Australia's toughest touring car race got even tougher

In 1983 the great race pushed two of the country's finest race teams to the limit, one to finish the race with victory, the other to just make the starting line.

Peter Brock's Holden Dealer Team had won four of the previous five Bathurst 1000 races. But for the team that made victory on the Mountain look easy, the 1983 classic was anything but. Early in the race Brock's #05 Commodore retired with a blown engine, though in a somewhat controversial move he raced on and took over teammate John Harvey's #25 Commodore at the first pit stop, robbing brother Phil of his race seat. Harvey and Brock, with his regular co-driver Larry Perkins also joining the driving line-up, raced on to record an historic win.

For Dick Johnson though, his 1983 Bathurst race began the day prior when his famous Greens-Tuf Falcon slid to a spectacular halt, destroyed among trackside trees after a crash during the Hardies Heroes shootout for pole position. In arguably his team's finest hour a replacement Falcon was sourced, rebuilt throughout the night and made it onto the grid just in time for the start of the race.

This is the era of Australian touring car racing at its best, locally developed Holdens and Fords up against turbo Nissans, rotary Mazdas and the brilliant JPS BMW.

Running time approx. 7 hours 23 minutes