Latest / Rusty's Garage / Jeff Grech (Part 1)

Transcript

Jeff Grech (Part 1) · Rusty's Garage

• 0:02
  A listener production.
• 0:10
  I'm automotive commentator and journalist Greg Rust and this is Rusty's Garage.
• 0:27
  I'm at home for this ep while my guest is in Victoria.
• 0:31
  He's had what he calls a tree change.
• 0:33
  Benalla is now home and he's lending decades of race experience to Winton Motor Raceway.
• 0:39
  More on that new chapter later.
• 0:41
  Geoff Gregg is a straight shooter with a very impressive CV.
• 0:46
  He's worked on some of the best Australian touring car teams over the years now.
• 0:51
  on the tools and in major frontline roles.
• 0:54
  From the legendary Peter Brock to Larry Perkins, with Nissan on the mighty GTRs, Godzilla.
• 1:01
  And he was team boss during a golden era for the Holden Racing team in supercars, with Mark Scaife, Craig Lowndes, Greg Murphy and many more.
• 1:11
  He's not really done a podcast like this before, so I'm honoured he's come on.
• 1:15
  You'll love some of the backstories, the rivalries, an innovation that hasn't been widely spoken about until now, some insights on the current state of play, and I'll tackle some of your questions raised on social media.
• 1:29
  I almost sense this is a bit cathartic for Jeff.
• 1:33
  He's seen some incredible highs and a few lows, and stepping away from major team positions in a sport which has been his life isn't easy.
• 1:43
  But Jeff's the first one to tell you he's not the lone ranger there.
• 1:46
  His record is one to be immensely proud of, and having interviewed him on broadcast many times over the years, I'm pleased he's still involved in the game.
• 1:56
  If you're into motorbikes, you'll love the start of this pod too, because Geoff's early days were dominated by bikes.
• 2:03
  Family life as a youngster played a huge part in the path he would end up taking.
• 2:09
  Rusty is in Emmerdale Heights in Melbourne, actually.
• 2:12
  Dad had a little engineering shop with a service station out the front.
• 2:16
  And he used to race motorbikes, mainly grass track,
• 2:22
  Speedway and back then motocross was called Scrambles.
• 2:26
  The motorcycle club would meet round at the house was next door to the business in Emmerdale Heights so, you know, with a gate between it.
• 2:36
  So I spent probably 23 and a half hours a day in the workshop
• 2:41
  And I only went home for a food and a bath and a bit of sleep.
• 2:45
  So it was a great upbringing.
• 2:47
  Dad and I were like mates.
• 2:51
  He kept me involved and everything.
• 2:53
  And I'd come in when they were having the club motorbike meetings.
• 2:58
  And he was in the Bravebrook club then.
• 3:02
  And we had Tracy Speedway, which was behind the Maribyrnong RSL.
• 3:07
  So I sort of, from, I can't remember the earliest time, but it was always motorbikes and hanging around Dad in the workshop.
• 3:15
  So when I was about 13, he bought me my first mini bike.
• 3:21
  It was a Yamaha...
• 3:23
  I think it was Yamaha 60 and he juiced it up, we put an expansion chamber on it and all those old school stuff.
• 3:33
  Anyway, obviously I got flogged a little bit.
• 3:36
  So he then, the bike to have then was an XR75.
• 3:42
  And they'd just come out and there was a guy in Airport West called Clive Wolfenden.
• 3:50
  And he was an expert tuner of XR75s.
• 3:55
  So I was in the Laverdon Motorcycle Club and we used to run around.
• 4:01
  There was a track at Laverdon, one at Wallen in country Victoria there, which was a really good track.
• 4:08
  And there was one at Knox.
• 4:11
  a few others, but they were the main tracks.
• 4:13
  I was going to say, was there a state title in there somewhere for you as well?
• 4:16
  There was.
• 4:17
  There was a couple of state championships.
• 4:20
  But so Dad decided that we went there with a standard XR75, and again, I got flogged, you know.
• 4:28
  And look, Rusty, I wasn't the gun rider, but I thought I could ride fairly well.
• 4:34
  Anyway, so Dad got the shits, actually, and he said,
• 4:38
  Because I kept saying, well, Dad, the Wolfenden bikes are the ones they have.
• 4:43
  And no, no, no.
• 4:44
  So next thing, we had the engine out back in the workshop.
• 4:48
  And he said about he ported out the – it's only a single cylinder.
• 4:52
  So he ported out the head.
• 4:54
  made bigger valves.
• 4:56
  He bought a piston that was just the same bore size, but it had to be all machined so it would fit.
• 5:02
  And he was mates with George Wade, Wade Cams, very famous camshaft designer.
• 5:09
  And George made a new cam for it.
• 5:14
  And I remember when we put it in, it hardly fitted in a little cradle.
• 5:19
  And anyway, he also, because he used to muck around, obviously with Pommy bikes back in the day, he decided to put an Amal Carby on it.
• 5:28
  So Stanco in the city of Melbourne, which were there for a lot of years, he went in, I can't think of the guy's name now, an old guy, and he bought an Amal Racing Carby with about 20 needles and different jetting, and, of course, he was,
• 5:47
  We got it all together and I remember up the side street, it was Gravel Wood Street in Neffindale Heights, and he just kept – we spent a day and this thing was wild.
• 5:58
  Like in the end when he got the carby right with the right needles and jets, you know, I wore out the knobby going up and down the street until we got it right.
• 6:11
  And obviously the carby was really big and he made the manifold himself.
• 6:18
  It was a weapon.
• 6:19
  I mean, it was a real weapon.
• 6:20
  So we go to the first race meeting.
• 6:21
  It was at Lavender at my home track.
• 6:25
  Anyway, we roll the bike off the trailer and they all had the wolf and, you know, a bigger Japanese carby and, you know, all the stuff.
• 6:35
  And here's this XR75 with this ammo poking out the side with a combed sock and everyone was laughing.
• 6:44
  I remember, anyway, Dad being as proud as punch, he just wheeled her out and, you know.
• 6:49
  we were behind the set that was going off in practice.
• 6:53
  Anyway, he also made this megaphone.
• 6:56
  It was a reverse mega and it was as loud as.
• 7:00
  And, of course, they all had the, you know, the American pipes that were Mickey Mouse and...
• 7:07
  Anyway, he started it up and you could hardly hear the other bikes.
• 7:13
  Anyway, he said, right, Dad used to call.
• 7:15
  I was in Dad's business.
• 7:18
  He was called Cactus.
• 7:20
  That was his nickname because he was a prick.
• 7:24
  And I was Cactus Junior.
• 7:28
  So anyway, he said, righto, Cactus, hop on the thing and give it to it.
• 7:35
  So we got to the start.
• 7:37
  It was a ribbon then.
• 7:38
  It wasn't the gates like they are now.
• 7:40
  It was a ribbon.
