Auction update
As Peter Brock’s public relations manager during Brock’s spell with the Holden Racing Team in the 1990s, Paul ‘Wally’ Weissel got to know the Great Man better than most. In this series, Wally recalls some of the fun from his time living with and managing the legend – the hilarious hijinks that were an inevitable part of life on the road with Brocky…
Autographs! If only I had a dollar – even a cent – for all the autographs I’ve supervised, arranged or sent, or sessions where I’ve tried (and failed) to meet the needs of both the drivers and the fans, then I’d be very well off financially! Brock would never voluntarily end an autograph session, but would remind me that he hadn’t had lunch/met with his engineer/gone to the toilet or needed to go home, leaving it to me to inherit the title of
when I dragged the Great Man away. Lowndes was more balanced – but also needed to be escorted from the signing session, while Skaifey would oblige with any number of autograph requests, but on his terms!
For Mark, work (as in driving the cars) came first, but if people were prepared to fit into his schedule, then he’d sign everything. I can remember being at Oran Park in the dark one Sunday night with an endless que of people – me holding a torch – while MS signed every last item. All the garages were closed, all the team transporters and crews had gone – there was just this lonely spot of light in a group of 50-plus people.
I’ve had people get an autograph on one body part or another – then proudly return the next day to show the signature permanently inked into their body! Glove-box lids, air box covers, seats – I even arranged at Bathurst one Saturday for Brock to sign some bloke’s shitbox old Holden (hand painted in HDT colours) and he was absolutely ecstatic, because he then planned to take it up the mountain to the skid pan area and torch the bloody thing that night!
We had items stuffed through car windows to be signed while sitting in traffic; we had things stuffed through car windows to be signed while actually driving, by people travelling alongside us! I even had to escort the drivers to the loo at the (old) Barbagallo circuit as the fans had no shame and would stand alongside them – pen and cap or poster poised – until the driver rezipped himself!
Brock could never refuse an autograph request from a member of the opposite sex. In Adelaide for a championship round (probably at Mallala) we had to attend a function for Mobil