Heats
1988 Bathurst 
1987 Wellington  Go 1989 Wellington 
1988 Pukekohe 
Back to index page

Nissan Mobil 500 Wellington 1988

Wellington Street Circuit, New Zealand

Date: 24/10/1988
Track length: 3.228 m
Attendance: unknown
Entries accepted: unknown
Starters: 27
Finishers: 13

Pole position: Bowe in 1.29,75 = 129,52 kmh
Fastest lap: unknown

Distance: 500 km
Average speed: unknown
Weather: unknown
Ruleset: Group A
Car info: 1988 Cars

 

The rolling start was as bad as usual; the pace car merely crept, most cars had to enter first to get away decently; it was a sort of rolling standing start. The result was a big lead for Johnson (Sierra), who was followed by Percy (Holden), Perkins, Pirro, Soper and Allam. But Percy was clearly faster and took the lead in lap 2. Soper got by Johnson too, but was unable to keep up with Percy. Johnson came in on lap 8 with a misfire, while Pirro had a coming together with Perkins - the BMW was third, the Holden now fifth with suspicious handling.
First retirements came with Brock (M3) with drivetrain failure, and then the Sierras started to fail like in Bathurst. Bagnall and Simonsen came in for an extended service, and Soper retired with rear hub failure. The pace car interfered again, picking up poor Radisich, who lost half a lap. The restart, poor as the first one, sent Riley’s Holden into the wall while Pirro lost second to Allam, but the Italian fought back a few laps later - with the prospect of only a single pit stop he would get the lead, and it duly happened in lap 46 when Percy came in. After the stops, it was Pirro in the lead with 40 seconds over Bowkett (taken over from Percy), who was followed by Hulme (taken over from Perkins) and Wallace (replacing Allam).
Halfway through the race, Pirro finally pitted and gave over to Ravaglia without even losing the lead. He pulled still further away from Bowkett and Hulme, the M3 was one lap ahead after the second round of stops. The order now was Ravaglia, Perkins and Percy, and from behind the M3 of Crowe and Thatcher started to attack the men in front of them.
Percy came in on lap 122 with zero oil pressure - he was out, while Finauer crashed into the barriers after getting as high as third, while Noske came in to hand over to Brock, but an official informed him, that he was not entered on this second Mobil M3 and could not drive! Noske took off instead, but half a lap later the car retired anyway.
It was nearly over now, with Ravaglia leading over Perkins, Bond and Thatcher - though the last was promoted to third when Bond had to come in again.

Division 1, 2 and 3
Pos Pos in class # Team / Entrant
Car- Engine		 Drivers, Nationality Engine
vol. (cc)		 Engine
Type		 Group Distance,
time		 Qualifying position Qualifying time Fastest lap Reason out,
remarks
1 1 52 Schnitzer
BMW M3 Evo		 Roberto Ravaglia, I
Emanuele Pirro, I
 2332 L4 Div. 2 152 laps, 4:01.33,00 4 1.30,45    
2 1 10 TWR Holden Special Vehicles
Holden VL SS Commodore		 Larry Perkins, AUS
Denny Hulme, NZ
 4980 V8 Div. 3 151 3 1.30,44    
3 2 53 John Sax Racing
BMW M3		 Trevor Crowe, NZ
Mark Thatcher, GB
(Kayne Scott, NZ)
 2332 L4 Div. 2 146 15 1.35,81?    
4 2 4 Caltex CXT Race Team
Ford Sierra RS 500 Cosworth		 Colin Bond, AUS
Alan Jones, AUS
 1993 tc L4 Div. 3 146 12 1.32,46    
5 3   M Motorsport
Holden VL SS Commodore		 John Billington, NZ
Warren McKellar, NZ
 4980 V8 Div. 3 138 18 1.38,04    
6 4   McIntyre
BMW 635 CSi		 Glenn McIntyre, NZ
Avon Hyde, NZ
 3475 L6 Div. 3 135 17 1.37,09    
7 1   Slater
Toyota Corolla		 David Slater, NZ
Ross Heffernan, NZ
 1587 L4 Div. 1 134 20 1.41,91    
8 3 54 Sax/Cardinal
BMW M3		 John Sorenson, NZ
Kayne Scott, NZ
(Trevor Crowe, NZ)
 2332 L4 Div. 2 133 19 1.38,09    
9 2   Bate
Toyota Corolla		 Bryan Bate, NZ
Andrew Maher, NZ
 1587 L4 Div. 1 131 21 1.42,53    
10 3   Willy
Toyota Corolla		 Steve Willy, NZ
Graham McGregor, NZ
 1587 L4 Div. 1 128 23 1.46,07    
11 5 3 Yellow Pages Racing
Holden VL SS Commodore		 Peter McLeod, AUS
Glenn Clark, NZ
 4980 V8 Div. 3 123 16 1.36,50    
12 6 21 Team CMS Sweden
Ford Sierra RS 500 Cosworth		 Ulf Granberg, S
Ian "Inky" Tulloch, NZ
Christer Simonsen, S
 1993 tc L4 Div. 3 117 10 1.31,94    
NC 7 6 Blast Dynamics
Ford Sierra RS 500 Cosworth		 Andrew Miedecke, AUS
Steve Soper, GB
Andrew Bagnall, NZ
 1993 tc L4 Div. 3 96 7 1.31,31    
DNF   57 Mobil 1 Racing Team
BMW M3 Evo		 Neil Crompton, AUS
Tony Noske, AUS
 2332 L4 Div. 2 126 13 1.33,21   Computer
DNF   2 Roadways
Holden VL SS Commodore		 Win Percy, GB
Graeme Bowkett, NZ
 4980 V8 Div. 3 122 2 1.29,84   Oil pressure
DNF   17 Shell Ultra Hi Tech Racing Team
Ford Sierra RS 500 Cosworth		 Dick Johnson, AUS
John Bowe, AUS
 1993 tc L4 Div. 3 119 1 1.29,75   Engine
DNF   55 Bill Bryce Racing
BMW M3		 Paul Radisich, NZ
Ludwig Finauer, D
 2332 L4 Div. 2 117 11 1.32,24   Accident
DNF   11 TWR Holden Special Vehicles
Holden VL SS Commodore		 Andy Wallace, GB
Jeff Allam, GB
 4980 V8 Div. 3 75 6 1.30,92   Engine
DNF   8 Blast Dynamics
Ford Sierra RS 500 Cosworth		 Andrew Miedecke, AUS
Pierre Dieudonné, B
Andrew Bagnall, NZ
 1993 tc L4 Div. 3 56 5 1.30,84   Accident
DNF   45 Whittakers Peanut Slab/Mark Petch
Ford Sierra RS 500 Cosworth		 Armin Hahne, D
Robbie Francevic, NZ
 1993 tc L4 Div. 3 40 9 1.31,84   Engine
DNF      
Holden VL SS Commodore		 Brett Riley, NZ
Ed Lamont, NZ
 4980 V8 Div. 3 24 14 1.34,75   Accident
DNF   56 Mobil 1 Racing Team
BMW M3 Evo		 Peter Brock, AUS
Jim Richards, NZ
 2332 L4 Div. 2 9 8 1.31,81   Propshaft