It's still a bit of a surprise to me that there has been no successor to Around the Houses written by some other motor racing history enthusiast. After all, that book concluded with the 1979 competition year, which is now a long time ago. It's not as though I have any exclusive rights to local racing history.
However, the re-issue of Around the Houses on CD-ROM last year inspired me enough to commit myself to doing the sequel. Provisionally entitled Around the Raceway, it will cover the history of motor racing during the Wanneroo Park (aka Barbagallo Raceway) era, that is, 1969 to date. It is going to be a horrendouly big job, even though racing has been largely confined to Wanneroo Park / Barbagallo Raceway, which opened in 1969.
The Size of the Task
There has been an enormous proliferation. The days when a turnout of 60 cars for a race meeting was considered good are long gone. Today, as many as 200 cars and drivers crowd the paddock. Similarly, the number of categories has expanded dramatically. In Around the Houses I could confine myself easily to just three - racing cars, sports cars and saloon cars - because these three were the only Western Australian Championship categories. Today the sedan car racing category alone is split into several sub-categories, each with their own championship: Street Cars, Saloon Cars, HQ Holdens, Historic Touring cars, Improved Production, and of course V8 Supercars. Sports cars have subdivided into Sports Cars, Marque Sports, Production Sports, and Sports Sedans, each with its own championship. And the former Racing Car category is now occupied by two classes at present, Formula Vee and Formula Ford, although others have come and gone. In the years since 1969, a number of other categories and race series have appeared and disappeared again.
My policy for driver profiles is that anybody who has managed to win a Championship, and anybody who has managed to win one of the big-ticket races such as a 300-km race (popular in the 1970s), deserves a profile. In addition there are "wild cards" - drivers and personalities are so conspicuous, or who are so persistent, or are so entertaining that to omit them would be to lose the flavour of the times. With all these many Championships, and with nearly forty years of racing, it means I have a very large number of people to track down. Possibly as many as 400. Each is to have a profile, some photos, and an achievements table.
Format
There is little doubt that I will have to publish it as a digital book - a website on a disc. As a printed book, it would run to 600 pages or more - and in colour. For a small market - maybe 500 people would really want it, if I am lucky - the cost of full-colour printing is out of the question for even the most optimistic (or craziest) publisher. To give a quick preview of the earliest stages of development, I have put a "dummy" of the contents page here. An example of the format of the biographic articles can be found here.
Championships
In the process of research, I have to reconstruct all the Championships from 1969 onwards, and this meant going through all the race results from 1969 onwards. The actual race results I have dug out do date can be found elsewhere on this site. So far, the reconstructed Championship lists are starting to look like this although there are still a lot of gaps to fill.
There are also a number of Championships or near-championships whose status I haven't clarified yet including Road Runners, and the series of historic races held in the mid-1980s.
To get an idea of the scale of the task, this is a very incomplete list of topics and people:
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Categories and Events |
People |
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300 km Races, 1970s-1990s Clubs |
Jim
Anderson Steve Armfield Denis Barbarich Alfa Barbagallo Steve Baxter Ross Bennett Bob Biltoft John Borich Frank Brennan Peter Brown Aaron Caratti Nathan Caratti George Cole Julian Cowan Bob Creasey Pud Collins Ian Diffen Rod Donovan Mark Douglas Jeff Dunkerton Cameron Edwards Dan Elliott Simon Emmerling Michael Epple Walter Epple Peter Finch Dean Fiore Paul Fiore Gary Francis Jaime Gard Peter Gidman Peter Gillon Claud Giorgi John Glasson Garry Gosatti Ray Hadlow John Hagarty Rob Hagarty Jez Hammond John Harken Clint Harvey Michael Henderson Tod Hill Trevor Hine Graeme Hooley |
Grant
Howlett John Hurney Bob Ilich Tony James Shane Jordan Paul Kelly Geoff Kendrick Bob Kingsbury Stuart Kostera Stuart Kostera Jr Kevin Ledger Steve Lee Anthony Lees Rod Lindau Ian Love Tony MacAlinden Peter McLean Craig McAllister Peter Mackenzie Robert Marcon Bill Meeks Mark Minshall Gordon Mitchell Noel Mitchell Rod Mitchell Ron Moller Luke Morton Jim Mullins Max McCrackan Christian Murchison Wayne Negus Geoff Nicol Bill Nitschke Don O'Sullivan Ashley O'Donnell Mark Pilatti Sean Phillips Wayne Phipps Neill Rear Steve Raisin |
Karl Reindler Lots more to be added as I continue to fill in the huge gaps in all my WA Championship charts!
(14 December 2006) |
Only on CD-ROM (or DVD-ROM)
The end product is likely to be the equivalent of a 500+ page book, with 2,000+ colour photos. And the market for such a book is small. Devout, but small. So it looks like it's going to have to be another E-book, or virtual website on a disc, probably DVD-ROM this time.
Because of the complexity of the categories and championships, it has taken me quite a while to establish a viable structure, but I think I've got it sorted now. However, I don't doubt that I will have to restructure the whole thing again when it's closer to completion.
At present my goal is to have it published well in time for the 40th anniversary of the opening of Wanneroo Park: March, 2009.