Kevin Bartlett posted this shot of him chasing Ian ‘Pete’ Geoghegan in KB’s Morris Minor 1000 – ‘one I bought from the NRMA write-off yard with only superficial damage’ – on Bob Williamson’s ‘Old Motor Racing Photographs-Australia Facebook page.
Aussie international racer/historian, Peter Finlay chipped in with ‘The Geoghegans were the first in Australia to race an 850 Mini’.
Hmmm, I thought, is that so?
Noted Cooper historian, Stephen Dalton, advises as follows, ‘The 850 went on sale on 23 March if my brain is operating! So the car’s competition debut was soon after. KB’s shot is on 21 May 1961 at Warwick Farm. Ian did get period coverage, quoting him as being the first to race a Morris 850 (this one listed at 995cc already), but he wasn’t.
Peter Manton ran at Tarrawingee on 23 April, while Bruce Coventry and Sid Sakzewski ran Minis at Lakeside the weekend before Warwick Farm.
And Harry Firth made its competition debut at Rob Roy before all of them. A week before Tarra and nearly a month before the Lakeside meeting took place…’
Morris 850 Development Pace…
This piece from Tony Johns’ upcoming book on the history of Austin 7 Racing in Australia shows just how quickly local tuners hopped onto the Mini Bandwagon…
‘The Australian Motor Sports Club (AMSC) had previously organised hillclimbs at Greensborough, Hurstbridge and Hepburn Springs. When the LCCA decided, due to dwindling spectator numbers, now less than 500, that they no longer wanted to run meetings at Rob Roy. The AMSC were allowed to organise a meeting on Sunday, July 2, 1961.
A few days before the weekend, the club put up yellow posters around Melbourne stating ‘Rob Roy Hillclimb – Sunday – Next – July 20d’ It worked, a crowd of 2,500 spectators arrived.
It was Nigel Tait’s first hillclimb, and he was one of five entries in the Austin 7 Formula class. Fastest was lan Wells with a best time of 35.54 secs, still well outside Bill Rees’ class record of 31.47 in the ex-Derek Jolly Austin.
Later Mini-King Peter ‘Skinny’ Manton fitted a supercharger to his Monaro Motors entered Morris 850 (Mini) to win the Gran Turismo class -1100cc class 37.18secs.
In the Touring class, he used an overbored Mini to beat the Austin Distributors Mini driven by Harry Firth, with times of 35.19 and 37.13 seconds respectively.
Two weeks later, on July 16, Nigel was having his first outing at Templestowe hillclimb. Initially, the track was damp and greasy, but dried out after lunch. lan Wells was nearly three seconds outside Bowring’s class record, with lan Walker and John Robertson filling the minor placings.’
Credits…
Kevin Bartlett, Stephen Dalton
primotipo... 