The Sporting Challenge

The sporting challenge

"Can't bat, can't bowl!" is one of the more infamous cricketing sledges but it accurately describes my school boy sporting endeavours. Not only that I couldn't run jump or perform any of those skills demanded of team sports. I think the only reason I ever played goalkeeper in a soccer team was that it was the least demanding position - if the team did their job all I had to do was stand around and barrack. Not that I didn't want to play but was never considered good enough to make the team. But I could swim and once even made the area carnival in the one mile event as it was know back then. Scott Derwin was the winner on that day and I think he was already in the change room by the time I had finished.

My lack of team sport prowess led me to instead pursue individual sports such as surfing and hang gliding. Along with filming, surfing was to become my other lifelong passion, a surf movie being the consummation of both passions. Sadly it is an unfulfilled dream but somewhere in my archives rests some yet to be seen footage of a young Mark Richards displaying his unique and conquering style off Merewether Point.

The pursuit of sporting footage led to some of my more remarkable escapades with a camera although I have never been quite sure which came first, the camera or the sporting activity. And at times the boundary was never quite clear between what was legitimate filming and what was a personal indulgence. Nevertheless like news I found the unpredictable nature of sport to be a worthwhile challenge naturally seeking that better angle or shot.

Now a housing estate Beaumont Park once used to stage greyhound race meetings. On alternate weeks we would shoot the first leg of the Daily Double at either the Broadmeadow race track or the Beaumont Park greyhound track. Our filming location at the horses was an easily accessed rooftop in line with the finish post. It offered a clear and unobstructed view of the horses' final run down the straight and over the finish line.

Contrastingly, our location at Beaumont Park, at the top of the grandstand seating was markedly inferior as the grandstand pillars periodically obscured the view of the race including the finish line. My enthusiasm spurred me to find a better location - the rooftop of the grandstand. It offered the same unimpeded view of the track we enjoyed with the horses at Broadmeadow. The first time I used the location everybody was very impressed with the results that I'd achieved but questioned why others did not use the same location. They simply had more sense than me and a greater sense of self preservation for access to the roof was via the guttering and downpipe system. If you lost your nerve or your grip during the exercise the 30 - 40 foot fall to the concrete below would have ensured little time for regret.

The afternoon the downpipe parted company with the building leaving me dangling like Spiderman without a web vindicated my colleagues more cautious approach to the task. Vindication is not much of a ladder nor could it quell the angst I felt when I realised that the falling pipe might have occasioned harm to innocent bystanders. I was up the proverbial stream of effluent in a barbed wire canoe sans paddle. Through some athletic maneuvering (I was younger and fitter then) and a healthy dose of good luck I managed to extricate myself from my perilous predicament and reach the ground without further incident. All future greyhound races were filmed subsequently from inside the race commentator's box. It was still a compromise but it was accessible and safe.

As we covered the races so also we covered the footy league on a Saturday afternoon and rugby on the Sunday afternoon. We were allocated only a short amount of time to get the requisite footage as it was little more than "wallpaper" for the results summary. My school-days had at least given me some idea of how these games were played. Not so Aussie Rules. Adopting my usual position on the sideline as it exists in league and union I soon found myself in the middle of the action, an embarrassing situation all round. Nobody told me that Aussie Rules uses the whole oval! As I watch today's sophisticated replays from multiple angles plus slow motion, and in colour, I recall my efforts and those of my colleagues (with a degree of frustration) as constrained interpretations awaiting technological fulfilment.

The ubiquitous interview challenged my view that sport should always be about the action so on occasion I would attempt to add some visual variety to interviews and in this instance I used two sound cameras, the objective being to change the viewpoint at times to relieve the monotony of a single shot. Noel was interviewing a sports trainer in of all things the sauna at Wests Leagues Club. The small size of the sauna and its accompanying, stifling atmosphere meant shooting the interview through the open door. Needless to say it took an interminably long time to assemble both cameras plus lights which I think strained the patience of the participants sweating it out in the sauna, Unfortunately I so badly underexposed the footage that it was unusable. We re-shot the interview, still in the sauna but using only one camera. Somewhat chastened by my earlier failure I wasn't prepared to seek the indulgence of Noel and his guest for the time needed to set up the additional camera.

