Watch the 2002 DVD of Peter Brock and Colin Bond discussing the famous Torana XU-1 victory at Bathurst in 1972 and you will detect some confusion on Brock’s face. Bond seems clear in his memory of an historic day for the Holden Dealer Team and annunciates it with conviction, but Brock can be seen looking slightly perplexed and hesitates when he finds himself contradicting his friend and former teammate. His equally sharp memory recalled some critical tyre information differently, but he chooses silence over disunity.
To make matters worse, team boss Harry Firth – a less than reliable witness, it must be said – had proffered another set of ‘alternative facts’ before his death in 2014. Such are the challenges of writing history. It’s said that history is written by the victors, so their interpretations prevail, but we historians are bound by the inconvenience of facts – or at least the most likely scenario based on the facts available. Harry, on the other hand, usually presented history in a form that glorified the legendary Old Fox himself.
In the case of Bathurst 1972, tyres played a vital role in the outcome. Race day had dawned wet and therefore began with critical choices and an eye on the weather. In the HDT pit, Firth spoke to Brock and Bond, considered the options, made his decisions – then promptly changed his mind just before the cars were wheeled out onto the grid.
In charming presenter mode for the camera in Holden Motorsport’s DVD, Brock playfully goes along with the line that he ‘pinched’ Bondy’s tyres on race morning. It’s worth noting at this point that HDT chief mechanic Ian Tate today maintains that Colin was indeed ‘dudded’ by Firth on the day. However, Colin’s version of which tyres each car employed in the race is mistaken – he was not given unsuitable ‘intermediates’ for the wet track, and nor did Brock have the trick ‘wets’ he apparently wanted – but there’s still no doubt that Bondy was consigned to battle on tyres that arguably caused his downfall.
Bond was put on a seemingly odd mixed set of tyres that were initially difficult but may have become ideal, though we will never know because his race ended in most dramatic fashion on lap three when the 1969 race winner slapped the fence hard at Reid Park and rolled his #24 Torana. Meanwhile, team-mate Brock, on innovative hand-grooved slicks fitted that morning to #28, drove on to his historic first of nine victories at Mount Panorama after a great battle with Ford hero Allan Moffat. It was the first step towards Brock’s ascension to the status of King of the Mountain.
Tate believes Brock was going to win Bathurst that year no matter what, but circumstances certainly played out in his favour. And the biggest of those was the weather, which in turn made tyres even more critical than usual. But why the confusion over who ran what, and why? For this investigation of a famous victory, we’ve
