Look, I don’t mind admitting that – when I first heard about the idea – I had some misgivings about former Kiwi Supercars ace and now fellow media pundit Greg Murphy’s joint ‘return’ to Australia’s ‘Great Race’ (the now Repco-sponsored Bathurst 1000) this year alongside (the much younger – and ‘more recently retired’ – Richie Stanaway.
Not because there was even a shred of doubt in my mind that the (just turned) 49-year-old from Havelock North in Hawke’s Bay would not absolutely be ‘up-for-the challenge.’
Or, that the deal put together by US-based Aussie businessman Peter Adderton, was in any way left wanting.
It was Adderton, the brains behind the Boost Mobile brand, after-all who came up with the idea of a Stanaway/Murphy ‘wildcard’ in the first place.
If you look, too, at the pace Erebus drivers Will Brown and Brodie Kostecki have shown at the three pre-Bathurst rounds of the Repco Supercars Championship held so far at Sydney’s Eastern Cr…..(sorry, that should read ‘Sydney Motorsport Park’) I have absolutely no doubt that Bettie Klimenko’s Erebus team were going to provide Murphy and Stanaway with a car with genuine race-winning potential.
No. My reservations were on a more esoteric level; to whit that no matter how appealing it might ‘seem’ to return to part of a life ‘lived before,’ time, people, places etc. change, and little or no good can come from such a move.
So, first and foremost, as a big fan of the bloke we all know fondly as ‘Murph,’, as well as both an acquaintance and now ‘fellow media brother’ I have to admit to a certain feeling of relief when the Erebus team put out a press release last Friday confirming what most of us still locked up in the Republic of Auckland had suspected for at least a couple of weeks;……that because neither Murphy nor Stanaway had been able to acquire MIQ spots via the NZ Government’s MIQ lottery for the trip home after ‘The Great Race’ the entry was officially scratched, for this year’s already delayed Bathurst 1000 at least.
In saying that all parties involved stated that they were still 100 % committed to the idea, Murph in fact commenting that ‘I hope we can repay the faith and the support of racing fans by looking ahead to 2022.’
“I can’t explain how frustrating it has been not being able to put our plan into action,” Murphy said on Friday.” I know that COVID has impacted so many people in far more serious ways, but Richie and I…… have played by the same rules as every other person trying to get a spot in MIQ.
“It’s a lottery, though, and our numbers simply haven’t come up.”
While it would appear to be early days yet – particularly with wholesale changes to the current MIQ system, not to mention the Lockdown system and Kiwis’ ability to travel (domestically at least) pending – the decision to scratch the Murphy/Stanaway wild card entry had to be made at this time for several reasons.
There was the all-important seat fitting and first chance for either driver to actually drive the car due to happen today (Tuesday Nov 16) at Sydney Motorsport Park.
Then there would – I imagine – be a whole heap of media and PR opportunities put together by Boost for the two high profile Kiwi drivers in the build-up to the Dec-04-05 race weekend.
I know from talking with my colleagues in the Aussie motorsport media that – to a man and a woman – they love crossing the Tasman for the NZ round of the annual Supercars series. I also know from attending rounds and going out and mixing with ‘the fans’ up on the ‘Mountain’ at Bathurst, in the grandstand opposite the pits at Sydney Motorsport Park and on the grassy bank at the south-eastern end of the Winton circuit in rural Victoria, that Kiwis like Murph, SVG, Scottie McLaughlin, Fabian Coulthard, Andre Heimgartner and Richie Stanaway are generally held in very high esteem by the vast majority of fans, with none of the petty sort of ‘why don’t you piss off back to Kiwi-land where you belong’ BS you might imagine would come from some quarters particularly in the wake of all the high-profile 501 ‘repatriations’ of Kiwi-born criminals the Federal Government has subjected us to of late.
On the contrary, whenever I’ve been ‘outed’ as a Kiwi at an Aussie round of the now Repco-backed ‘Australian Supercars Championship, the response has always been the same…..there’s been genuine interest in ‘what’s in the water over there’ that produces such great all-rounders (not to mention ambassadors) as Jim and son Steve Richards, Murph, Craig Baird, Shane Van Gisbergen and Scott McLaughlin, and whether or not I might know ‘so-and-so’ who works at the mill/brickworks/local power or lines operation ‘who’s a Kiwi!’
Incredibly, the last time I had a conversation like this it turned out that I did in fact know the ‘great young bloke’ the lady I was talking to mentioned. He was one of the legions of young drifters I had got to know (if not by name at least by car and/or driving style/attitude etc) at Taupo and Hampton Downs before he headed to Aussie, and when I asked her to remember me to him the next time they spoke, I think I made her day!
