Travelling around Australia within a fortnight is an amazing achievement in a four-wheel-drive, let alone a family sedan, but Peter Brock was at the peak of his powers as he embarked on what he regarded as his greatest victory.
An entry of 167 took on the 1979 Repco Reliability Trial encompassing some of the toughest roads across the country and a hot field of drivers. Starting at the Melbourne Showgrounds on August 5, the trial headed north and went in a clockwise direction around the country returning 14 days later.
Holden Dealer Team boss John Sheppard had attempted to talk Brock out of competing after a taxing Australian Touring Car Championship campaign where he narrowly lost to privateer Bob Morris.
The two other HDT Commodores were more highly rated led by Barry Ferguson, Wayne Bell and Dave Bodie in #17. Internationals Shekhar Mehta and Rauno Aaltonen had local motoring journalist Barry Lake calling the shots to cap off a solid team of two Commodores without mentioning the third.
Brock was partnered with experienced navigator Noel Richard and HDT mechanic Matt Philip in a third Commodore deemed nothing more than a publicity stunt. How much these doubters were proved wrong after the 20,000km event.
Rivals were led by a Ford effort using its midsized Cortina featuring the best rally drivers in Australia leading all three entries headlined by Colin Bond, George Fury and Greg Carr. This effort proved disappointing due to a lack of time to prepare as Ford committed late to the project spearheaded by Bond.
Volvo fielded an entry spearheaded by rally champion Ross Dunkerton in addition to Audi, Porsche, Peugeot, Subaru, Citroen and even a Chevy Blazer being entered as part of the trial catering to two-wheel-drive variants only.
Holden’s planning had started a year prior under the stewardship of George Shepheard, a HDT stalwart behind the scenes and a co-driver during the early-1970s.
For the first time, Holden’s main family model was to be based on the Opel offering in Europe and durability had been cause for concern during testing. Also, significantly smaller than its HZ predecessor was failing to convert the market, so the timing of this event came at a pivotal stage. The Commodores were all six-cylinder offerings and the HDT worked like clockwork to repair the entries travelling via aeroplane to many service stops.
Privateer rally ace Geoff Portman led the early running in his Datsun Stanza, but it soon emerged the three Holden Commodores were the ones to beat.
It wasn’t until late in the trial when Brock took the lead as he battled Ferguson until crossing into the snow of southern New South Wales.
Much fanfare occurred at the Melbourne Showgrounds as just 13 of the crews finished the event. Brock was immensely tired due to the cut and thrust of the event, where rest stops were few as the pace was breakneck.
Brock later won the 1980 ATCC and Bathurst 1000 in a Commodore to quell any misconceptions of the model’s durability.
Check out the documentary below hosted by ABC’s Drew Morphett, which provides terrific insight of the event.
Make sure to check out the Peter Brock Trophy competition on the Repco Garage, the Tour and sign up to not miss any of the content placed here.