of course, and we're bloody happy that it is winning straight off, we really are. (All else is forgotten as Peter rambles enthusiastically on about the new SL/R 5000). Here and at Surfers we had the 2.78 diff in and we could easily pull 5,700 revs if we wanted to - that's about 130 miles per hour, or maybe a whisker more. We hold it on about 5,500 though, you know, just to be sure. There's no point in taking risks when you're way out in front. We lined it up with Bob's XU-1 here yesterday and it's got bags more torque - so much more it's just not funny. The new car is very good to drive, it handles very well. If you are spot on, it's fast but if you get out of shape you don't do good lap times. The trouble is that it looks unspectacular. People say "why don't put your foot down?" and "what would it do if you really tried hard?" Go slower, that's what it would do! (laughs)

CF: At what point during the ATCC did you feel confident that you had it won?

PB: After Oran Park, when I finished second to Moffat and scored enough points to have it sewn up. We had problems in that race, the clutch slipped early on and I grossly over-revved the engine, wreaking the cam followers. The hydraulic lifters turned themselves inside out and the front two pushrods pushed themselves right through the rocker arms. The engine went right off song, it was really bad. I was praying I'd finish and I'd get second. I like to win, mind you, but you have to think of it in terms of winning the series. Look at last year; I won four races, Moffat won three and Janie won one - that's in terms of first across the line - if you don't count all those disqualifications and things. Yet, when it was all over, it worked out that we didn't have enough points up on the board. I was rapt in last year's series really, but it just didn't work out right. This year was different though, Harry's been around a long enough to know what's what and he wouldn't let me go out there and try and win just to satisfy my ego. It's the series you're aiming at, not just one race and you have to think in terms of the series all the time. I think this was where we went wrong last year really; we tried to win each individual race and didn't pay enough attention to winning the series. This year it was just the series we were aiming for and that's what we got.

CF: Was there any particular round that gave you more satisfaction than the rest?

PB: I think they all had their little things. Calder I felt good about because we were a little down on horsepower - the same at Symmons Plains, we had a big rebuild on the Saturday night - that was the most problems we ever had at a meeting anywhere, it really was, we won the race when we didn't think we could - we just had so many things go wrong we didn't think we had a chance, yet by race day everything turned out alright. At Sandown we had intermediate tyres on when everybody else had wets on. We took a gamble and it didn't pay off in that one. We did have a strong engine in for that race though and I could hold Bob (Morris) off down the straight, but I really had to work on those corners just to stay with it. The two Fords were way out ahead but if the gamble had paid off and the track began to dry, we could have won by half a lap. Just after the race was over the sun came out and the track did begin to dry. If the race had been on just that bit later I could have won, but that's one of the risks you have to have to take sometimes. Then there was Amaroo, I felt happy with that weekend really, we didn't have any trick tyres to get a good time in practice like Moffat did - he put on a set of soft compound tyres and did just one quick lap to get pole position, so I felt happy that we could beat him in the race. But then he blew up on the warm-up lap anyway and Bob was the main opposition. Harry was signalling me to take it easy though and I was taking it fairly easy. Occasionally I'd get a bit sick of Bob being there and I'd speed up a bit and go away from him just to let him know I could if I wanted to.

CF: What about the last lap though, when it appeared as though you chopped across and hit him when he came alongside in the run to the flag?

PB: It wasn't what it appeared actually. That last lap was pretty quick one really and; if you remember, Don Holland had spewed oil all around the track. I was trying to keep the tight line through that last corner to stay inside the oil, the back wheels touched it, and I got all sideways. That was what made me swing across the track - I certainly wasn't trying to block Bob. Harry wasn't happy though, he was jumping up and down on the fence saying, "what are they doing out there, playing silly buggers for no good reason?" He obviously couldn't see any sense in us having a big carve up on the last lap and risking everything.

CF: What has been the most satisfying experience for you, winning the Australian Touring Car Championship or winning the Hardie Ferodo?

