African Muscle Cars - Forum

Has anyone got a special race meeting they attended which has left an impression on them? Why not share our experiences?

The 1st national meeting at Killarney in 1968.

We all remember the day. The Gough vs Van Rooyen fued. when the cars touched exiting Hoals and the van Rooyen GTA spun.

I still maintain that was the start of "full contact" saloon car racing in S A

Jim Redman at Killarney in the early 60's on a Honda 250 6.
Not because anything spectacular happened, except that the "6" was there, but it was an early introduction to motor racing. I remember a rabbit running across the track in front of Redman and him braking to avoid it.

Sorry not a car one but still the most amazing thing I've seen on a race track was at Snetterton in Norfolk.
Trevor Nation and I think it was Steve Spray,late eightees around '88.On the JPS Nortons.
Coming up the main straight together passing everything and then when they backed off for the right hander huge flames shooting out the pipes

Think it was early 90's @ Killarney Wesbanks...the second heat was posponed till the end of the day to allow Willie Hepburn fix the SABAT Rekord (the one with the very ferocious Nascar motor)....after the start (on lap 1) they entered Malmesbury corner as follows... Moss,Aberdien and about a car length behind Hepburn.....Hepburn went off the track with all 4 wheels on the outside about 1/2 round the corner...there were 2 huge wheelspin gravel bows while he was totally opposite lock, as he rejoined the tar he was still the same car length behind the 2nd Audi!!! to this day it is still something that completely blows my mind!!!

Much more recent and my kids reminded me of it.

What about the Truck Racing day at Killarney. What a success and probably the biggest crowd I have seen there. Why on earth don't the organisers do that again?

Sat at Malmesbury that day.... still remeber the vapour from the brakes... looked as if the truck were overheating... Tschops did a few doughnuts, smoke all over, till the wheels popped. I don't think I have ever seen Killarney as packed as on that day..

I heard that truck racing is no longer seen in Europe as well ... might have been stopped???

A few pics on Moby's site.

That's possible Wing. It was often on TV and now there is nothing. Maybe it is environmental issues over there.

Yes I remember them popping tyres up at Quarry

I remember when Peter Gough took over the Swanepoel Lotus Cortina and we were all there to support him in his first race against Basil Van Rooyen driving the Superformance Mustang. His times were very close to VR's in practice. When the flag dropped Gough outdragged VR to Hoals and started pulling out a lead. Everyone was going mad. Unforunately he was obviously pushing the Cortina to it's limit and he lost it in Hoals on about the 5th lap. That was it. VR had a smoke and a cup of tea for the rest of it.

Most recent, and personal. February at Killarney - we spent about 6 hours getting Eddie Perk's Lehman's Twin Cam to work. Mystery - it would turn about 355 degrees the hit something - much head scratching - eventually it turned out to be a stuck bucket follower.

Got it buttoned up just in time for the last race. Eddie went out, pulled a fast lap, then faster one, then a slow one arguing with a Dart, then even faster, and faster, and another tenth better - then went missing - rod through the block!

Ah the lows and highs and lows. First time I had been involved in the pits in almost 40 years - previous time was as a laatjie with Jack Holme's B8 at a 3 hour at Hesketh.

This is where you see the cameraderie - people we had never met helped us with a leak down tester, and someone else with a dial gauge. Henry K was a great organiser. And before we were finished packing Henry and Craig arrived with an AX block for the rebuild back in the UK.