Australian Stock Car Auto Racing

AUSCAR (Australian Stock Car Auto Racing) was an auto racing sanctioning body owned by Bob Jane, which ran American-style Superspeedway racing in Australia. The initial AUSCAR venue was the Calder Park Thunderdome Superspeedway, but over time the series expanded to include the Bob Jane owned 1/2 mile Speedway Super Bowl at the eastern end of Adelaide International Raceway (the only other paved oval circuit in Australia), the Surfers Paradise Street Circuit, and eventually several Australian road racing circuits including Calder Park's road course. Three categories of racing car were developed to run on the Australian circuits.

• NASCAR: imported and locally developed versions of the American race cars
• AUSCAR: down spec-ed cars, closer to production specification, The category comprised the Holden Commodore and Ford Falcon
• Sportsman: lower specification again, cheaper to buy or build and older cars, and some former AUSCARs

Other categories, such as the HQ's, a category based around the Holden HQ Kingswood powered by the 3.3L Holden red motor, were also popular at the Calder Park Thunderdome. Another category was based on the American dirt track category known as Legends (unrelated to Aussie Racing Cars), since disappeared from circuit racing. And Formula Vee open wheelers raced briefly on the Thunderdome apron.

AUSCAR category

AUSCAR was also the name used for the second tier racing category that raced alongside the Australian NASCAR stock car racing series, starting in 1986 and continuing until 2001. The cars were not pure space frame chassis like NASCAR, but were built on Australian Holden Commodore and Ford Falcon road car chassis. As a result, AUSCARs are right-hand-drive, and race clockwise at ovals, compared to the left-hand-drive anticlockwise NASCAR vehicles. AUSCAR's were also restricted to running the 5.0 litre Holden V8 engine and the 5.0L Ford V8. These engines developed less power than the larger and more highly developed engines used in NASCAR and as a result AUSCAR's were slower, but not by much.

Jim Richards won the first ever AUSCAR championship in 1987/88 driving a Ford XF Falcon, but in a shock to the male dominated establishment, the first ever AUSCAR race at the Thunderdome was won by female driver Terri Sawyer. While Sawyer would remain competitive in the early years of the category, it was Albury panel shop owner and Group E/Group A driver Brad Jones who would dominate the category, winning five consecutive titles during the peak of the series popularity, all in Commodore's. Other notable drivers include: Marshall J. Brewer, Terry Wyhoon, Russell Ingall, John Faulkner, Bathurst and ATCC champion Jim Richards and his son Steven Richards, Tony Kavich, Adam Pay, Nathan Pretty and his sister Nicole Pretty, Jason Whylie, Eddie Abelnecia and Leigh Watkins (who was the only driver other than Jim Richards to win the championship driving a Falcon). Even Australian touring car legend Peter Brock briefly tried AUSCAR in 1988 driving a Falcon (after his 1987 split with Holden) and again at his testimonial race meeting (held on the Calder Park road circuit) in 1995 driving a Commodore.

Due to the returning popularity of the Australian Touring Car Championship, relaunched as V8 Supercars in 1997, and financial difficulties, AUSCAR was shut down and the drivers dispersed into other national racing series.

Champions

Season	Driver	Car	Team
1987-88	Jim Richards	Ford XF Falcon	Stillwell Ford
1988–89	Tony Kavich	Holden VL Commodore	Tony Kavich Racing
1989–90	Brad Jones	Holden VL Commodore	Brad Jones Racing
1990–91	Brad Jones	Holden VN Commodore	Brad Jones Racing
1991–92	Brad Jones	Holden VN Commodore	Brad Jones Racing
1992–93	Brad Jones	Holden VN Commodore	Brad Jones Racing
1993–94	Brad Jones	Holden VP Commodore	Brad Jones Racing
1994–95	Marshall J Brewer	Holden VR Commodore	Fastrack Racing
1995–96	Terry Wyhoon	Holden VR Commodore
1996–97	Matthew White	Holden VR Commodore
1997–98	Darren McDonald	Holden VS Commodore
1998–99	Leigh Watkins	Ford EF Falcon	Leigh Watkins Racing

See also

• NASCAR in Australia

External links

• Calder Park Motor Sport