PB: I think that because the ATCC is held over a period of time you tend to be able to analyse it all and the impact isn't so great, especially when you get a few points ahead. It is great to win the ATCC - because it's a national championship I suppose and you do have a fair bit of a battle all the way through, with people like Allan Moffat to win. Last year there was a lot of drama all the way through, both with Moffat and ourselves…but the Hardie Ferodo, it's so much a once a year never to be repeated thing and the impact seems so much greater. They're two different types of thing and Bathurst is incredible to win, the atmosphere builds up throughout the year. Everybody goes slightly crazy for a while…including myself. With the ATCC, too, there's no real private financial gain. The real benefits come from the follow-up promotions by the sponsors and I suppose it does pay off well in the long run.

CF: How do you feel about the future of the ATCC? Which way do you think it is heading?

PB: I think that the emphasis should be switched from the make of the car to the driver. There has been a tendency over the last year or two to place more emphasis on the make of the steed rather than the name of the jockey. I think it has come to the stage where everybody buys the best Production Touring Car he can and it is the driver who wins rather than the car, as is the case in the Manufacturers' Championship. There must have been a lot of people staying away from this meeting today saying, "oh, it's only going to be a Torana Benefit". So what! People used to go in their thousands to see three Mustangs race against one another and they'd barrack for Beechey or Geoghegan or Jane - it didn't matter to them that they were all in the one make of car. That's the whole point…in this way I think it can be even better, more exciting series next year. If the SL/R5000 does prove to be the best car for the job next year, we'll have several top drivers all driving similar cars and the competition will be really close. Surely this has the potential to offer even closer competition than we've had in the past. Another thing that would be a good idea would be to have decent individual prize money for each round plus a big pot of gold at the end - for all the top point scorers, not just the winner. Then we would have better fields all the way through the series, people would still keep going to get themselves higher up in that final point score. At the moment it's geared as a manufacturers' title - there's untold publicity value in it for the winning car, but the drivers get nothing. Even the winner only gets the title, there's no financial or material reward at all. I don't begrudge the manufacturers getting their shilling's worth out of this, they deserve everything they get, but the point I'm trying to make is that the drivers will run the make of car that they think will win. If they all finish up in the same make of car, so what, it can still be a damn good series.

CF: What of your own future? What do you see in the future for yourself?

PB: I'd like to race overseas. I'm getting to the stage now that I would like to go overseas. Of course, the problem there is that things are so attractive for me in Australia now…I'm married now and I'm buying a house…I'd have to know that I was going to get a fair amount of money before I could talk seriously about it. I was telling you yesterday, wasn't I, that we would like to take the SL/R5000 overseas to race in Europe. Le mans is going to be for Group 2 saloons in 1976. Group 2 regulations are pretty free in the engine, gearbox and diff departments - we could build a real screamer of a car. You have to stick to the original body shape but we could run a slightly detuned F5000 engine with a beaut gearbox and diff arrangement, flare the guards and run 14 inch diameter wheels to get better brakes and rubber. It would be great, it really would. They'd probably have similar races for these cars at places like Nurburgring and probably even Spa. Could you imagine it (at this point, Peter is almost beside himself with excitement- showing the unbounded enthusiasm which shows out so clearly in his driving and, in fact his whole approach to the sport). And the whole thing is that is that it would be an Australian based venture, it would be Australians taking on the world - on their home ground - I think we could really give them a shake-up, and wouldn't that be a feather in Australia's cap. Imagine a Torana SL/R 5000 dusting it up with those turbocharged BMW's and the overhead cam Capri's. If we beat them, and I think we could, it would bring tremendous prestige to Australia. All we have to do is convince the powers that be, of this. The answer to your question, though, is that wherever the challenge is, I'd like to meet it. I think we have the healthiest country in the world here at the moment and it would take a lot to attract me away from here right now.

CF: You ran in Formula 2 with a Birrana for a while. What was your reason for stopping?

PB: Money! The thing is that, once you reach the position that I'm in, every time you sit your bum in something you have to be fair to yourself and to your sponsors. You have to do it properly. The big mistake I made with that was in trying to run with a very tired old Hart engine. Compared to the standard of preparation of the HDT cars, it was never really well prepared. I have never had the right tyres…it just wasn't good enough. To do F2 properly you need a really good chassis and two good engines. With the engines costing around $5000.00 each, you finish up spending more than you would on Formula F5000! I was happy with myself though, I felt that I drove pretty well and I think that I could be competitive if the opportunity to drive open wheelers ever arises again. We'll just have to wait and see what happens on that one. Talking about preparation, I didn't mention earlier but I think we should give full credit here to the part Ian Tate, HDT's chief mechanic, has played in winning the ATCC this year. Ian is a brilliant mechanic, works tirelessly and is a good leader for the rest of the crew - we just couldn't have done it without him.

