Vauxhall Cresta led way in much- vaunted Great Race

The Bathurst 1000 race has produced more joy, despair and great feats of driving than any other race meeting in Australasia. In the past 60- plus years, this battle of man versus mountain has mentally broken many an emerging driver but also forged some of Australasia’s best.

These include the iconic Peter Brock, Allan Moffat, Jim Richards and Larry Perkins, and more recently Mark Skaife, Greg Murphy, Craig Lowndes, Jamie Whincup and Scott McLaughlin.

The race has attracted Formula One drivers such as Stirling Moss, Jack Brabham, Jacky Ickx and Kiwi world champion Denny Hulme.

Championship winning motorcycle racers have turned their hand to tin- top racing also including Gregg Hansford, who won with Jack Perkins in 1993, Wayne Gardner, who set pole in 2000, Troy Bayliss and Kiwi Graeme Crosby.

The circuit itself i s regarded as one of the greats, rated alongside the likes of the old Nurburgring, Spa Francorchamps, Brands Hatch and Laguna Seca. These tracks evoke memories of great races and master drivers at their best, and Mount Panorama has produced its fair share.

For the closest finish, you won’t beat 2016, when Will Davison and Jonathan Webb’s winning margin was just 0.1434 seconds, while 1977’ s Ford one- two saw Moffat and Colin Bond cross the line mere centimetres apart.

For a drubbing of the rest of the field, Brock’s six- lap demolition of all- comers in 1979 rates as the best,

considering he broke the course record on the last lap for the hell of it.

Nine- time winner Brock, whose trophy the drivers are competing for this weekend, owned the place and some say we’ll never see the likes of him again. He finessed the track into giving him what he wanted.

Kiwi “Gentleman” Jim Richards shares second place on the winners’ list with Craig Lowndes on seven.

Richards also has the most starts, with

35, and Lowndes, the most podiums, with 14.

The Great Race track i s complicated and almost impossible to complete a perfect lap. First raced on in 1938 for the Australian Tourist Trophy, it has evolved little, other than big changes for safety and the introduction of The Chase in 1987 to meet the FIA criteria to host a round of the World Touring Car Championship.

There are 23 corners each lap and an elevation change of 174 metres.

The winners of the first race over

500 miles were John Roxburgh and Frank Coad, driving a Vauxhall Cresta in 1960 and taking 8h 19m 59.1s, averaging 96.56km/ h.

In 2018, Lowndes and Steve Richards completed the 161 laps in

6h 01m 44.86s, averaging 165.91km/ h.