• 7:40
  So the ribbon went up and I just flattened it.
• 7:42
  And I won the first race by half a lap.
• 7:46
  Like this thing was just screaming anyway.
• 7:50
  So, and the talk was about this thing and, you know, whether it was illegal or whatever, you know, there was, you can imagine the chat because, as I said, there was really good riders and I just smoked them and going my first meeting back.
• 8:08
  Anyway, at the next race meeting, all these XR75s had turned up with Amal Carbys on them.
• 8:18
  And I think it was Phil, this bloke Phil, I think it was Phil, at Stanko rang.
• 8:23
  He said, hey, Cactus, I've just run out of Amal Carbys.
• 8:26
  All these young blokes and their dads are coming in.
• 8:30
  So as you know, Rusty, you've been around pit lane.
• 8:33
  Like once someone finds something...
• 8:36
  Next thing, all the pit lanes got it.
• 8:38
  So anyway, that was a bit of a laugh and I did.
• 8:42
  I won the state title race at Wallen and then I had a mate got really, really hurt bad, really good mate, and I thought it didn't affect me but he actually, he actually, he was behind me and he, he,
• 9:01
  where Wallen used to come down a hill and turn at a tree and go over a little creek and he fell off and a bike come over and landed on his back and he was, you know, quadriplegic and so, you know, that really, I didn't think it would get to me but
• 9:21
  About a month later, Dad sort of said one night at home, he said, hey, Kat, this, like, you know, Steve got hurt bad and maybe it's time to throw the towel.
• 9:31
  And, you know, if you're not going to raise hard, don't do it, you know, if you're frightened.
• 9:37
  And I thought about it and, yeah, I just, I did.
• 9:39
  I thought, yeah, look, and I knew I was, I knew I wasn't that good to keep going.
• 9:45
  By then, you know, you were starting to get into one, two, fives and stuff.
• 9:49
  So I had my go and, yeah, it was good.
• 9:53
  So then the attention really turned to, from there, I obviously, I,
• 10:01
  I went to uni actually.
• 10:04
  So when I finished school, I was good at, there was a subject called mechanical drawing and it was the old board with the slides and, you know, slide rule to work through.
• 10:18
  And the teacher taught mum and dad into sending me to be an architect.
• 10:25
  And, like, you can imagine my life, mate, I was always around the workshop.
• 10:31
  Anyway, I said, Dad, I don't want to do that.
• 10:34
  He said, no, no, mate, you're not going to be a mechanic, so don't dream about it.
• 10:39
  You're going, you know, you're going to be something better than I was.
• 10:43
  Anyway, so we enrolled and I got in and all that sort of stuff.
• 10:47
  Anyway, I was there nearly six months at RMIT in Melbourne,
• 10:52
  And I thought, I got the shits with this.
• 10:54
  You know, I did like mechanical drawing, obviously, but I wanted to get spanners in my hand.
• 11:04
  And dad at that stage,
• 11:08
  He didn't retire.
• 11:09
  He was always interested in farming, so he bought some farms north of Melbourne, up at Kitan.
• 11:16
  And he then decided to lease out all the buildings and the businesses and just concentrate going up to the farm all the time.
• 11:26
  There wasn't really a... A workshop for you.
• 11:29
  Yeah, yeah.
• 11:30
  So in the end, Malford Motors in the city, which is a Ford dealer, decided to...
• 11:37
  They put an ad for apprentices and there was a government incentive to take on 40 first year apprentices.
• 11:45
  Imagine 40, you know.
• 11:47
  Yeah.
• 11:47
  40 young blokes thrashing around in workshop utes.
• 11:52
  Anyway, so I got a job, but the problem was I had to get my indentures signed.
• 11:59
  So I talked mum into coming in with me at the interview.
• 12:03
  And anyway, I mean, poor old mum, I put her under the pump.
• 12:08
  So she actually signed off.
• 12:11
  And I worked at Melford's for three months before dad even knew.
• 12:15
  How did that conversation go then?
• 12:17
  Oh, he found out, obviously.
• 12:18
  Mum had a weak moment apparently and...
• 12:21
  Because he kept asking how well am I too.
• 12:24
  He was going, oh, yeah, no, it's all right.
• 12:27
  Anyway, I got a little bit of a clip over the ear roll for doing it.
• 12:32
  But, you know, he ended up being as proud as Punch that I took the course I did.
• 12:39
  Yeah.
• 12:39
  That's how I got into trade.
• 12:41
  And then...
• 12:43
  I love racing, you know, I love any sort of racing, but, and he's a famous, in my mind, he's, everyone knows him, Colin Russell, who was at one stage team manager of Ford Racing Team with Moffat and, anyway, he retired.
• 13:02
  He was a schoolteacher at Batman Automotive, but he was mucking around with, or he's helping, establish Larry Ormsby in Top Fuel.
• 13:12
  And there was another guy, Johnny Mepstead, I think, yep, Johnny.
• 13:20
  So he said to me one day, hey, Jeff, do you want to help us out with the top fuel car?
• 13:26
  I said, oh, I'd love to.
• 13:28
  So anyway, that started that.
• 13:30
  I ended up doing...
• 13:33
  I ended up volunteering.
• 13:34
  It was all night work, so you finish work.
• 13:36
  And I'd start a little bit early, finish a little bit early, and drive all the way to Melbourne to Footscray.
• 13:41
  Oh, wow.
• 13:42
  And then work on a top fuel car and then go home.
• 13:46
  grab a couple of hours sleep and it was back to work again.
• 13:49
  Back to work again.
• 13:50
  And then the first race meeting I went was the 1979 finals at Castlereagh in Sydney.
• 13:58
  I was only a gofer, mind you, but there was Colin and a guy by the name of Mark Watson.
• 14:04
  So, yeah, that was a bug that got me.
• 14:07
  And, Geoff, the top fuel, I mean, the drag racing community has been in touch via social media about this.
• 14:13
  So people had fondly remembered that you had that involvement.
• 14:16
  What was that car like?
• 14:18
  And am I right in saying that that association would lead to a bit of an overseas trip too?
• 14:23
  Is that correct?
• 14:24
  Yeah, yeah.
• 14:26
  So as time went on and I then finished my apprenticeship and I got a job in the Dine section in Fisherman's Bend in experimental engineering.
• 14:39
  So I went there and I was still working with Larry.
• 14:42
  By that time, I think Colin had sort of had enough of it and he trained me up to run the car myself.
• 14:50
  So we were going along pretty well.
• 14:53
  And those were the days of the Jim Reeds, you know, the Hussey Brothers, Johnny Marr and Top Fuel with both Funny Car, with Jimmy Walton.
• 15:06
  I mean, it was a golden era drag racing.
• 15:08
  It was magic, magic days.
• 15:11
  What sort of horsepower numbers for the listeners, Geoff?
• 15:14
  Back then here, I mean, we didn't run the cars as hard as they did in the States.
