Holden VK Commodore 1985 Bathurst

The 1985 James Hardie 1000 was the 26th running of the Bathurst 1000 Touring Car Race. It was held on October 6 at the Mount Panorama Circuit. This was the first time Australian touring car racing had run under International Group A regulations, rather than the indigenous Group C regulations that had been in force since 1973.
The 163 lap, 1000km race, heralded a new era of touring car motorsport in Australia. There would be 62 entries accepted from the multi-national field of drivers featured throughout the Class A, Class B and Class C groups. Peter Brock and little known Kiwi co-driver David Oxton, arrived at Bathurst with their Class C Holden VK Commodore. Their Class C rivals included the might of the big V12 Jaguar XJS cars, the V8 Ford Mustangs, Rover Vitesses and the BMW 635CSi. With the likes of John Goss and Tom Walkinshaw piloting the Jaguars, Dick Johnson and Larry Perkins at the wheel of the Mustang and Jim Richards and Tony Longhurst partnering up in the BMW; the Commodores seemed to be an outside chance of winning at best.
Qualifying saw Brock and Oxton place themselves in 11th position on the grid with a time of 2:23.018. The Tom Walkinshaw and Win Percy Jaguar took pole with a blistering qualifying time of 2:18.822 ahead of Jeff Allam and Ron Dickson also in a XJS Jaguar. It would be a long, hard road ahead for the 05 Commodore to weave its way through the 51 starting entries and overcome the clearly dominant Jaguars and BMWs.
The 1985 James Hardie 1000 was not to be one of Brock's nine Bathurst victories. However, the hard-charging Brock, whose progress had twice been interrupted by pit stops to remove a broken front windscreen and later to dislodge the rear window, was steadily making inroads on the leading John Goss Jaguar XJ-S, who had qualified five grid positions ahead in 6th place.
Despite only one win during the season, Brock nearly pulled off an upset podium, but his magnificent drive came to an end just three laps from the chequered flag, when a timing chain broke while running a strong second. Eventual winners, John Goss and Armin Hahne, in the JRA Ltd/Jaguar Racing XJS Jaguar, completed the total race distance of 163 laps in a time of 6:41:30.19 with the second place Gould Motorsport BMW driven by Roberto Ravaglia and Johnny Cecotto, crossing the line almost a full minute behind them.
The victorious Goss/Hahne Jaguar also produced the fastest lap of the race, covering the 6.172km circuit in 2:21.86 at an average speed of 156.63 km/h.
Only 23 cars managed to finish the 1000km race and 1985 turned out to be the worst Bathurst result for Holden in history.

Item includes certificate and production number plate, mounted to the chassis.