Hang gliding quickly captured my imagination and my lens providing me with many opportunities to capture colourful and graceful imagery. It was an irresistible sport and one to which I eagerly succumbed. My passion for the sport had been fired through my filming of the Duncan boys Shane, Rick and Russell who along with father Kevin were leading exponents with close ties to its pioneer, Bill Moyes. Both Shane and Rick were to distinguish themselves at the national and international level of competition and to-day continue their pioneering role in their development of ultra-light aircraft. They taught me how to fly these seemingly frail craft. The spirit still yearns. The Duncan connection allowed me to prevail on some of their Gold Coast compatriots while doing some filming for the Leyland Brothers. With a borrowed kite I headed into the hinterland west of the Gold Coast for an afternoon's flying with my new found friends.

Inland flying is significantly different to coastal soaring, a distinction I was still learning. This afternoon session taught me a most fundamental and painful lesson in hang-gliding. I stalled the kite on my landing approach, colliding with a solitary rock protruding from the verdant expanse. Ever the optimist, with my left hand now almost perpendicular to my arm I asked the guys on the way to the hospital if they thought it was broken. They were none too reassuring and a couple of hours later I emerged from Southport Hospital with my left arm in plaster to the elbow. I could at least still bend it so all was not lost. Despite the setback I successfully completed filming for the Leyland Brothers.

Mark Goolmeer is one of those quiet, unassuming characters who seem to appear when you need them most. Although he started his career as a technician with Telecom Australia (now Telstra), he joined Channel 3 in the 70's as a technician which was fortunate for me. We were already hang gliding friends but it was comforting to know that somebody else in the station from a more disciplined area was also a hang gliding devotee. In my file is some footage of Mark in an embarrassing landing where he inverted his kite at Boolaroo during a club championship event. Fortunately he didn't hold it against me.

By Saturday I had all but completed a musical hang gliding piece for Noel's sporting programme on the Sunday morning but was lacking the punchy intro despite having already selected the music. With an overnight southerly change forecast for Saturday night I prevailed on Mark to meet at the station early on the Sunday should the change arrive. This would give me the additional footage I needed to complete the clip. Bear in mind that it had to go to air at mid-day on the Sunday.

Come Sunday morning at 8.00 am the wind had definitely turned south and although not ideal at our spot off Hickson Street in Merewether, would nevertheless facilitate the footage I needed. Mark duly assembled the kite while I filmed then launched himself into a breeze that normally we would not have contemplated. From a filming point of view it was perfect, clear sunny skies and a stiff breeze. From Mark's perspective it was something of challenge. The wind was very turbulent, bumpy and not quite in the direction it should have been. In other words, things had the potential to go wrong for him with painful consequences. Nevertheless he launched and despite the turbulent atmospherics made it all seem perfectly normal. Little did he then realise that it was simply a foretaste of what the future held in store for him.

When safely back on the ground I left him to dismantle the kite and hastened to the studio to process and edit the footage. The clip went to air attracting some favourable commentary with no indication of the last minute endeavours that went into its completion. Eventually Mark left Channel 3 to pursue a flying career... in choppers, and we were to spend many hours together high above Newcastle and the Hunter Valley in pursuit of definitive aerials.

The long week-end in June 2007 saw Newcastle again belted by a "severe weather  event" as the Bureau of Meteorology so euphemistically called it. In 1974 it was called a cyclone and the Sygna was to finish her days as a wreck in Stockton Bight as a result. Similar conditions in 2007 drove the Pasha Bulker, one of the flotilla of coal bulk carriers waiting off Newcastle, on to Nobbys Beach in a spectacular display of omnipotent power. When the Westpac Rescue helicopter materialised to salvage the situation in conditions that were at if not beyond the operating limits of the chopper, Mark Goolmeer was one of those who steadfastly refused to yield to the elements, piloting the fragile craft in its crucial missions. As always, there when needed, quiet, unassuming, heroic.

Underwater

My willingness to attempt anything with a camera gave me an entreaty to sports I hadn't particularly contemplated. Frank West was an enthusiastic and highly motivated scuba instructor and he approached Leigh Maughan about doing a series on learning to scuba dive for the sports show. Leigh said to me "Whaddya reckon Baz?" It was largely a rhetorical question for he knew that I couldn't resist the challenge of the unknown.