• 15:20
  But back here, they were probably about three and a half, 4,000.
• 15:24
  But it was never a dyno.
• 15:25
  It was only theoretical.
• 15:27
  Over in America, they used to run them on big Navy, you know, the Navy Packard engine.
• 15:34
  They had big dynos who were as big as a house and they used to run top fuel engines.
• 15:38
  But...
• 15:39
  It was an estimate because over that, you just pull the string and bang, you know, and the absorber would try and hold the flywheel.
• 15:48
  So that was my foray into drag racing.
• 15:51
  And then the trip you're talking about, Larry decided that we would go over and get a new engine out of Keith Black's.
• 16:01
  So he said to me, do you want to come over?
• 16:03
  To the US, wasn't it?
• 16:04
  Yeah.
• 16:04
  So Larry's daily business, he used to buy brake machinery.
• 16:11
  So the Van Norman big brake drum lays and shoe riveters, because back then it was all, you know, all that hand stuff done.
• 16:19
  Yeah.
• 16:20
  And he basically had an open order with PBR in the southeast of...
• 16:28
  Melbourne, they were in, just off North Road there in Oakley.
• 16:34
  And so he'd buy, go around America, buy all the, buy anything he could as far as brake reconditioning machinery.
• 16:44
  He'd bring it back here, recondition it, and then obviously sell it off to PBR was his biggest customer.
• 16:51
  So he said, why don't you come over?
• 16:52
  So I actually left work.
• 16:54
  I thought, oh, well, I'll leave work and go over and have like a working holiday.
• 16:59
  I had to pay for it myself.
• 17:02
  But anyway, I was only 21 and never been out of, never been out of Australia.
• 17:08
  So we went to Black's, the engine was built.
• 17:12
  So what they did is they had like a little assembly shop and a Mexican guy used to run it called Amos Saddle Tree.
• 17:19
  He was a ripper guy.
• 17:21
  I remember one, I stayed on a bit because Larry had come back and I remember he took me home to his house and it was a typical Mexican family, Yombama, Saddle Tree and they had a dozen kids, the ones I saw anyway, they were everywhere.
• 17:39
  And I had the authentic Mexican meal and it was just sensational.
• 17:47
  Mind you, in the morning, lucky the toilet was water-cooled because I tell you.
• 17:53
  It was.
• 17:56
  But, yeah, so I ended up coming home and I guess the foray into, I worked at a tyre service as soon as I got home and I bought a Harley while I was over there.
• 18:10
  So that followed me home.
• 18:12
  Yeah.
• 18:13
  So we're talking early 80s here, really, aren't we?
• 18:16
  Yeah, early 80s.
• 18:17
  And is this about the point somehow that the connection with Peter Brock and the Holden dealer team starts?
• 18:22
  How did that all come about?
• 18:23
  Yeah.
• 18:25
  Well, I was working at the tyre shop just, you know, trying to fill in.
• 18:29
  And I'd heard that they were putting HGT special vehicles was...
• 18:34
  putting on people.
• 18:35
  So obviously I'd known of HDT themselves.
• 18:39
  I thought, well, if I can get into the organisation, I might be able to somehow wangle getting into racing.
• 18:46
  Yeah.
• 18:47
  Anyway, so I started at Special Vehicles.
• 18:50
  So you're a young bloke here.
• 18:51
  What are we talking?
• 18:52
  You're sort of 20 or early 20s kind of thing.
• 18:54
  How old were you?
• 18:56
  So I was 23 then.
• 18:57
  Okay.
• 18:58
  So I was working at Special Vehicles in a workshop.
• 19:03
  And as you know,
• 19:05
  That was in Leveson Street, North Melbourne, and the race shop was the old Johnny Shepard shop, which, you know, Brock had bought, in Chetwin Street.
• 19:16
  So he used to walk through a little paddock and...
• 19:18
  Anyway, I didn't sort of telegraph, you know, I'd love to get into racing, but I was working away and, you know, fate's everything, I guess, and luck, a bit of both.
• 19:34
  You know our famous mortician?
• 19:35
  Yep, Graham Mort Brown we're talking about, yes?
• 19:38
  Yeah, which back then I didn't, I'd never gone up to the race team to even have a look.
• 19:45
  I sort of kept...
• 19:47
  kept them myself because I thought they probably get every man his dog from the workshop, go up there and want to have a look.
• 19:54
  And I heard that was when Bruce Nowacki got crook.
• 20:00
  You know, he had a misfortune and then Brock talked Larry into running the workshop, being team manager.
• 20:07
  Mm-hmm.
• 20:08
  So, and I, Larry had come down to the main, Brock had his main offices up at, um,
• 20:15
  in Leveson Street up on the second floor there at the front.
• 20:18
  So you'd often see Larry come down all part, Neil Burns, one of the guys, and you just acknowledge.
• 20:27
  But Larry was always in and out.
• 20:30
  He had the shits on all the time.
• 20:31
  And I thought, oh, shit.
• 20:34
  So it got around that, you know, he's a pretty hard guy to work for.
• 20:40
  Anyway, I don't know what it was, Rusty.
• 20:43
  I keep meaning to ask LP, but he was walking through the workshop one day and I was on the back of a car.
• 20:53
  It was a VH truck.
• 20:56
  VHSS, you know, HDT car.
• 21:01
  And he walked past and I turned around and he said, what are you doing, cot?
• 21:06
  As he always does.
• 21:07
  Yeah, yeah.
• 21:08
  And I said, oh, nothing really.
• 21:10
  He said...
• 21:12
  do you want to come to a race meeting and help out?
• 21:14
  And I said, yeah, yeah, no, I'd love to.
• 21:17
  He said, have you got any experience?
• 21:18
  I said, oh, look, I worked on drags and he kept walking, you know, did want it.
• 21:23
  He sort of half listened.
• 21:25
  That race meeting was a CRC 300 at Amaru Park.
• 21:29
  Fantastic.
• 21:30
  So I went up for the weekend.
• 21:32
  I was just a churn operator, basically.
• 21:38
  So the regular guys were there, obviously Mort.
• 21:43
  Sorry, the reason I went up, the reason I got asked, because Mort dropped an air bottle on his foot and broke his toe.
• 21:50
  Ah.
• 21:50
  So they needed someone.
• 21:52
  And that's...
• 21:54
  Opened the door for you.
• 21:55
  Opened the door.
• 21:58
  I went up for the race meeting and apart from that, the guys really didn't want you to, you were just a gopher, you know.
• 22:07
  You weren't allowed to go near the cars.
• 22:10
  Andy Bartley was working there then as well and I just said to Andy, look, well, I said to everyone, Marty Watt, I said, look, if I can do anything, just yell out.
• 22:21
  Anyway, it was empty the oil bucket and everything.
• 22:26
  Anyway, Andy was under the car and he said, mate, can you come up and give us a hand, come under and give us a hand?
