By Derek Schlennstedt
Holden or ford?
It’s a question that’s divided Australians for millennia.
But, if you ask ex-Holden race car driver John Harvey, it’s the wrong question.
“I loved open wheel cars, open cockpit cars – that was my go,” said Australian motor racing legend and Wandin resident, John Harvey.
“It’s a real race car. It goes around the corners faster than a touring car, brakes harder and compared to an open-wheel F1 car, they were slow racers.”
“I didn’t want to be in the slow races, I wanted to be in the fast races,” he joked.
Despite his desire to race open wheel cars, Harvey has etched his name into the record books as one of Australia’s most accomplished touring car drivers, being one of a select few to have won a Bathurst 1000.
The winning didn’t stop there and he quickly proved a gifted racer in every category he competed in.
Although retired, he’s proven he can still win one last award, and this Australia Day was awarded an OAM for his service to motor sports.
That service to motor sports started at a very young age.
In-fact fifty-years-ago, a fresh-faced and fast teenager called John Harvey became a Saturday night star at the Sydney Showgrounds dirt track speedway.
“I had the best cars and I was the best driver at the time … I just won everything,”
“I was racing just about every weekend.”
After winning a string of feature races and three New South Wales speed car championships, Harvey made a silky smooth transition to road racing.
No matter the car or category, Harvey was a winner, and his 1966 Australia 1.5 litre Championship win was followed by an utter domination of sports car racing in Bob Jane’s Repco V8 powered McLaren M6B.
From there he moved into Touring Cars and Sports Sedans, taking victory in the Toby Lee Series and Marlboro Series piloting the legendary Holden Torana Repco V8.
Harvey spoke fondly of his time in the touring car series, though admits the one-seater F1 cars were quicker.
“In one race meeting, when I was with Bob Jane, I’d race a touring car, Torana and a sports car all in the one meet,” he joked.
“The touring cars, they were tricky to drive, but they were tricky to drive because that was what was going to make them win so you had to be right on the ball when racing.”
In 1983, a Bathurst 1000 victory in a Holden Commodore cemented his place as one of the best drivers in the series.
A few year later, in 1987 Harvey teamed with Allan Moffat in a Commodore to win the opening round of the World Touring Car Championship at Monza in Italy.
Later that year the pace was a little slower with the versatile Harvey winning the inaugural World Solar Challenge in the GM Sunraycer averaging 66.9 kilometers per hour over five days from Darwin to Adelaide.
These days Harvey is classified as retired, but he still owns a commodore.
For Harvey, in those early days, winning was everything, but in retirement he’s come accustomed to enjoying things at a slower pace.
“You were only ever in it for one reason, and that was the race and to make a name for yourself as a very, very good driver.
“Because, if you win everybody loves you, you don’t, you’re a bum.”
