From the years 1960 to 1968, the Australian Touring Car Championship was decided by a single race, rather than a series of races hosted by several tracks. Touring car racing was rapidly growing in stature and popularity in Australia. Evolving from a novelty to keep punters entertained in between the open wheeler races, which were the main draw-card, so touring car racing quickly grew into something that could stand on its own.
The location for each years Australian Touring Car Championship race changed. In 1960, the first ever ATCC was held at the New South Wales venue Gnoo Blas. A fairly basic layout in a rough triangle shape with very long straights, the lengthy 6.03km circuit favoured the Jaguars, which completely dominated the 75km event, with David McKay heading home Bill Pitt and Ron Hodgson, who were all Jaguar mounted.
For 1961, the ATCC moved to the 4.54km Lowood circuit in Queensland, and again Jaguars filled the top three positions, with Pitt leading pole sitter Ian ‘Pete’ Geoghegan, and Hodgson. The race length was just over 81km. Jaguars filled the top five grid positions, and the fastest non-Jag was the Holden FJ of Bob Holden, a full 17.6sec off Geoghegans pole time!
The massive 7.24km (of which more than half were public roads) Longford circuit in Tasmania hosted the 1962 ATCC, and again Jaguars dominated the results, with Bob Jane beating Pitt and Bill Burns. In fact, Jane had annihilated the opposition, which should have featured strong performances from both Geoghegan and Norm Beechey. Beechey had imported a big Chevy Impala from the US, cleverly identifying this as a weapon that might finally have the muscle to take on the Jag’s. But the Impala was a no-show at Longford. Geoghegans very quick Jaguar suffered axle failure in practice and was withdrawn from the race.
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