• 22:32
  And I did.
• 22:33
  And we just started talking and I was getting the bolt, you know, working in with him.
• 22:39
  And he said, oh, you seem to be pretty handy around a race car.
• 22:42
  And I said, oh, look, I used to work.
• 22:45
  with Larry Ormsby in drag racing.
• 22:47
  So, yeah, you know, obviously specialty bolts and nuts and, you know, you just didn't belt everything into a hole if it didn't fit.
• 22:57
  You had to find out why.
• 22:58
  So that was – I'd come back and I'd done another meeting and then –
• 23:03
  LP come down and said, look, can you give us a hand up in the workshop overnight?
• 23:07
  Which I said, yeah, love to.
• 23:09
  So then I went up into the race team and he was getting me to do odd jobs.
• 23:14
  And I remember I, because Dad had an engineering business.
• 23:18
  So, you know, I learnt from, I don't know when to use micrometers and, you know,
• 23:23
  From a young age, from a really young age.
• 23:25
  Yeah.
• 23:26
  So I was putting a caliper together and a front caliper it was and the piston, it looked a bit tight.
• 23:35
  So I thought, I better measure it before I try and push it in.
• 23:38
  So I got a set of vernis and I was measuring a piston.
• 23:41
  And LP said, what are you doing now?
• 23:43
  So I just, it felt a bit tight, LP, so I'm just measuring the piston to make sure that, you know, I've got the right piston in the right bore or it's, because there was two calibers in bits and I was putting them together.
• 23:55
  So I didn't know whether, you know, one piston might have been from the other calibre.
• 23:58
  The other one, yeah.
• 23:59
  So he said, where'd you learn to do that?
• 24:01
  And I said, oh, Dad had an engineering shop.
• 24:03
  And then it was about a week later, he said, do you want to work up here full time?
• 24:07
  So that was it in 83, I think it was.
• 24:11
  So we're talking here for people that are listening to the podcast that mightn't realise, LP, Larry Perkins, Bathurst and Australian touring car racing legend.
• 24:20
  And we began this part of the conversation by talking about the great Peter Brock.
• 24:25
  Now, Jeff, what was it like to work with him?
• 24:28
  He featured a couple of times in your career too, didn't he?
• 24:31
  I mean, he was an incredible figure as both a sportsman and as a human being, wasn't he?
• 24:38
  Yeah, he was.
• 24:39
  Look, I mean, to Peter, I mean, he was busy.
• 24:46
  He was very busy.
• 24:48
  And at that stage, special vehicles was going gangbusters.
• 24:52
  You know, they were the car.
• 24:56
  I can't remember the amount of...
• 24:58
  cars that were being produced down the road from the donor cars from Holden, but it was going gangbusters.
• 25:05
  He used to come up to the race team probably on average once or twice a week.
• 25:12
  Regardless of him, he'd come up, he was very quietly spoken around us guys or me.
• 25:18
  I mean, Part worked with him for years, so did Mort.
• 25:23
  So I was just a young bloke.
• 25:24
  But I'll never forget one day I brought the Harley in.
• 25:31
  Anyway, he'd come up to the race team and he said, oh,
• 25:35
  Well, whose is that?
• 25:35
  And I said, oh, it's mine, you know.
• 25:37
  And anyway, he then, he went, I think he travelled overseas at one stage and he'd come back and it was all this hog stuff.
• 25:45
  So he was the one that started calling me hog.
• 25:49
  So...
• 25:51
  that stuck with me.
• 25:52
  But I guess the magic of Brock then was just when you went to the track, you know, he'd do minimal laps and he'd just hop in and, like, he'd be on pole or he'd be just... At one with it.
• 26:06
  Oh, absolutely.
• 26:09
  I guess back in those days the Group C cars, which, by the way, are my favourite really, they really were sort of half a...
• 26:20
  half a road car base, but, you know, they were still, they were fettled.
• 26:25
  They had good brakes and, um, but a lot of, a lot of stuff was based off a genuine road car.
• 26:34
  You know, you tuned it.
• 26:36
  So obviously part was, part was a magic 308 engine builder then.
• 26:42
  And, um, and, and we, you know, we obviously, um,
• 26:47
  Larry was very clever at the way the cars were engineered and put together.
• 26:55
  So, and then Peter just hopped in and drove them and he got the best.
• 26:59
  It was a bit like me going back, it was a bit like me when Dad tuned the bike with the Amal Carby, you know.
• 27:05
  He just hopped in and it was a great car and he just shined, you know, it was just brilliant to watch.
• 27:23
  The Nissan GTR nickname, Godzilla, was originally given to it by the Australian magazine Wheels in its July 1989 edition.
• 27:31
  Us Aussies really do love a nickname don't we?
• 27:35
  I think I would like to be called, Navo.
• 27:38
  People can find pictures on the web, Jeff.
• 27:42
  There's a great one, I think, from 84 of all of the team.
• 27:46
  You know, they were sponsored, of course, by Philip Morris back then.
• 27:49
  It was an incredible, incredible outfit.
• 27:51
  And some of the names that you've rattled off already are in that photo from Graham Mort Brown.
• 27:55
  I mean, Craig Fletcher, I think, is in there as well.
• 27:58
  He's a much-missed guy.
• 28:02
  You've sort of summed up what he was like around the team for you to begin with and then what he was like when it came to the car.
• 28:11
  But he was, you get athletes, Jeff, I think, and then you get these real special ones every once in a while.
• 28:17
  And that was him, wasn't it?
• 28:18
  It was.
• 28:20
  Look, and, you know, we've been around together, mate, and I was very young then, so that was probably my – I didn't follow a lot of sports.
• 28:31
  I was a bit of footy, but, you know, I was in awe when I –
• 28:37
  met with him and then he'd go and work there, you know, we'd go to a race meeting and it was just, wow, you know, geez, you know, he just picked it up and walked with it.
• 28:48
  And then over time, mate, you know, you do the same thing with a Mark Skae for Lounsey.
• 28:56
  even McLaughlin now, you know, you just look at, you do, you get special, you get a special person that rolls up and it's in every sport.
• 29:05
  I now like watching a lot of sports, you know, when you see special people, you know, the Shoemakers, the Hamildons, the Senners, you know, they just stand out and it just, they look like they do no wrong, to be honest, and they're special people, you know.
• 29:24
  Most definitely.
• 29:25
  So did you ever get a steer of one of those cars, one of those Group C cars, either from the workshop, maybe a sneaky little test run out the back?
• 29:33
  What did you do?
• 29:34
  No.
• 29:35
  No, I've had a couple of episodes, but obviously I would have always loved to be a driver, but I didn't explore it because I love working on the cars.
• 29:49
  So there's a couple of instances.
• 29:51
  There's one where I drove the car, we were testing a calder, it was a car,
• 29:58
  I was with L.P. then in his own team.
