Internationals who conquered the Mountain
Amid the drama surrounding the 2019 Supercheap Auto Bathurst 1000, winning co-driver Alex Premat was almost the forgotten man.
While Scott McLaughlin’s victory and teammate Fabian Coulthard’s go-slow made all the headlines, the magnitude of Premat’s achievement went understated.
As he so often has, the Frenchman went to Bathurst with no shortage of critics, this time claiming he couldn’t match it with the Red Bull Holden Racing Team’s ‘dream team’ co-drivers.
But in the race he was exceptional; holding back the full-timers for an extended period, before taking the lead when Craig Lowndes made two errors in their critical stints.
Premat’s credentials are headlined by a stint in GP2, where he was teammates with Lewis Hamilton, and as a factory Audi driver at Le Mans.
But he’s no stranger to Supercars fans, having raced full-time for Garry Rogers Motorsport in 2012 and ’13, before tackling co-driving alongside McLaughlin the following two seasons.
He then joined Shane van Gisbergen at Red Bull in 2016, finishing second at Sandown and Bathurst, taking a maiden win on the Gold Coast and securing the PIRTEK Enduro Cup trophy.
It was enough to be poached by DJR Team Penske when McLaughlin joined the squad in 2017 – a combination that yielded another Bathurst podium in ‘18, before the breakthrough this year.
Premat is now one of just a handful of true internationals to win the Great Race throughout its six decades, giving him a special place in history.
The below list excludes New Zealanders, who can hardly be included as internationals in this context, and also four-time winner Allan Moffat.
While Moffat competed under the Canadian flag, he was racing – and living – full-time in Australia during his winning years, and eventually became a local citizen.
Rauno Aaltonen - Finland
Best known for his exploits in rallying, Aaltonen was dispatched to Australia by BMC as part of its fleet of Mini drivers for the 1966 race.
On debut at Bathurst, the Finn co-drove the winning entry alongside Aussie Bob Holden, leading home a Mini sweep of the top nine places.
Aaltonen would make just one more Bathurst start a full 25 years later, again part of a team with Holden, this time driving a Toyota Corolla.
John Fitzpatrick – Great Britain
Highly experienced in sports and GT cars throughout Europe and the USA, the versatile Fitzpatrick was a regular at Bathurst from 1975-82.
Victory in the Great Race came in his second start, co-driving with Bob Morris in the Ron Hodgson Motors Holden Torana L34.
Fitzpatrick was in the car at the finish, with Morris’ anxious trackside wait as the ailing Torana stumbled to the line part of Bathurst folklore.
Jacky Ickx - Belgium
Le Mans legend Ickx was a high-profile yet left-field signing to the Moffat Ford Dealers team for Bathurst in 1977.
Unused to the mechanical sympathy required for a production-based touring car race, Ickx famously wore out the brakes on Moffat’s #1 car, inadvertently leading to the iconic one-two form finish.
Ickx became one of few to win the race on debut and would return just once more, again driving with Moffat in the ill-fated Cobra effort the following year.
Armin Hahne - Germany
Highly rated by Tom Walkinshaw, Hahne made his Great Race debut with TWR’s Rover program in 1984, winning the Group A class.
He was brought back by Walkinshaw as part of the three-car Jaguar assault on outright honours the following year, taking victory alongside John Goss.
Hahne made two more Bathurst starts – in 1987 aboard a Maserati Biturbo and ’88 in a Ford Sierra – and, as revealed last year, was in line for a last-minute Holden Racing Team call-up in 1994.
Win Percy – Great Britain
Another Walkinshaw recruit, Percy’s against-the-odds Bathurst win alongside Allan Grice in 1990 was the first major success for the Holden Racing Team.
The Brit had that year been dispatched to Australia by Walkinshaw to establish the team that would go on to dominate the local touring car scene later in the decade.
Percy made a total of 11 Great Race starts between 1985 and 1997, finishing second with the HRT in 1991 and third with the Jaguar squad in ’85.
Rickard Rydell - Sweden
In 1998, Swede Rydell had the luxury of tackling Mount Panorama in familiar machinery, thanks to the 2.0 litre Super Tourers and 5.0 litre V8 Supercars holding separate Bathurst 1000s.
Having just won that year’s British Touring Car Championship in a Volvo S40, Rydell teamed with Bathurst legend Jim Richards to take out the Great Race, following a stunning pole lap.
A last-minute withdrawal from the HRT’s squad in 1994, Rydell's Great Race debut had come with Volvo in '97, and he returned for the Supercars event in 2003, driving for Triple Eight.
