71 replies to this topic

[GTRXU1]

Harry signed many things...

 

 

Edited by GTRXU1, 28 April 2014 - 07:36 PM.

[N/A-PWR]

I say, Harry gave her options

[to fly]

96 yrs old,  like a well planned and executed race, RIP Harry ,met him several times and loved to hear him tell his stories.

[Dodgey]

He also pedalled his super-charged MG Special pretty hard in Historic events. This is from January 1979 Amaroo Park Historic meeting.

 

RIP Harry

 

 

Attached Files

•  SCAN0077.JPG   163.49K   1 downloads

[N/A-PWR]

I wonder what Monument Harry Should Have

or Harry and Brocky shaking hands

anyone got a picture

 

Edited by TORYPOWER, 29 April 2014 - 09:04 PM.

[sagman]

Very sad that a true Legend has gone , thanks for signing old 'Saggy Sarah '  ..... promise i will look after her and keep it just how you would have , no show pony ......  lol

 

 Thanks for your understanding and words when Daryl departed us , it helped me a lot at a difficult time ....... i won't ever forget that ....

 

 Thanks for the chats and the phone calls ...... RIP  Legend ......

 

 Laz

[Pop's-SS]

Thanks Macca97

 

Harry Firth paved the way for modern race teams

Date April 29, 2014 - 11:43PM

• Read later

Mark Fogarty

 

 

Read more: http://www.smh.com.a...l#ixzz30KOb9JnE

 

Australian motor sport legend Harry Firth was an innovator and iconoclast who paved the way for modern race teams.

It was nearly 50 years ago that Firth, who died at the age of 96 on Saturday after a battle with cancer, established the first factory-backed squads that have remained the basic model for leading touring car teams in Australia.

 

As well as a visionary team boss, he was a champion race and rally driver whose skill behind the wheel matched his prowess in the pit lane.

 

Firth also gave the late Peter Brock his big break and mentored the early development of the gifted young tear-away who would become one of Australia’s all-time great racing drivers.

 

The Ford and Holden-supported teams in V8 Supercars owe their existence to the wily driver-turned-manager known as ''The Fox'', a sobriquet that acknowledged his cunning exploitation of the rulebook.

Ford Performance Racing and Holden Racing Team both trace their roots to operations Firth established in the mid-to-late 1960s.

He ran the Ford factory race and rally teams from 1961-68 before defecting to arch-rival General Motors in '69 to set up the Holden Dealer Team, which he ran for nine years from a small garage in the back streets of Hawthorn.

HDT was presented as being financed by dealers to get around GM's worldwide ban on factory-funded racing teams at the time, but behind the flimsy facade it was fully supported by Holden.

 

With additional sponsor backing and slick presentation, HRT under Firth established the commercial and organisational template that still underpins the structure – on a larger scale – of V8 Supercars teams today.

Firth's influence on the sport over three decades was far-reaching and continued well after he retired from team management at the end of 1977.

 

He did things his way, and his methods were groundbreaking and unorthodox, pioneering meticulous preparation and painstaking development.

 

Notoriously blunt and fearless in his appraisals, he was equally unrepentant about using loopholes in the rules to gain an advantage.

As the early motor sport mastermind of both Ford and Holden, Firth also had a seminal role in Australian motoring history, developing some of the most iconic high-performance versions of family road cars.

Back in the '60s and '70s, the annual Bathurst endurance race was for production cars and later production-based machines, spawning a legendary era of racing-bred specials to comply with the "showroom stock" rules.

Firth oversaw the development of several legendary Australian performance cars, most notably the original Ford Falcon GT and the hottest Holden Torana XU-1, L34 and A9X models.

 

Before he switched to full-time team management in the late '60s, he was among Australia's leading race and rally drivers.

Firth partnered Bob Jane to victory in the predecessor to the Bathurst 500/1000, the Phillip Island 500, in 1961 and '62, then won again with Jane when the event moved to Mount Panorama in '63.

 

Firth scored further Bathurst 500 wins in '64 and '67 before masterminding Holden successes in the Mountain classic in '69 and '72.

He gave Brock his first start at Bathurst in '69, with the youngster's promise immediately apparent with his debut third-place finish.

 

Firth's autocratic approach tamed Brock, and instilled in him the smooth speed and mechanical sympathy that served the charismatic driver so well in his long reign as the nation's most popular racer.

 

While he secured several Australian touring car and rally championships for HDT, Firth's crowning achievement as a team chief was in the 1968 London-Sydney Marathon, a gruelling event of unprecedented length and difficulty.

Against leading European rally outfits, his three-car team of Falcon GTs won the teams' prize, led by Firth himself as a member of the driving crew in the entry that finished third outright.

 

Firth was a highly significant figure in the development of Australian motor sport over three decades and his contribution on and off the track earned him many awards and decorations.

 

Perhaps the most defining acknowledgement, though, was his induction into the V8 Supercars Hall of Fame in 2007, recognising the profound role that The Fox played in shaping modern touring car racing in Australia.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/sport/motorsport/harry-firth-paved-the-way-for-modern-race-teams-20140429-zr1ew.html#ixzz30KNqen11

 

Well said

 

Barry

Edited by Pop's-SS, 30 April 2014 - 11:30 AM.

[rodomo]

Hey Tim? Who was the bloke in the Dustings Motor Sport jacket?

[rodomo]

Goes for 25mins but worth it. Harry giving "lip service" (http://www.urbandict...erm=lip service) regarding HDT being factory backed.............no wonder they called him the FOX!