1960’s
TASMAN REVIVAL - The John Benson story (Elfin Aero)
Today (6 December 2006) I received
an email from John Benson who had quite an eventful weekend at the
Tasman Revival meeting. It demeonstrates the value of friendships
through the Historic Racing movement.
Read on...
Greetings,
The word “Revival”
took on a whole new meaning for me at the 2006 Eastern Creek Historic
meeting last weekend. So too did the words ‘friendship’,
‘camaraderie’ ‘emotion’ and the great Aussie
tradition of ‘having a red hot go’!
In the first instance, I must
thank most sincerely Cam Walker, Urban Maintenance Systems (UMS) and
Bill Hemming, Elfin Sports Cars for making it possible to enter and
travel to this excellent historic motor race meeting. A step back
in time indeed and it was wonderful to see the magnificent collection
of fine racing cars of the ‘60s era, the gathering of Cooper
Climax, the many Brabhams, Lotus’ the F1 Tyrell 004 Cosworth
DFV which looked, performed, sounded and smelt just the way one remembers
a late ‘60s early ‘70s racing car, immaculately prepared,
very loud, fast and the spent ‘rocket fuel’ it was running
on almost brought tears to your eyes. Some of these cars many of us
haven’t seen since the Tasman Series.
The roller coaster weekend got
off to an emotional start when I managed to be on the track with the
‘wrong’ racing Group during Thursday’s practise
and I came up behind Don Thallon’s magnificent ’61 Cooper
Climax T53 F1. Just to be on the same race track with this wonderful
car, looking absolutely magnificent in the Yeoman Credit colours,
which I last saw racing when I was in short pants and long socks with
Uncle Lex at the wheel at Longford in 1962 was an unforgettable moment.
Lex’s ‘experience’ at the Longford Pub Corner is
now indelibly written into Australian Motor Racing folklore with the
main bar proudly carrying his name, some of the magnificent trophies
and a host of wonderful memories. In the same session one very quick
Lotus 49 driven by John Smith scared the living daylights out of me
when he rounded me up going into the braking area of Turn 1! (Well,
braking area for me, ‘feathering’ area for most others!))
This of course is the famous Gold Leaf Lotus now owned by the Dawson-Damer
family. D-D would have been absolutely beaming to have seen this car
in full flight, circulating Eastern Creek, it sounded absolutely fantastic!
Secondly, I thank my close friends
and confidants Graham & Michael Ritter for their special efforts
and professionalism, a premium level which never fails to impress
me and many others, good old friend and fellow petrol head David Vervaart
who drove the Sonic truck, welded the spanners all weekend when he
was on a ‘promise’ that he would not touch them and had
to put up with me (Priceless), for the 5 days when I was awake.
Rod, Raelei and 6 months Sienna
Kennedy who allowed David and I to ‘invade’ their wonderful
tranquil home, arriving home at all hours and leaving as the sun was
rising and generally giving up their time, one of their cars to a
self indulgent, soft, emotional old fart who has a passion and enthusiasm
for racing cars and Formula Fords and ‘beer’ budget!
As most of you know I vented Graham’s
wonderfully quick Kent engine 11/2 laps into the first HFF race on
Friday. No sooner had I started feeling desperately and emotionally
sorry for myself when Bill Hemming picked me up and escorted me down
to the TAFE garage and explained to the cheery Granville College TAFE
Teacher, Dave McCowage our/my problem. Bill had just acquired a spare
engine which we had picked up for him the previous day and we just
happened to have it in the truck. Without skipping a beat Bill said,
‘Right O, Benson, you haven’t come all this way to do
one racing lap have you?’ (Bill-speak for G.O.Y.A. - Get Off
Your Arse and pull yourself together!) ‘Let’s get that
dammed engine out of that truck and down here pronto’.
The synopsis from Graham late
yesterday after pulling down the subject motor – a big-end bolt
broke, causing the failure, a rear occurrence under any circumstances,
‘short motor’ and sump totally US, head basically OK,
valves will need to be replaced, other engine accessories, oil pump
etc all OK.
