30 years on: How Perkins and Ingall pulled off last to first
Larry Perkins/Russell Ingall pulled off last to first win in 1995
This year marks 30 years since the first all-V8 Bathurst 1000
Perkins and Craig Lowndes clashed within seconds of the start
This year marks 30 years since the first all-V8 Bathurst 1000 held in 1995, famously won by the Castrol Commodore of Larry Perkins and Russell Ingall.
It’s rare for a race-winning car to spend time at the tail of the field during the 1000-kilometre classic, but that’s exactly what happened three decades ago.
Perkins and pole man Craig Lowndes clashed within seconds of the start, the contact handing Perkins a flat Dunlop tyre and a long lap to limp around before he could reach the pits for a replacement.
He and Ingall then drove hard all day, aided by a late Safety Car – ironically involving the failure of a Perkins Engineering-built customer car driven by David ‘Truckie’ Parsons – to get close enough to the lead pack.
From there Perkins did the rest, passing Brad Jones’ Coke Holden and the pair of Peter Jackson Falcons to seal a wildly popular victory.
The race was heartbreak for Glenn Seton, who was attempting to win the race for the first time 30 years after his father Barry had won in a GT500 Cortina.
Seton Jnr was aged 30, driving car #30 and had a bonus placed up for grabs by race organisers should he win the race 30 years after his father.
The Ford ace was given the choice of taking home the ’65 Cortina race winning car or a $30,000 bonus cash prize should he win.
He got within nine laps of having to make the tough decision, only for the valve springs in his engine to fail with nine laps to go, allowing Perkins to sweep by into a lead he converted into his fifth Bathurst win and the first for then-new co-driver Russell Ingall.
It was a day when a range of Perkins’ rivals failed.
The pair of Holden Racing Team Commodores were out by the first pit stop with a bad batch of head gaskets and ’95 Australian Touring Car Champion John Bowe clashed with Ford rival Seton, the damage enough to take the #17 Shell-FAI Ford out of the battle for victory.
The Gibson Motorsport Commodore of Jim Richards and Mark Skaife built a solid lead in the early stages, though a broken tailshaft took them out while in a strong position.
But the 1995 Tooheys 1000 was all about Larry as the team owner/driver sealed his second Bathurst win in three years.
