GroupC forcontroversy
I
t’s hard to believe that at the end of 1977 the
Bathurst scoreboard read: Moffat 4, Brock- And for the 1970s, Ford led Holden 5 to 3
on the back of the legendary all-conquering
Moffat Ford Dealer Team 1-2 form nish.
But all was not well in Broadmeadows.
Despite their success, the hierarchy at Ford
Australia was not particularly enamoured of
motorsport and barely even acknowledged the
Moffat team’s historic achievement at Mount
Panorama. And when he came calling, asking for
renewed commitment in ghting off the Holden
hordes, they thought Moffat was just angling for
more money.
It’s not as if he was living it up and buying
luxury boats. Moffat had always poured every
cent he had – and a bit more – into his racing,
and he understood that the dominance of 1977
couldnotberepeatedwithouta evenbigger
effort in 1978. He knew that Holden was coming
to get him. Harry Firth’s outdated out t was being
replaced by a sharp new operation led by John
Sheppard, and Peter Brock was back as lead
driver. Holden was upping the ante.
As it turned out, the Holden Dealer Team
steamrolled Moffat and his ageing Falcon
Hardtops, despite the arrival at Ford HQ of an
ally in Edsel Ford (grandson of the company
founder) and his US-inspired ‘Cobra’ warpaint.
Brock and his Torana A9X Hatchback simply
ran roughshod over the increasingly unreliable
Moffat Falcons.
At that time it was becoming increasingly
more common for teams to negotiate
‘concessions’ from the governing body to make
their production-based cars go faster and last
longer as speeds rose and components werestressed well beyond their design briefs. Holden
was sufficiently committed to the homologation
process to ensure their cars were always at the
pointy end, but Ford had long previously dropped
the political ball, leaving Moffat to battle on and
ght for new freedoms – just as he had done in
1978 with roller-bearing rocker arms.
Despite his gains, though, Moffat continued
to blow 351 Ford V8s as he strove to remain
competitive, blaming oil surge. Years later he told
me he’d blown $300,000 worth of engines – an
enormous sum in the ’70s – but CAMS remained
steadfast in refusing him a dry sump, even
though the Americans had adopted it for the
Trans-Am series.