Pedro Rodriguez blasts off Long Bridge in his 2.5-litre BRM P126 #01 V12 during the South Pacific Trophy, Tasman Cup meeting over the March 4, 1968 weekend at Longford.
Montgomery Dunn (a King Street, Sydney snapper I’ve not heard of) took this ripper shot on March 2, ‘Rodriguez in the V12 BRM before it blew up in Saturday’s supporting race.’ Graham Hill won from Jim Clark and Chris Amon: Lotus 49 Ford DFW by two, and Ferrari Dino 246T.
Len Terry’s new Grand Prix design was blooded in the 1968 Tasman Cup, where P126/01 and P126/02 were shared by Pedro, Bruce McLaren and Richard Attwood. Bruce got the better of it with a victory in the Teretonga International.
Pedro raced P126/01 at Levin DNF fuel-pickup, Wigram sixth, Teretonga DNF engine, Surfers Paradise tenth, and Sandown DNF engine. But he spent most of his time, when Tim Parnell was out of sight, looking at the 2.1-litre V8 P261, which was fully sorted, to say the least! It was the tour spare, but Pedro raced it at Pukekohe for a DNF clutch, Warwick Farm, sixth and a splendid second at Longford where he nicked the spot from Frank Gardner’s Brabham BT23D Alfa Romeo 2.5 V8 in the streaming, atrocious rain on the last lap.
More about Piers Courage’s 1968 South Pacific Trophy win here:https://primotipo.com/2015/10/20/longford-tasman-south-pacific-trophy-4-march-1968-and-piers-courage/
Pedro is reunited with P126/01 during the 1969 Monaco weekend, Q14 and DNF engine after 15 laps.
The Mexican raced the car from South Africa to Monaco that year, mainly collecting DNFs in a horror BRM season. Denny Hulme behind. More about the BRM P126 here:https://primotipo.com/2018/01/25/richard-attwood-brm-p126-longford-1968/
Credits…
Montgomery Dunn, LAT
Finito…
Hi Mark,
Still looking forward to seeing what you can do with those pics…
Regarding this story about Pedro at Longford, there was a very long
driver’s meeting on that very wet day. Nobody wanted to race – except
Pedro. He sat in a corner and the drivers took their vote (the series
hung in the balance between Clark on 42 points and Amon on 36) and Pedro
merely said, “We race!”
As they lined up, four cars were missing. Cusack had bundled up his in
the special practice session put on so the drivers could acclimatise to
the conditions while Hulme and Geoghegan decided they weren’t going to
risk it. Bartlett was prevented from running by Alec Mildren, who told
him, “Frank can make up his own mind but you’re not driving.”
A spin at Newry on the first lap ruined Amon’s chances and so Clark won
the series.
Ray