Murph of course falls into another category altogether. Particularly at Bathurst where he is revered as a ‘four-time winner’ and for ‘that lap,’ his epic 2:06.859 ‘Lap of The Gods’ set (way) back in 2003.
When I was editing the motorcycle magazine back at this time, the bike industry (such as it was) found it easier and no doubt much more cost-effective to fly me to and from Australia for its various new model launches so for several years I was a regular trans-Tasman commuter – as (or so it turned out) was Greg Murphy.
Murph, wife Monique and kids Ronan, Neve and Cormac still lived in Melbourne at that stage, yet chances are each time I’d rock up to Melbourne International Airport for the (very) early ‘red-eye’ back ‘home,’ there Murph would be in the queue either just in front or just behind me.
I remember at the time mentioning this to the late Jason Richards, who immediately agreed that Murph was ‘one of the hardest workers in show business’ and was apparently, setting himself up for life ‘AD’ (i.e., life After Driving).
These were days well before even Murph’ earliest forays into paid promotional work with the likes (I think) of the Motor Trade Association, and also many moons before his commentary work with the Supercars TV squad and local role with Sky TV’s weekly motorsport show Sky Speed.
Until Murph made the effort, in fact, the general consensus amongst the production houses which seemed to have a stranglehold on the making or any sort of motoring or even motoring-related TV shows here, appeared to think so little of their target audience that they’d give the presenting gig to a professional broadcaster with as much interest and passion for the subject as his bloody ever-present Labrador dog, Dexter(Mark Leishman) or some Citroen-loving architect from Wellington who no one (outside his own esoteric little world obviously) had ever heard of!
To be fair it was the Grand Dame of NZ’s then fledgling private TV production house industry, Julie Christie (DNZM), who eventually changed things up in the sector, giving Aussie motorsport icon Peter Brock his long-form TV break on TV3’s Police Stop show between 1996 & 1998 and TVNZ’s short-lived Love That Car show in 2000.
Ironically, it was all the MCing and ‘front-manning’ work Greg Murphy did behind the scenes in the years I used to see him at an airport either here or the other side of the Tasman which helped him make his own break into the media – first as a pit reporter for the Supercars Series’ own TV production house alongside long-time former on-track sparring partner Mark Skaife and fellow former drivers Neill Crompton and former driver & team owner Mark Larkham.
That ‘gig’ which saw him return to a punishing trans-Tasman flight schedule, in turn segwayed into a gig co-presenting Sky TV’s excellent locally produced weekly motorsport show – Sky Speed – with Stephen McIvor –- a lucky break as it has turned out because with the borders between the two countries effectively shut since the early months of 2020 thanks to the ravages of the COVID-19 Coronavirus Murphy has effectively been grounded here in NZ for the past 20 months.
Which – and here comes another healthy dose of irony – brings me neatly back to the first paragraph of this week’s column, and about the misgivings I originally had about the whole Murphy/Stanaway/Boost/Repco Bathurst 1000 gig going ahead – this year at least..
Seat time and with it, confidence in your car are both key ingredients to a successful race AND finish at Bathurst.
In previous years, for instance, co-drivers regularly got the chance to ‘get into the swing of things’ with a pre-Bathurst 1000 mini enduro meeting at Sandown in suburban Melbourne or at the magnificent Phillip Island circuit a couple of hours further south.
It was at Sandown, for instance that young Richie (Stanaway) caught the eye of the Supercars establishment with a win (from pole no less) in the Pirtek Enduro Cup race behind the wheel of the Tickford Ford Falcon he was sharing with the team’s other young gun, Aussie star-on-the rise, Cam Waters.
So, if they are – simply – going to push their wildcard entry out a year – to the hopefully less COVID-19 affected 2022 version of the Repco-backed ‘Great Race’ I’d like to see Erebus run each driver as a wildcard at at least one of the sprint rounds, and together at whatever enduro round (if any) is planned before the big Bathurst 1000 km race.
I have to say too, that the thought of being there next October when Greg Murphy leaves the Erebus pit for the first time and heads off out onto the circuit many fans still consider ‘his’ thanks to a singular lap of driving brilliance 19 years ago is sending goose bumps up and down my legs and forearms even now.
So, my attitude now is, ‘bugger the misgivings, If it’s good enough for Murf to agree to get in the car and drive the wheels off it, then it’s good enough for me to keep any remaining misgivings I might still have to myself!
Sure, it’s a shame we are all going to have to wait another 11 months to see it. But that just gives Peter Adderton’s Boost Mobile marketers to come up with some cutting-edge YouTube content to keep us fans engaged.
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