Dave swung his young TAFE team
into action and proceeded to replace the Ritter engine I had successfully
managed to turn into one expensive ‘boat anchor’. After
12 hours and half-dozen pizzas and Pepsi in 40’ sticky Sydney
heat we all retired for the evening at 22.00 hrs with the other engine
installed and what we all envisaged would be some ‘minor fitting
details’ on Saturday morning.
Saturday morning arrives, with
the so-called minor fittings complete, the starter was fitted –
and yes – you guessed it, another ‘problem’ –
no starter! Well, with two TAFE ‘sparkies’ on hand, they
proceed to strip the faulty starter right down, find the ‘brush’
and internal lead connection problem and went about repairing it.
In the mean time, to keep myself
amused, I went to the central commentary box and assisted Charles
Rogers and his team call the other Formula Ford races. Murray Walker,
Martin Brundle et al can relax, their jobs are not under any threat
whatsoever, but by God did I have some fun. I had no idea how ‘powerful’
one can be with a microphone, you can say (almost) anything you like
about anyone.
By around 1.00pm – some
27 hours after we commenced this remarkable journey, we fired up the
replacement engine and bingo! After bleeding rear brakes and clutch
hydraulics we wheeled the Elfin Aero out of the TAFE garage ready
for the 7 lap ‘feature’ race. Twenty minutes prior the
heavens opened up as only they can do in Sydney and after a 15 minute
thunder and lightening display and around 25mm of rain was dumped
on the circuit, surprise, surprise, it was time for the Formula Ford
Feature race! Onto the dummy grid I went, full of expectation of actually
having another race, observation lap, slipping and sliding, around
corporate hill the engine died, with enough momentum I managed to
wheel the powerless Elfin onto the short circuit slip road, through
Turn 4 Paddock entry gate and back to our trailer annexe/garage on
the skid pan – further investigation revealed a lead had jumped
off the coil!
Unbelievable, would be the best
printable word to use – but as I stated earlier, a huge learning
curve for all and a supremely wonderful team effort from Dave and
his TAFE crew, other teacher Tony, students Alisha, ‘Mr Warren’,
Jon, two Nathans, and the two switched on ‘sparkies’ whose
names I didn’t manage to obtain in all the rushing around.
It would be easy to sum up the
weekend as an absolute ‘disaster’. But this would be very
unfair on the wonderful efforts firstly to the HSRCA who put on a
memorable and nostalgic weekend of motor sport. Secondly, the TAFE
team who went along to Eastern Creek with some expectation of working
on a real racing car and turning someone’s ‘disaster’
into their absolute ‘triumph’ and all involved can be
very proud of their efforts. The fact that the car didn’t complete
the ‘journey’ in full is no big deal. After all, there
were no sheep stations at stake and Eastern Creek Historics will be
around again soon enough with (hopefully) another opportunity to race
there again. Gratification that we managed to wheel the Aero into
the trailer in one piece on Saturday night was a blessing.
In closing, Dave to you and your
TAFE team – “you guys rock!” - is this youngies
speak/language of saying ‘thank you’? Don’t forget
to send me that ‘work-in-progress’ picture which will
make the ‘Elfin Aero Montage’ complete and ready to hang
proudly on the College wall for those involved to say – ‘yeah
I was there, how good was it to work on that?’ It may not have
been a ‘Lotus’ ‘Cooper’ or ‘Brabham’
but one of Garrie Cooper’s indeed Australia’s contribution
to the wonderful world of racing Formula Fords – the ‘Aero’.
Have a wonderful Christmas and
a Prosperous 2007 – my ‘garage’ will always be open
to you and any of your budding young pupils who show the positive
attitude you have managed to instil into the ones I have met so far
– take a bow ‘Mr Dave’. We are richer for this entire
memorable experience. Cheers &
Kind Regards,
John F Benson
