Pop McLaren and another helper about to bump-start Bruce’s Cooper T45 Climax FPF 2.5 at the Wigram RNZAF track on the January 23, 1960 weekend.
That’s Ian Burgess’ third-placed Cooper T51 Climax behind, then Pat Hoare’s Ferrari 256 V12 a little further back; he was fifth. Jack Brabham won the race in a T51 2.5-FPF with David Piper’s Lotus 16 Climax FPF 2.5 second. Bruce was fourth in the Lycoming Special; more of that soon.
New Zealand’s Summer Internationals commenced with the NZ GP, then held on the Ardmore Airfield circuit outside Auckland, with the Lady Wigram Trophy the other round most visiting internationals did. Sometimes they also entered the Dunedin Road Race and Teretonga International, held on a permanent racetrack near Invercargill, both venues on the South Island.
That year the visitors were headlined by Stirling Moss, twice-on-the-trot World Champion Brabham, and Burgess, Piper, while the Australian contingent included Bib Stillwell and Stan Jones in Cooper T51s, and Len Lukey in a T45. Similarly mounted was Kiwi youngsters Denny Hulme and George Lawton, both Driver to Europe exports; Lawton’s a sad one…
Coopers to the fore on the first lap at of the New Zealand GP at Ardmore: McLaren, Moss, Brabham, #6 Australian Bib Stillwell and then Ian Burgess. One T45 and four T51s. In the middle of the road is David Pipers Lotus 16 Climax, car #17 Johnny Mansel’s Maserati 250F, while #88 is Ron Roycroft’s positively historic but very well driven ex-Ascari Ferrari 375 4.5-litre V12. Behind Mansel is perhaps Pat Hoare, Ferrari 256 V12 – a Dino 246 fitted with a 3-litre V12 – then Arnold Glass in his Maserati 250F #12. Close to the oil drum is 1954 NZ GP winner Stan Jones, Cooper T51 Climax, and finally the big front-engined car is Ted Gray in his last drive of Australian Land Speed record holder, Ted Gray in Tornado 2 Chev V8.
At this time of technological change, it was certainly a grid lacking variety! Coopers were of course right up there: Brabham and McLaren finished one-two in their 2.5-litre FPF-powered cars from the 2.2s of Stillwell and Jones. The best placed front-engined cars were the pair of 2.5-litre six-cylinder Maserati 250Fs raced by Kiwi Johnny Mansel and Aussie Arnold Glass.
That summer, Jack Brabham won both the NZ GP and Wigram, while Syd Jensen’s nimble Cooper T45 Climax 1.5 won on the Dunedin city roads, and Ian Burgess triumphed at Teretonga, Cooper T51 Climax FPF 2.2-litre.
On the other side of The Ditch Brabham won at Longford and Phillip Island against local opposition; it was a great summer for him. It wasn’t until 1961 – and really 1962 – that the Australians had the tracks to cut it with the Kiwis to attract the internationals with the first Tasman Cup held and won by Bruce McLaren’s Cooper T70 Climax in 1964.
While Bruce McLaren started the Lady Wigram Trophy in his Cooper, he retired the car and then took over the famous aircraft-engined Lycoming Special, finishing the race in fourth place (below).
Jim Clark did a few laps in one of the Kiwis’ most loved specials during practice during the Tasman Series a couple of years later.
McLaren ran out of brakes in the Lycoming during the race; the car ran four-wheel drums sourced from an Austin road car. Bruce found the car’s handling so forgiving that he was able to make up for the lack of stoppers, in part, by throwing the it sideways into the corners.
Never one to forget a favour, when he returned to England, Bruce sent a set of Dunlop rotors and calipers to New Zealand, the Lycoming raced on so equipped!
The shot above shows the Lycoming in the Levin paddock in January 1960. Note the road-rego and Michelin radial tyres. Clearly, (pic above) Bruce raced it on Dunlop racing tyres, but the 4.7-litre four cylinder engines car was originally built by oh-so-talented Kiwi engineer Ralph Watson as a road-going racer. At the time Bruce borrowed the car, it was being raced by Malcolm Gill and later Jim Boyd, happily it is extant, alive and well.
Ian Burgess’s Cooper T51 Climax at Wigram above, and the 2.5-litre Climax in Stirling Moss’ car being fettled in the Ardmore paddock below.
David Piper (below) pushing his Lotus 16 Climax 2.5 #368 to the start line at Dunedin on January 30, where he withdrew with gearbox problems after 22 of the 36 laps.
Piper coaxed local boy Arnold Stafford into the hot-seat of his 1.5-litre FPF-engined Lotus 16 #353 ‘renter’ at Wigram (below), but Stafford thought the better of it after a big-spin in practice, having not raced for three years and didn’t start.
Both cars weren’t particularly old in years but were technically passé by early 1960, even in the colonies where Coopers had been rather popular from the early 1950s.
Etcetera…
McLaren at Wigram in 1962, where he was fourth in his 2.7-litre Cooper T53 behind Stirling Moss’ Rob Walker Lotus 21 Climax 2.5 and the 2.7-powered Coopers of Brabham, T55, and John Surtees, T53…Happy Patty below.
Pop McLaren and who folks?
Credits…
Rosalie Stuart, Graham Woods Collection, Merv Knowles, Bruce McLaren Trust via Jim Bennett, Kelvin Brown, Milan Fistonic, National Library of New Zealand
Finito…
primotipo... 
Do you know that Bruce’s surname was adopted by his grandfather, Benjamin Howie, who left his home town of McLaren Vale in South Australia circa 1900 and changed his name to McLaren to cover his tracks after he and his lover, Frances Hockey (nee Moyle,) eloped to Auckland. A McLaren Vale Shiraz 2020 commemorates this piece of history?