Phillip Island Classic Festival, Australia

The largest historic motorsports event in the Southern Hemisphere continues to grow. This year practice and qualifying for the Phillip Island Classic weekend were held on Friday because two full days of racing were needed to cope with the 564 entrants. Several anniversaries were celebrated including a century of Morgan Cars, 50 years of the Mini and 40 years of Formula Ford and Australia’s own Elfin racing and sports cars.

The paddock always turns up something different. Melbourne company Historic & Vintage Restorations displayed their recreation of an Alfa Romeo 6C 2500SS Corsa.

According to Alfa historian Luigi Fusi and “Alfa Romeo 6C 2500” author Angelo Tito Anselmi, 3 were built in 1939-40. One had a coupe body, the others were spiders and they competed at Le Mans (Bira) in 1939 and in the 1940 Mille Miglia.
This coupe recreation was built with a chassis #913191, engine #923808 and suspension of the type used in Alfa’s competition cars and demonstrated convincingly that old coach building skills are still alive and well. Notable in the car park was a Lancia Delta Integrale that a photographer had borrowed from a friend and driven down from Sydney.

Out on the track things were just as interesting.

In Group J in Geoff Hood’s capable hands was the 83 years young Talbot Darracq of Stuart Anderson. Over the last 20 of these years, Stuart has completed the difficult process of returning the car to its former glory. Chassis number 3, it is one of three twin cam, straight eight, supercharged 1500cc cars built in 1926 and raced at tracks such as Brooklands, Monza and Tripoli by Seagrave and Nuvolari, who drove a T-D to a second place at the 1929 Monza GP.

The engines, with 47 bearings, cast crankcases and 4 steel blocks each of 2 cylinders were good for 145bhp @ 6500rpm. During the war George Radford laid chassis #3 up in England, racing it in 1947. The next year Jack Day took it to Australia where it was regularly campaigned until Stuart began its restoration in 1988.

Running in the same category was long time competitor George Hetrel in his Type 35C Bugatti. A few years ago this car lost a wheel coming out of MG corner at the bottom of Lukey Heights but both George and the 35C are made of stern stuff and continue to be a familiar sight at historic meets. Keeping them both honest was Frank Cuttell’s Special built from a 1929 Fiat. Its 6 litre Gipsy Moth engine with stub exhausts gave it more than enough grunt out of the tight Honda and MG corners.

Anderson, Hetrel and Cuttell gave these eighty year old cars more track time during the Division 1 Regularity runs. With them was Lago Talbot Type 26C chassis #110002, the second of the 4 ½ litre unsupercharged cars built for the 1948 Formula 1 season. Tony Lago sold this car to Australian Doug Whiteford in 1954, Whiteford having won the Australian Grand Prix in 1952 and ’53 in chassis #110007.

It ran third in the 1955 AGP at Port Wakefield, South Australia (won by Jack Brabham in a Cooper). It passed to Ralph Snodgrass in 1956 who stored it in 1957 after an accident. In 1980 Reg Hunt purchased and rebuilt the car, considered the most original of the Formula 1 Lagos before Ron Townley became its custodian in 2006.

Also running in Regularity was Trevor Montgomery in the 6C 1500 “Little Alfa.” This car had been imported to Australia as a chassis (#0111522) in 1928 by the father of 4 time Australian Grand Prix winner Lex Davison and then fitted with a Martin & King fabric covered saloon body. In 1936 Terdick’s of Melbourne converted this to steel but when Lex wanted to go racing after the war, he and friend Barney Dentry turned it into a 2 seater using the original engine, running gear and radiator. It ran without a body in its first outing. At the inaugural post war Bathurst meeting in 1946 (during his honeymoon) Lex came 6th in it in a 1500cc class handicap race, and then drove it 600 miles north to Queensland’s Gold Coast to finish the holiday.

In 1950 the Alfa had its chassis shortened, a supercharger fitted, it was given a Bob Baker aluminium body and became known as Lex’s Little Alfa, as he had also raced a P3. Lex Davison lost his life in 1965 in a crash at Melbourne’s Sandown circuit. The car, unused from 1960, was restored in 1979 and used in historic events. Recently recommissioned, it changed ownership last November and looks set to continue its public outings.

Other more modern entrants over the weekend included the beautifully prepared 1971 Alpine Renault A110 of Colin Stark, veteran Bill Prowse’s 1968 Alfa-Ricciardi Spyder and the 308 GTB and GT4 Ferraris of Stephen Dunn and Jim Reark.

There were several well sorted 105 Alfas and Alfettas, including those from the well named Veloce Racing Association. The De Tomaso Panteras of Perry Spiridis, Colin Fulton and Ross Jackson contested the sharp end of the Group S races.

Guido Belgiorno-Nettis ran his 156/85 Ferrari F1 car which gets plenty of exercise in Group R historic events. Chassis #079, one of 5 built in 1985, that year it scored 2nd places in Brazil and Portugal in the hands of Michele Alboreto, and 4th in Austria and 6th in San Marino driven by Stefan Johansson. Alboreto’s patron, Count Gugge Zanon, received #079 as a gift from Enzo Ferrari for his services to the team and the car was maintained in his collection by the factory. Guido acquired the car in 1995.

Phillip Island backs onto Bass Strait which separates the island state of Tasmania from the Australian mainland and the god Neptune has a large say in the weather in these parts. During Saturday, a force ten gale fronted a rainstorm which brought the red flag out for over two hours.

But the wind helped get things back on track and though the rain returned on Sunday, historic racing isn’t about championship titles.

The irony of the weekend’s weather was not lost on those who were present. A range of on and off-track activities enabled competitors and enthusiasts to support the Victorian Bushfire Appeal with a substantial donation.

Planning for the 2010 Classic is underway in the knowledge that a famous Italian marque turns 100 next year.

Thanks to:
Event Secretary, Janis Holloway
Victorian Historic Racing Register Publicist. Michael Browning
Dale & Paul at Historic & Vintage Restorations for Alfa 2500SS Corsa Mille Miglia photo & history.