CF: When the SL/R 5000 was first announced and it appeared with the air dam at the front and that rather ungainly large looking spoiler on the tail, many people wondered if they are really functional or if they have been added mainly to give what is known as that "horny" look that so effectively sells cars to many young people.

PB: Oh no! They work alright, they really do. We tried the car for a few laps at Surfers Paradise without the air dam on the front and it gets so much air under the front of the car that it becomes all weightless and wants to understeer off the track. It's frightening, it really is - especially going under the Dunlop bridge, you have to fight just to keep it from spearing off into the boonies. Just having that on the front adds a full eight mph to your top speed…(laughs)…and the spoiler takes three mph off, so you come about five mph better off overall.

CF: But the spoiler does add downforce and stabilise the car?

PB: Oh yes, for sure. It becomes really skittish in the tail without it. You can't run competitively without it. They were designed by the same fellow who designed the basic concept and much of the overall car of that four rotor Chev Corvette in the states - he really knows what he's doing. He's a resident designer in Australia now and I think they just gave him the finished car and said, "there you go, make it work" and that's what he came up with. I think it is a result of the overall aerodynamics of the car that the rear spoiler has to be so tall - to get it up into the airstream - it certainly has nothing to do with appearance.

CF: Getting onto a more personal subject, we often hear people say that you get preferential treatment with HDT in comparison to Colin Bond. How do you see this?

PB: Most of this feeling seems to come from Sydney and I really think it's just an extension of the age-old Sydney-Melbourne rivalry. Colin said to me before the beginning of this year "you run the ATCC and I'll run the Rally Championship"… basically these decisions are up to Harry but we do have some say in it and that was the way Colin wanted it. I think he's pretty happy really - he's got a good car, he's getting plenty of driving and he's making a fair bit of money, I don't think he has any complaints about it all. I do a lot more testing than Colin, but that's because I live in Melbourne and I'm always on hand. The cars are set up pretty much the same and I've often helped to set up Colin's car when he hasn't been able to make it down to do it himself. I honestly can't see any real reason why people would want to think like that.

CF: This one might be even more ticklish to answer. How do you find Harry Firth as a boss? Is he really as tough as the image he projects through the press and to the public?

PB: (looking thoughtful): Oh yeah…if he thinks you're not doing what you should be doing in the car, he's not happy - that's for sure. Then, if you're driving the car to his liking, he's pretty happy…Yes, he is a hard task master but hell, he's got a pretty responsible position and he's carrying a lot of worries on his shoulders - he has to be tough sometimes to get the job done.

CF: What about on a more personal level, do you mix socially….would you call him a friend rather than just a boss?

PB: Now Harry and I are friendly. It has certainly got past the stage of being a team manager ruling over a driver. It's a bit different from early Neubauer-type days, that's for sure. We work together well now…and we go out together socially, I think you could say we are friends. But race meetings are business. If things are going badly, Harry goes under a cloud - and so do we.

CF: Do you think there is anyone else in Australia who, given the HDT and the same resources, could have done this well with the team as Harry has?

PB: (after a long, thoughtful pause - obviously genuinely trying to think of someone who could have done the job): No, I don't, think there is. Harry's had so many years of experience and he knows so many people he can draw information from when even he is doubtful about something. I really don't think anyone else is as well equipped as he is for the job. Something a lot of people don't seem to realise is that Harry has never been given what he wants in the way of a car, but he's still gets the job done. Each year at Bathurst, for instance, we've always had the car that we would have liked to have had the previous year. When we ran the 186 Torana XU-1 the 202 was already released and we would have liked to run the 202 but the marketing people said, "no, it's too much of a risk with a new car. We'll run the 186". It always seems to happen like that…until this year. Now we're finally got just the car we want, it will take a really good car to toss it. I don't say it can't be beaten, but it's got no basic weaknesses, it's a damn good car and they'll have to come up with something really special to beat it.

Written by Barry Lake

Chequered Flag August 1974