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The Larko link to Percat's AGP victory

Supercars
27 Mar
Nick Percat’s victory also ended a winless run for his new race number that stretched back nearly two decades
2 mins by James Pavey
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  • Nick Percat won his first race since Sydney 2020

  • Percat helped the #10 to its first win since Calder Park 2000

  • Mark Larkham's sole championship race win came in the #10

Nick Percat managed to break a personal winless drought stretching back nearly four years, while Matt Stone Racing secured just its second Supercars win.

However, Percat’s victory also ended a winless run for his new race number that stretched back nearly two decades, last taken by a very familiar name.

The MSR driver, who held off Triple Eight duo Will Brown and Broc Feeney to win on Sunday, is racing with the #10 in 2024.

The #10 has largely been on the sidelines this century, previously used by Lee Holdsworth and Penrite Racing in 2022.

Before Holdsworth picked it up for what was his final full-time season, the #10 was used in one-off events by Erebus Motorsport (2015), Walkinshaw Racing (2014) and Triple Eight’s Bathurst wildcard (2013).

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However, you have to go back to 2000 for the last win for the #10. The driver? Mark ‘Larko’ Larkham, who claimed his sole Supercars race victory at Calder Park.

Larkham used the #10 from the mid-to-late 1990s through to his retirement, with the number remaining with his eponymous team until it became WPS Racing in 2006.

Remarkably, the Calder-winning Larkham AU Falcon was built to replace the one destroyed in his fiery start line crash with Paul Morris at Oran Park. The new car, complete with #10, instantly delivered a result.

Saturday Sleuthing: Larko’s Mitre 10 Falcon Open Graph Image

Before Larko in the 1990s, the #10 was on the sidelines again, with its major success coming with Robbie Francevic and Volvo in 1986.

Francevic won Volvo’s only Australian Touring Car Championship in 1986, breaking the Jim Richards/BMW stranglehold. Francevic won at Amaroo, Symmons Plains and Adelaide International Raceway to win the second title in the Group A era.

Ironically, before his dominated the Great Race with the Holden Dealer Team, Richards also used the #10 on a Falcon in 1977.

Before Holdsworth in 2022, the #10 was last used in a full season by Walkinshaw Racing and Andrew Thompson. And who made his Supercars debut alongside Thompson, in the #10? Nick Percat!

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