• 30:01
  And I went round and they had, like, little islands in the middle and I just nicked the front spoiler on the – and, mate, I got ripped a new a-hole, I can tell you.
• 30:15
  But there was another one.
• 30:17
  I did get, I was fortunate enough I snuck a few in.
• 30:21
  Yes.
• 30:22
  There was a couple of times where we were at Wannaroo and back in Wannaroo days, the three cars, an LP had actually placed.
• 30:34
  So there was, I think it was a Nissan, might have been,
• 30:40
  Back then it might have been Richo.
• 30:43
  Yes, Jimmy Richards, yeah.
• 30:44
  Richo or C. And LP and I think Dick.
• 30:51
  So they pulled up the front, they do the presentation, and it was up to us to drive them.
• 30:55
  You had to go around the track and come into the pit entrance.
• 30:58
  Pit lane, yeah.
• 31:00
  So there was Pete Alphabet, Peter Schaefer.
• 31:04
  He was in the Nissan Dino.
• 31:06
  Dick's brother was in there.
• 31:08
  Yes.
• 31:09
  And me and...
• 31:11
  So we've gone round turn one, two, over the back, and we've looked at each other and we're into it, you know?
• 31:18
  Reving the shit out of him.
• 31:19
  Anyway...
• 31:21
  We go down to the bowl and we ended up, we nearly hit each other and Alphabet went off into the sand.
• 31:30
  Anyway, we've come up to the hill, you know, where you come down to the last turn.
• 31:36
  We've all backed off and...
• 31:39
  We'd driven into the pits, and LP, he'd done his lol.
• 31:42
  You, you know, I won't say the expletives, but I said, no, mate, we weren't racing.
• 31:47
  He said, yes, you were.
• 31:48
  I said, no, I was only, I couldn't change gears.
• 31:51
  I just left it in second, and obviously it just sounded louder than I was going to do.
• 31:58
  And then at Calder, I did a little bit of a stint with Johnny Shepard, John Shepard when he was running the Volvos.
• 32:06
  Volvos, yes.
• 32:07
  And when he wasn't around, I used to get Bowie's helmet and put it on and we'd just drive out because we worked there and the bloke in the gate was fired.
• 32:15
  He just thought we were going out for a spin.
• 32:17
  So he'd just wave, I'd wave.
• 32:19
  So I'd go for a whole green Calder.
• 32:23
  As John Bauer's stunt double.
• 32:25
  Yeah.
• 32:27
  Anyway, there was some good, I must admit, the best one, the most memorable one was Fred asked me to take the GDR down to Sandown.
• 32:41
  I was doing a promo shot.
• 32:42
  Godzilla, the Nissan.
• 32:44
  Yeah, yeah.
• 32:44
  And anyway, it was down the old, the blokes wanted down the old NGKs.
• 32:50
  I took it off the trailer, drove it down to the NGK, and they said, all right, we want to go.
• 32:56
  And there was no one on the track, obviously, doing.
• 32:58
  He said, oh, now we want to go down to the front straight.
• 33:01
  And I said, oh, I'll go around the track, you know.
• 33:05
  So I did do that and that was an awesome, I mean I didn't drive to any ability of a proper driver, mind you, but boy.
• 33:14
  What a machine.
• 33:16
  Going around a corner and like I didn't warm tyres up and it just gripped and it was amazing.
• 33:23
  to actually, and you got a really good appreciation of when we were racing it, but yeah, it was good.
• 33:33
  Terrific.
• 33:33
  We'll talk more about this because we've jumped across a couple of things in your timeline.
• 33:37
  Before we wrap up your first experiences with Brock and that chapter with HDT, firstly, you'd only been there a relatively short period of time, Jeff, and 84 won to finish at the Mountain.
• 33:48
  I mean, that must rank as one of the special ones for you.
• 33:52
  Yeah, it was.
• 33:52
  It was.
• 33:53
  Look, that was probably, you know, I mean, there was favourite times when I was involved at HRT as well and Nissan, you know, we got, we...
• 34:06
  You know, we had awesome, they were all awesome times with great people, you know, and drivers, but the one tour at Bathurst was certainly the most, I mean, we'd, I'd gone over to England, Larry asked me if I'd go to England to help
• 34:27
  work on the Team Australia, the 956, which was a lease car from John Fitzpatrick, and we worked in his workshop preparing it.
• 34:37
  I'm glad you brought that up, because that's actually another great yarn in itself.
• 34:40
  The fact that you're able to do that as well is huge.
• 34:42
  Yeah, yeah.
• 34:43
  No, it was great.
• 34:45
  We had Andy Bartley,
• 34:48
  also went over.
• 34:49
  He was a senior guy and I was basically the junior, but it was a great experience for sure.
• 34:55
  But going back to the Group C cars, we rushed back because Holden and Peter wanted to have two brand new cars for the run out of
• 35:06
  And I've got a lot of the pictures in Chetwin Street when we were building the two big bangers.
• 35:12
  I remember we – and it was the first time we were going to use a Philip Morris Formula One colour, which was that Dayglo orange.
• 35:21
  Anyway, this guy, a painter, ET, and there was another guy down at Special Vehicles, had their own paint shop.
• 35:32
  And so the paint come out and they did the new paint scheme, which was just stunning.
• 35:41
  And we took the car out to Calder for a shakedown because we were running really late getting them finished.
• 35:49
  Anyway, it was wet out there and we did two laps.
• 35:52
  And I remember the front straighter Calder was day glow orange.
• 35:56
  It just peeled off because...
• 35:59
  It was a plastic sort of – you needed a special primer, so it peeled off.
• 36:07
  And we had to rush them back, and obviously, ET worked out that –
• 36:13
  We had the, we had the right, you know, he needed an etch primer and got it, got it, got it sorted.
• 36:20
  But they were, they were an awesome, they were an awesome car.
• 36:23
  I mean, they weren't any different to the older, the ones I preceded.
• 36:28
  It was just that they were brand new and they were just a stunning, stunning paint job and, and, and LP had,
• 36:36
  designed a new inlet manifold then for those two races.
• 36:42
  And it really worked well.
• 36:44
  And, yeah, Peter, like it was just easy, you know.
• 36:48
  Let's bounce through a couple of other aspects of your career because I want to get to Nissan and I certainly want to get to the Holden Racing team.
• 36:54
  You mentioned Volvo there before and sneaking out and being John Bauer's stunt double.
• 37:00
  It was a short little stint that you experienced with that team, but the 240T actually enjoyed a bit of success around that period before the Swedes sort of withdrew from the championship.
• 37:11
  What was it like?
• 37:12
  Absolutely.
• 37:13
  Well, most of the development work they were racing in Europe then, obviously it was full on Group A, and RAS were their anointed, I guess, works team.
• 37:27
  And there was some pretty clever stuff.
• 37:29
  I mean, they looked like a brick, but they were far from it.
