1985 Australian Sports Car Championship

The 1985 Australian Sports Car Championship was a CAMS sanctioned motor racing title for drivers of Group A Sports Cars. It was the 17th Australian Sports Car Championship [1] and the first to be run concurrently with the Australian GT Championship.[2]

1985 Australian Sports Car Championship
Previous: 1984 Next: 1986

1982 Australian Sports Car Champion Chris Clearihan won his second national title, driving a Kaditcha Chevrolet. Only 2.5 points behind Clearihan was Terry Hook in the ex-Guy Edwards owned Chevrolet powered Lola T610 (this car had previously competed at Le Mans in 1982 and 1983), while finishing 3rd in his Mazda powered JWS C2 (an FIA Group C2 sports car) was Jeff Harris.

The 1985 ASCC saw the début of the Veskanda C1 Chevrolet (using a 5.0L Formula 5000 engine) and driven by dual Australian Drivers' Champion John Bowe. Built in Adelaide by K&A Engineering and owned by ASCC driver Bernie Van Elsen, the Veskanda would go on to be regarded as Australia's fastest ever sports car and one of the countries fastest ever race cars. The Veskanda made its race debut in Round 4 at its home circuit, the Adelaide International Raceway where Bowe failed to finish, though he would win Round 5 at Melbourne's Calder Park Raceway, easily defeating the previously dominant Clearihan Kaditcha and Hook Lola. Bowe finished in 7th place in the championship with 25 points.

The 1984 Champion, Queenslander Bap Romano driving his 3.9L Cosworth DFL powered Romano WE84 was expected to bring a strong challenge in defence of his title despite now running in the outright class due to the larger Cosworth V8, but unreliability saw his challenge fade as the series progressed (prior to December 1984 the Romano WE84 had used an ex-Formula One 3.0 L Cosworth DFV V8 engine which put the car in Class B). In the defence of his title, Romano finished in 6th place having only scored 36.5 points.

Schedule

The championship was contested over a six-round series.[3]

Round Circuit State Date Format Round winner Car
1 Lakeside Queensland 24 March One race Chris Clearihan Kaditcha Chevrolet
2 Oran Park New South Wales 5 May Two heats Chris Clearihan Kaditcha Chevrolet
3 Winton Victoria 2 June Two heats Terry Hook Lola T610 Chevrolet
4 Adelaide South Australia 30 June One race Terry Hook Lola T610 Chevrolet
5 Calder Park Victoria 11 August One race John Bowe Veskanda C1 Chevrolet
6 Surfers Paradise Queensland 25 August One race Chris Clearihan Kaditcha Chevrolet

Classes

Cars competed in three engine capacity classes.[1]

  • Up to 1.6 litres
  • 1.6 to 3 litres
  • Over 3 litres

Points system

For single race rounds, championship points were awarded to the top twenty outright placegetters in the Sports Car category, based on the following three tier structure:[1]

Position 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
Up to 1.6 litres 30 27 24 21 19 17 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2
1.6 to 3 litres 28 26 23 20 17 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Over 3 litres 25 23 20 17 15 13 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 - - -

For rounds contested over two heats, the same points system was applied to each heat, with the aggregate points achieved by each driver divided by two to determine the championship points allocation for the round.[1]

Results
Position [2] Driver [2] No. Car [2] Entrant [4] Class [4] R1 R2 R3 R4 R5 R6 Total [4]
1 Chris Clearihan 22 Kaditcha Chevrolet Chris Clearihan Over 3 litre 25 25 11.5 23 20 23 127.5
2 Terry Hook 15 Lola T610 Chevrolet Terry Hook Over 3 litre 23 10 24 25 23 20 125
3 Jeff Harris 65 JWS C2 Mazda Jeff Harris 1.6 to 3 litre 17 21.5 14 20 20 20 112.5
4 Ray Hanger 5 & 8 Rennmax Ford BDA Ray Hanger 1.6 to 3 litre 23 13 23 - 15 - 74

Note: The above table lists only the first four placings in the championship.

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References
  1. Conditions for Australian Titles, 1985 CAMS Manual of Motor Sport, pages 86-89
  2. Barry Catford, Australian Sports/GT Championship, Australian Motor Racing Year, 1985/86, pages 220-233
  3. 1985 Championship Results, Australian Motor Racing Year, 1985/86, pages 315-316
  4. Official Programme, Adelaide International Raceway, Sunday, June 30, 1985
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