Whaddayaknow
YYes, we know, this isn’t a muscle car. But stick with us here, because there is a muscle car connection, tenuous though it may be. More on that in a bit. Recently in AMC #111 we pro led Sue Ransom as part of our Muscle Woman series, noting that she shared a Ford Capri with then husband Bill Brown in the 1978 Bathurst 1000. The ‘Susie/ Billy’ driver pairing is not the time a Great Race featured a husband and his wife in the eld – Fred and Christine Gibson drove in the same Bathurst 1000 race, although not together in the same car. It has been generally assumed that Ransom/Brown were the rst married couple to compete as a driver pairing at Bathurst.
Not so, however. The rst married couple (at least that AMC is aware of) to race at Bathurst was in fact Max and Diane Dickson, aboard a Ford Cortina MkII 240.
This is where the muscle car connection comes in. The Dicksons’ Cortina was part of the rst McLeod Ford assault on the Mountain in 1969. That’s right, the Dicksons’ team-mates were John Goss, in his rst Bathurst start, and Denis Cribbin in their Starlight Blue Falcon GTHO (inset). No pressure then.
The Cortina 240, also nished in Starlight Blue, was no ball of re, even with the optional 1600cc cross ow engine, giving away over 20 horsepower to the all-conquering Datsun 1600. Not surprisingly it was the only Cortina entered – but there were a few other optimists in the class in unlikely cars such as VW Type 3 Notchback, Morris 1500 and even a Renault 10!
Back in AMC issue #78 we covered the Starlight Blue Falcon GT-HO’s ill-fated run in the 1969 Bathurst 500 and its subsequent resurrection and restoration. This writer interviewed John Goss and team patron Max McLeod about their rst Bathurst, and the Dickson Cortina rated an unfavourable mention with both men.
“We entered a Ford Cortina 240 (MkII) for husband and wife Max and Diane Dickson,” recalled Max McLeod. “That was a big mistake, but Ford provided support for us to run the Cortina though the car wasn’t up to the mark.”
Goss remembered the Cortina as a distraction. “I had to attend to that car’s strategy, though it ran well in the race and nished.”
Indeed the Cortina did nish sixth in class behind ve Datsun 1600s for 31st outright on 108 laps. Not a bad effort around an unforgiving track like Mount Panorama.
What has us stumped is we can’t nd a record of Max and Diane Dickson racing anywhere else. They must have, of course, in order to get off their ‘three stripes,’ allowing them entry into the 500 in the rst place. There is no mention of Diane Dickson in the popular ‘Ladies Races’ held at Oran Park during that period. It’s a given that the Cortina would have disappeared into the abyss, but what about the Dicksons? As far as we can tell, it doesn’t look like the couple ever raced again. So Whaddayaknow?
Update
We’ve struck, ahem, gold with the Stacey/ McIntyre Falcon XR GT. Both the (lead) driver and car survive. Stay tuned for an upcoming feature, we promise it will be a cracking read!