• 37:34
  So they were actually, even though they were, you know, the comments were it was ugly, but there was some under the skin, there was some pretty clever engineering, I can tell you.
• 37:44
  Yeah, definitely.
• 37:46
  So you were there, but then an opportunity came to link back up with Larry Perkins with his own operation, didn't it?
• 37:52
  Just to sort of, if you can, a bit of backstory on how that unfolded.
• 37:56
  Well, LP got in touch with him and said, look, I want to start my own team.
• 38:00
  LP's one of, he's almost the same character as a Brock, probably not in the overall driving thing, but the experience and what he's done in life,
• 38:16
  Yes.
• 38:16
  With his Europe experiences and winning the Formula 3 European Championship, which if you won that, you were there, you know, and his drives.
• 38:31
  And then coming back here, his passion for engineering and I guess it complimented Peter because I think Peter knew that he
• 38:43
  And Larry would leave no stone unturned as far as getting the best out of the car through engineering.
• 38:50
  And so then – and I respected LP for that.
• 38:56
  He was at times very hard to work with.
• 38:59
  But, you know, I respected that, you know, with LP, you just did what you were told and got on with it.
• 39:07
  And that was the best –
• 39:09
  That was the best remedy.
• 39:10
  So when he rang up and said, look, Hogg, I'm starting my own team, it was Roberna Street in Moorabbin.
• 39:18
  I said, yeah, he didn't have to ask me twice.
• 39:21
  So there was, at that stage, he convinced, so there was Part, myself, Barry Abbott-Meyer.
• 39:31
  And that was the initial, there was a couple other people after that, but we went down there and there's this empty workshop with two brand new body shells that Holden had given him, sitting on the floor, and his mum's round Australia VW sitting over in the corner.
• 39:48
  and it was look and I really enjoyed that I really enjoyed that time it was bloody hard because money wasn't, we didn't have the biggest budget but we certainly, we had to bring all our own tools and dad still had a lot of stuff left over from when he got out of engineering which we took down and
• 40:12
  just it was that tight even building shelves there was a furniture maker out the back and and there was a laneway and they should throw all the old timber and we'd be out there getting the nails out and straighten them and really putting bits of timber together to make a shelf and so it was it was you know it was real we started at the very bottom and you know but it became a significant operation didn't it?
• 40:37
  No, I mean, I was there for four years and then I left obviously to go when Fred and Mark invited me to go to Nissan for the GDR program.
• 40:51
  But yeah, I mean, LP, you know, Perkins Motorsport and then...
• 41:00
  It went on to do big things, obviously with Russell and all the guys he had there.
• 41:04
  You know, they were a formidable operation, no two ways about it.
• 41:08
  I nearly went back, I actually nearly went back to LPs.
• 41:12
  It was, I think, 91 when he did a deal with Brock for one year.
• 41:19
  and we had a long chat.
• 41:21
  I was at Nissan then, obviously, and we did talk about going back.
• 41:27
  And then I ummed and ahmed, but I knew things were a bit tense between the two operations because they moved down to Chetland Street.
• 41:40
  And so I thought, oh, no, I'll just stay where I was at that time.
• 41:45
  But yeah, LP, fond memories, great guy, great teacher.
• 41:51
  I'll always, you know, I'll always recognise...
• 41:54
  There's a couple of people I'll always recognise who I'm very grateful for and...
• 42:03
  He's very much one of them.
• 42:05
  And he's not, you know, he just really, really was great to work with and showed me a lot in racing.
• 42:11
  Am I right in saying that one of the kind of Larry learnings, if you like, was that the cars...
• 42:18
  were often in their build and in their development, very much with a Bathurst focus, Geoff, weren't they?
• 42:24
  From day one, Rusty, and in the end, it was unspoken, but from the HDT days when we were there,
• 42:33
  Nothing went on to any car unless he knew it would perform and last a 1,000k race at Bathurst.
• 42:41
  And that was his whole yearly focus.
• 42:44
  He didn't, you know, he wasn't interested in, you know, the Mickey Mouse lightweight race.
• 42:50
  widget that'll do one race, it was all he prepped the whole year to win Bathurst and that was his goal.
• 43:00
  And if you worked under him, it had to be your goal as well.
• 43:04
  Like if he knew that you were doing something that would help
• 43:10
  not work on the car for a Bathurst race.
• 43:12
  Even though you weren't going to Bathurst, you would get a severe talking to.
• 43:20
  And that really come with me right through my career.
• 43:25
  It ended up being me.
• 43:26
  Bathurst was it.
• 43:29
  Forget everything else, you had to win Bathurst and you had to have the right car and people to do it.
• 43:35
  You talked before about GTR and, you know, I think Neil Crompton once described it in commentary as being a bigger tennis racket.
• 43:44
  Freddie Gibson ran an ultra professional show and you were there at a great time, Jeff, with the likes of Mark Scafer, you detailed before, Jim Richards, whose record is just remarkable.
• 43:57
  Two very different characters and yet they work so well together.
• 44:01
  Mark learnt so much from Jimmy.
• 44:03
  Yep.
• 44:05
  Look, it was an interesting time, but Fred, I mean, it was a – he had – like, you went from LP, who, you know, bare bones, straight engineering, to Fred, who was, I guess, one of the –
• 44:27
  you know, the marketing and the thing that went on there was second to none.
• 44:33
  You know, everything had to be pristine, the team looked great.
• 44:38
  It was always, you know, if you had your white race shoes on and they were dirty, you had to have a new pair the next day.
• 44:45
  You know, it was just – and it really worked for – you know, Fred was no-nonsense in the marketing.
• 44:53
  side of things, I guess Mark took that on as well and together, as you said, a very important thing was the Jimmy Richards, Mark Scaife, you know, a bit like the Peter Brock, Craig Lowndes, same thing, you know.
• 45:11
  Mark just soaked up all the...
• 45:15
  all the information that Jimmy gave him and then just careered on from there.
• 45:21
  I'm sure you've, over time, sat back.
• 45:26
  Sometimes maybe it's just fake Jeff, as you said before, and at other times you make your own luck.
• 45:30
  You work incredibly hard to get those opportunities, but you've been with some terrific teams along the way and fans always think about the HRT chapter, the Holden Racing Team, golden period for the sport, golden period for that team.
• 45:46
  Let's start with who approached who and how did that all sort of unfold, but you would get to go and work there.
• 45:54
  Well, I initially bumped into John Crennan and I'll jump ahead in one.
• 46:01
  The other person that I owe a lot of my career to other than LP is John Crennan because, you know, he was my mentor that, you know, what I learnt from him, you know, you couldn't put down in words.
• 46:20
  So...
• 46:22
  When there was a stage there when LP got the contract to run Special Vehicles Race Team.
• 46:31
  Yep.
• 46:31
  When John was setting up HSV.
• 46:36
  So they were doing it.
• 46:37
  Remember the Group A, the 500?
