Next year marks the 40th since Formula 1 made its debut in Australia and the Repco Adelaide Motorsport Festival will celebrate this in March.
Australia’s last Formula 1 World Champion Alan Jones will be present at the event, which is significant as he completed the first to lap the new Adelaide street circuit.
Not only will Jones be there, but the Beatrice Haas Lola THL1 Hart he completed the ceremonial lap in will also be in attendance.
Famously taking his sole World Drivers’ Championship in 1980, Jones started a long line of success for Williams before retiring at the end of 1981.
Jones returned in 1985 with Haas, but it was a less than successful return and at the end of the next season retired for good.
In between the retirements, Jones made his first foray into touring car racing and was a factory Alfa Romeo driver alongside Colin Bond for the first half of 1985.
The Hart Lola THL1 was only ready to race at Monza for Round 12 of the Formula 1 World Championship. Although a Ford engine deal was agreed to, but was delayed due to development of a failed 4-cylinder unit as a V6 was chosen instead.
Instead, a Hart 1.5-litre turbocharged 4 cylinder 415T was fitted as a temporary measure until the Ford engines were ready.
Reliability was key area of failure during the part-season, but Jones did display he’d lost nothing at the Australian Grand Prix when he came back from a stall to run as high as sixth before an electrical problem struck down the Haas after 20 laps.
Adding to the Formula 1 flavour at the Repco Adelaide Motorsport Festival is a chassis, which raced prior to Adelaide and is an icon.
Tyrrell was an innovative constructor and the famous six-wheeled P34 will make an appearance.
Only stopped due to the unwillingness of Goodyear to continue to develop the smaller tyres, the Derek Gardner-designed P34 won the 1976 Swedish Grand Prix in the hands of South African Jody Scheckter.
Being the only six-wheeler to be successful in Formula makes the P34 special and unique.
The Repco Adelaide Motorsport Festival is held on March 8-9.