The fab five: The drivers who broke their ducks in Sydney
Sydney Motorsport Park will stage its 60th championship race when the 2021 season resumes next month.
The Eastern Creek venue was confirmed as the host of four straight events ahead of the Repco Bathurst 1000 season finale.
With four events comes ample opportunity for the nine winless drivers on the 2021 grid to break their ducks.
It has happened five times before in Sydney - and two drivers are on this year’s grid.
When the lights go out in the first race in Sydney next month, Todd Hazelwood will be the most experienced of the nine drivers, having made 113 starts.
Behind him in the winless grouping are Macauley Jones (100 starts), Garry Jacobson (85), Bryce Fullwood (55), Jack Smith (59), Jake Kostecki (37), Zane Goddard (34), Will Brown (29) and Brodie Kostecki (25).
Ahead of the return to Eastern Creek, Supercars.com lists the five drivers who broke through in Sydney's west.
Craig Lowndes, 1996
’The Kid’ burst onto the scene with a stunning Bathurst performance in 1994, which paved the way to a full-time Holden Racing Team drive for 1996.
Lowndes needed two starts to break his duck, winning the second heat of the Eastern Creek weekend.
He backed it up with victory in Race 3, which was the historic first race held under lights in Sydney.
Lowndes went on to win a then record 16 races and the title, as well as the Sandown and Bathurst enduros with Greg Murphy.
Paul Radisich, 2000
A 37-year-old Radisich won his first championship race at Eastern Creek in just his 40th career start.
’The Rat’ finished third in the 1993 and 1994 British Touring Car Championship before returning Down Under with Dick Johnson Racing in 1999.
Radisich had big shoes to fill, replacing the departing 1995 champion John Bowe.
The Kiwi finished 16th overall in 1999, before first winning in Sydney before claiming two wins and the round at Sandown en route to fourth overall in 2000.
Rick Kelly, 2004
It must be noted from the get go that Kelly won the previous year’s Bathurst 1000 alongside Murphy.
However, Sydney was the scene of Kelly’s first solo race win in April 2004.
Six months after he became the youngest driver to win the Great Race, Kelly became the youngest to win a solo round of the championship.
The 77-lap race was cut short by 10 laps after heavy rain lashed the circuit.
It did little to mask the epic effort of Kelly, who started the race 17th - which remains the lowest grid spot for a winner in the circuit’s championship history.
Will Davison, 2008
Before he became a two-time Bathurst winner, Davison was a young challenger with DJR.
Formative seasons in 2006 and 2007 produced little in the way of solo results aside from a stunning Bathurst podium with Steven Johnson.
Come 2008, and Davison was a new force - and he produced his first career win at Eastern Creek in Race 2 of the weekend.
Reigning champion Garth Tander won the Saturday heat, but Davison smashed him off the line and motored to his first championship race victory.
Davison holds the distinction of being the last ever round winner in Sydney, and he added a win at Winton en route to fifth overall.
Jack Le Brocq, 2020
A shift from Tekno Autosports to Tickford Racing paid dividends for Le Brocq when the 2020 season resumed last year.
Le Brocq was forced to hold off pole man Andre Heimgartner in a tense finale to the Sydney doubleheader.
The race was a battle between those who had saved their two sets of soft tyres for the occasion.
Drivers on that strategy filled the top seven places.
Le Brocq's win came in his 85th career start, the longest wait of all five drivers.