• 46:39
  That was their first lot of jobs.
• 46:43
  But in the contract, HSV had to have some racing element to it.
• 46:48
  So they contracted LP.
• 46:50
  And to be honest, Parton and I and probably Barry Abbottmire and Rod Smith was there by then.
• 46:58
  We thought that this was our time.
• 47:00
  You know, we would get the factory team.
• 47:03
  And because Parton and I had worked at HDT when, you know, the fans loved the brand, you know, with Brock and Ed
• 47:12
  and what have you, we thought, well, you know, we would love to have a piece of that back.
• 47:19
  But typical LP, you know, he and Tom...
• 47:25
  He and Tom didn't see eye to eye many times and obviously the 88 Bathurst didn't help that when we were, Denny and LP were miles out in front and because Tom's, the secret women from England was a secret shitbox.
• 47:45
  And Tom, at the end of the race when he knew we were miles in front and got a win, wanted to hop in the car and...
• 47:54
  Contractually, you know, the arguments were on but it had to happen and it's obvious history.
• 48:01
  You know, Tom hopped in the car and we used to run what we called the 1103.
• 48:07
  Everyone used to run the Mickey Mouse, whatever the pageant or whatever brand pad, but LP had the, it was 1103, it was a really hard compound.
• 48:21
  pad but it meant that we didn't have to do a pad change so it went for a thousand k and but but you know you had to drive it accordingly it was very hard it was very hard to stop the car because they didn't have a lot of co-coa friction yep you know thus lasting instead of wearing it yep
• 48:41
  So Tom just to stop, I remember him hearing on the radio to, he's got, because his guy jumped in, can't think of his name now, Pommy Guy, and obviously he was screaming and yelling that he couldn't pull the car up, so he was going down, you know,
• 49:00
  that forest elbow, he was going down two and three gears at once and dropping the clutch and you imagine the old engine.
• 49:09
  So, yeah, that ended that and that was, I remember I, you know, LP had the shits obviously and so did we.
• 49:19
  You know, we always backed LP because, you know, he was our boss and the team owner.
• 49:25
  And at the end of 88, I said to LP, I want to travel overseas on a motorbike.
• 49:36
  I've wanted to do it for years when I was a young bloke and I had a mate and it never, ever happened.
• 49:42
  He said, all right, I said, I'm going to have to leave because, you know, it's going to be six months.
• 49:47
  So, all righty-o.
• 49:48
  So I left.
• 49:52
  I left and we did the whole Europe on a, bought a BMW motorbike, my wife, the first wife.
• 49:59
  did the lap of Europe and had a great time.
• 50:02
  Anyway, we finished up in England because I, one of the guys I'd worked with at Fitzpatrick's who was working on the Skull Banner cars, we become really good mates and I was sort of basing myself out of his place when we were, when we ventured.
• 50:18
  So we went down south into right down.
• 50:21
  I wanted to go to Anzac Cove because my grandfather was in the English Merchant Navy there.
• 50:28
  So when we got back to England, just before we'd come home, they ended up saying, why don't you come down to Kiddlington?
• 50:36
  And I was a bit uneasy because of what happened at the 88 Bathurst thing because we all let everyone know we had the shits about the, you know, the secret shitbox that come over and, you know, the diff fell out of it and all that sort of stuff.
• 50:50
  But anyway, I went down as courtesy and met a few of the guys that had come over and...
• 50:57
  Anyway, Kenny Page it was.
• 50:59
  Kenny Page was the team manager and he said, oh, you'll be running late to get back to Australia.
• 51:05
  And I said, what do you mean?
• 51:06
  He said, oh, LP's done a deal with Tom to run the long distance races.
• 51:12
  I said, what?
• 51:13
  I couldn't believe it.
• 51:15
  So it was gonna be Wynn, Percy, Wynn and Neil cropped it, and LP and Thomas, Nazira.
• 51:26
  So I didn't, we just got back in our own time.
• 51:29
  Anyway, when we locked up our house and I had Mahali and everything over at mum and dad's place and so we got back, got up, you know, greeted the family or families.
• 51:47
  Anyway, I went over to pick Mahali up and dad said, look, LP's been trying to get old here, you know, on the house phone.
• 51:52
  I said, oh.
• 51:54
  Yeah, okay.
• 51:55
  So anyway, I rang and, yeah, cock, get in your ute and come down.
• 52:01
  We've got to get ready.
• 52:03
  And I'd missed Sandown.
• 52:05
  I'd missed Sandown.
• 52:06
  So anyway, I said, all right.
• 52:09
  So I took the toolbox down and basically started back there again and went up to Bathurst.
• 52:15
  And it was a, yeah, it was just a nightmare.
• 52:19
  It was the whole, the whole time and...
• 52:24
  LP thing just didn't work, which is a shame because I thought, I did go up because I thought, well, you never know, it might turn around and LP does get the gig.
• 52:35
  But that was the last straw as far as Tom was concerned and that's when they started HRT in-house.
• 52:45
  Yeah.
• 52:45
  So fast forward to your post or toward the end of your Nissan chapter, John Crennan gets in contact with you.
• 52:54
  I think you were at Lakeside, weren't you, when the chat?
• 52:56
  Yeah, no, we were at Lakeside and we just bumped into each other.
• 53:00
  And he said, oh, what are you up to?
• 53:01
  And I said, oh, you know.
• 53:02
  At that stage, we were running Commodores.
• 53:05
  We'd gone, the Nissan thing had ended, you know, started in the, what was the original supercar period start.
• 53:12
  And...
• 53:15
  He said, you know, are you happy where you are?
• 53:18
  And I said, oh, look, I love the Nissen thing.
• 53:21
  I said, but, you know, what are you getting at, John?
• 53:24
  He said, oh, there might be something coming up.
• 53:26
  So I said, oh, okay.
• 53:28
  Anyway, long story short, Neil Lowe got in touch with me and said, look, do you want to be workshop manager?
• 53:35
  So I said, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 53:36
  So we talked about it and I ended up going there.
• 53:40
  At that stage, I was seriously thinking of doing something else out of racing.
• 53:46
  I thought maybe it's worth, because, you know, we were thinking about having a family and all that sort of thing and what have you.
• 53:56
  Anyway, I took up the offer and went down and straight up, that was when Wayne Gardner was,
• 54:04
  the driver and Thomas, and I think Thomas had some instigation in getting me there.
• 54:11
  And anyway, there was a lot of taps on the shoulder and I got –
• 54:19
  what was the real story, which I won't go into, but it was, wow.
• 54:24
  And the deal was, take the workshop manager thing, but just be patient because there might be another change.
• 54:31
  And I'm thinking, oh, no.
• 54:32
  Anyway, it happened.
• 54:36
  There was a couple of race meetings and then...
• 54:40
  I'd bought over Matthew Crawford it was from Nissan he'd come and a couple of Andy Coucher a few guys so anyway we were Phillip Island testing and it was a two day test so Neil was down for the first day and then I drove home because I obviously lived at Mount Martha then and I got the call from John and Thomas and
• 55:09
  yeah, go down and run the second day because Neil Lowe won't be there.
• 55:15
  So we obviously had a bit of a briefing and the cars were in a – the cars in the engineering – and this is my opinion.
• 55:25
  I mean, other people that were there might –
• 55:28
  might have different thoughts.
• 55:31
  But they were very fragile, if I can put that nicely, and high maintenance.
• 55:38
  So Thomas really was the instigator, I guess, with –
• 55:44
  with John.
• 55:45
  And so initially it was Thomas to be team manager and then we got Ronnie Harrop to come on board as a consultant engineer and I was a facilitator.
• 55:59
  So we basically had round table, cleaned out the cars,
• 56:06
  in componentry and then start introducing stuff that we knew would last and be competitive and what have you.
• 56:13
  So that went on for a while.
• 56:15
  And then obviously once we got under control with that, Thomas stepped back as a team manager and I took over as team manager.
• 56:23
  And that's how it all started.
• 56:28
  They were tough early years, I know, but then the mix happened.
• 56:32
  Was right, Jeff.
• 56:33
  And Aaron Noonan will correct me if I'm wrong here, but is it six championships, four great race wins in your time there?
• 56:41
  I mean, just mega.
• 56:44
  Fans will want to know which title and which Bathurst are the ones that resonate for you from that chapter, that part.
• 56:51
  I guess there's three parts to it.
• 56:55
  And John used to have offsite meetings.
• 56:59
  So there'd be myself, John, Ronnie Harrop, a couple of Chris Dyer then as well.
• 57:06
  Who went to work for Ferrari?
• 57:07
  Yep.
• 57:08
  Yeah, went to work and obviously was part of Michael Shoemaker's magnificent run and myself.
• 57:16
  John was a stickler for a five-year plan.
• 57:20
  And then when you dropped off a couple of years, then you went in.
• 57:23
  And John was really good at – he didn't want to know about the nuts and bolts.
• 57:29
  All he wanted to know was the business.
• 57:32
  It run right.
• 57:33
  It was successful.
• 57:35
  And, you know, we got the right people in the right place.
• 57:39
  in the right places.
• 57:40
  So it did, I've got to say, I was young and I know John, I know Tom and other people in the industry, both here and England were probably a bit sceptical about me being team manager, I was young.
• 58:00
  But John always had my back and he supported me and I'll never forget him for that.
• 58:06
  But in early days we cut ourselves a lot walking over broken glass and a lot of that was me.
• 58:14
  But I guess...
• 58:16
  Probably the key moments were getting Peter back into the factory team.
• 58:23
  Mm-hmm.
• 58:24
  That was obviously key.
• 58:27
  And as soon as Peter come back in, we become, the black cloud moved away and we become the factory racing team with all the fans and the whole bit that went with it, which was great, you know, people...
• 58:44
  and people acknowledge that when we're away.
• 58:46
  The Brock effect, yeah.
• 58:48
  It was, it was.
• 58:49
  And mate, you couldn't fault him for that.
• 58:52
  He was just, he was a consummate professional.
• 58:55
  The second one was having Craig come on as a young bloke.
• 59:01
  And again, it was the Jim Richards, Mark Scaife thing, which I saw, and we replicated with Peter and Craig.
• 59:13
  So the best Bathurst win was no doubtedly 96, you know, for a lot of reasons, and, you know, I've said that before, but 96 was...
• 59:25
  You know, 95, we had a massive problem with engines and not with the engine guys.
• 59:34
  They were ripper guys, but we had a component failure that just happened to be on both engines.
• 59:39
  So, and we nearly lost the factory deal.
• 59:43
  We nearly lost the factory deal.
• 59:45
  Wow.
• 59:45
  It was, as a matter of fact, there was drawings and probably John would have them where it was going to go back to,
• 59:52
  A HS1 car and it was going to be the silk cut colours.
• 59:57
  It wasn't silk cut, but it was serious.
• 1:00:01
  And look, 85, I had a long, I had a chat to Credo and said, look, John, it was my fault, maybe I should leave.
• 1:00:11
  And he said, no, no, no, no.
• 1:00:13
  He said, you're not going to do that.
• 1:00:14
  You're going to stand up and correct it.
• 1:00:19
  So we did.
• 1:00:21
  And it was a big year because we had to move.
• 1:00:23
  We moved out of Notting Hill down to the Nissan plant down at Centre Road.
• 1:00:30
  So massive Christmas.
• 1:00:33
  met two new car builds, which were, as you know, the old Pedibar cars, which Benny Eccleston owns actually.
• 1:00:44
  So, and they were like the old Group C cars.
• 1:00:46
  You know, they were always been our memory for ages.
• 1:00:51
  That paint scheme, believe it or not, was invented out on the wash with cans of blue paint and we'd wipe lines and we ended up getting something that looked
• 1:01:03
  presentable and that's how they were painted.
• 1:01:06
  That's fantastic.
• 1:01:07
  Not with the cans of paint, mind you, but we just got the theme right.
• 1:01:12
  And, yeah, so that was a special year.
• 1:01:15
  That was really special in my book to have Craig and Greg, you know, Greg come on board also as a young guy.
• 1:01:24
  I mean, he was driving with BJR then, but, you know, the two-litre thing wasn't...
• 1:01:31
  wasn't recognised by the fan base, but when he hopped in with Craig and they – and Craig had a stellar year, and so did Peter.
• 1:01:40
  You know, Peter won – Peter was – he'd won a couple of races as well, but we were just bang.
• 1:01:46
  You know, it was there and then.
• 1:01:48
  But it all come down – we just had a –
• 1:01:51
  I attribute all that to the guys we had on the team, absolutely.
• 1:01:54
  You know, they were just, everyone worked together.
• 1:01:57
  It was like, it was like probably what a Richmond and Port Adelaide are now or Team New Zealand, you know, it was just a magical time to have all the guys and all pulling the one way.
• 1:02:11
  And we had John as our boss who was just there for everyone.
• 1:02:16
  So it was great.
• 1:02:22
  Most of you will know he's talking about Craig Lowndes and Greg Murphy there and a magic year in 1996.
• 1:02:29
  That's the end of part one of my podcast with Jeff Gregg, who is up for a chat.
• 1:02:33
  There is lots of gold still to come.
• 1:02:36
  Don't miss part two.
• 1:02:37
  Head back to the Rusty's Garage Library and hit the start button as we cover more on that unforgettable period with the Holden Racing Team.
• 1:02:46
  Our time helped heal a wound with one of the greats.
• 1:02:48
  They're back on speaking terms now, which is good.
• 1:02:51
  His friendship with Barry Sheen, plus an innovation that HRT did their best to keep secret in the engineering race to remain number one.