For the series to have credibility some of it needed to be filmed underwater so while Leigh was learning the basics of scuba diving and explaining to the viewing audience I too was following a similar trajectory while addressing the unique filmic challenges posed by the underwater environment. Given my rather dismal history of mixing cameras with water the scuba series had catastrophe written all over it. Luckily the underwater housing never leaked and the camera survived the series intact. The only minor drama arose when I wanted to get some footage of a large Wobbegong shark lurking under some rocks off Box Beach at Nelson Bay. Frank's efforts with some seaweed to entice the shark to reveal itself were of no avail so I swam around to the other side of its rocky enclosure and grabbed it by the tail hoping that it might venture forth for the benefit of my camera. Although I have never touched a bolt of lightning that shark's tail is as close as ever I want to come to such an experience. Instantaneously I released my grip then anxiously waited to see if there was to be any further aggressive response from the beastie, Fortunately Wobbies are generally docile fish as sharks go and this one was content to continue to laze in its cavern having effortlessly dismissed whatever was annoying its tail. I think I now know how a horse fly must feel at times.

Having survived the scuba series Leigh turned his attention to "snow bunnies": "Hey Baz, why don't we do something with snow skiing like we did with the scuba?" Here we go again... Only on this occasion Leigh had to learn to ski in only two consecutive days for a week-end in the snow was all the time we were allowed. Yet it had to look as though he had spent several weeks learning to ski. Fortunately I didn't have to learn to ski but rather how to work in the snow without getting the gear drenched. My cinematic misadventures again raised the potential for another calamity but our weekend was incident free. To his credit Leigh managed to advance sufficiently that with a little strategic editing he was confidently skiing after only two days. I never did see the snow bunnies...

For the average young Australian male a driver's licence is his passport to manhood and a car the symbol of his consequent maturity, a tool with which to demonstrate it and motorsport the enticing and ultimate arena in which to test it. For me a licence and a car were therefore inevitabilities. The camera simply zoomed me into motorsport.

Good food, good wine and fine entertainment is a recipe for a conventional Saturday night out. But for ORSA, Beethoven and Barnesy were nothing compared to the sounds of a pair of Weber carburettors feverishly fuelling extremely potent rally cars as they audaciously navigated the forest trails from Gosford to Gloucester and beyond.

ORSA?

Official Rally Spectators’ Association and a nicer bunch of motoring enthusiasts I have yet to meet. Robbo, the Cottams, Brambles, Paul O'Neill and others whose names escape me would spend their Saturday nights spectating at car rallies back when rallies were largely an obscure division of the broader motorsport spectrum - largely because they were run at night. Never mind the fact that it was generally very cold and that you could be out all night with little chance for sleep. Such deprivations never dampened their enthusiasm for which I was eternally grateful. They took me to some of the best locations for filming rally action and would fortuitously materialise to drag my car back on to the road after I had executed one of my several unplanned exits.

As well as being the familiar face of Channel 3's news, Fin was also a keen rally competitor and I took it upon myself to take some still photographs of his endeavours for publicity purposes. The fact that I had very limited experience with still photographic equipment was not a deterrent. It should have been as frustrating equipment failures meant many fruitless nights. But some interesting journeys such as sliding around the curves of the Comboyne Mountains west of Wingham, my two mates hanging on for grim death as we tried to stay in front of the competitors... in Channel 3's Hillman Hunter Station Wagon. Andrew Cowan might have won the London to Sydney marathon in a humble Hillman in 1968 but I was hardly trying to emulate his feat, just getting to the bottom of the mountain intact seemed a grand enough achievement at the time. Our paths were ultimately to intersect but more of that later.

That poor old Hillman station wagon had a tortured life. All of our news vehicles were aged well beyond what showed on the clock but the Hillman's additional, secret life as a rally support vehicle accelerated its demise. It suffered an inglorious dunking in a flooded creek when I quickly rounded a corner only to discover the bridge I was expecting, submerged under a significant body of water. For Mary Byrnes (subsequently to become Boddy in a later tale) it was a nevertheless exciting introduction for her to the madness of car rallying circa 1970, done in the dark in the bush. 

Despite sitting in water up to our arses Mary asked that I turn my back while she discreetly removed her pantyhose. I complied. Far be it for me to tangle with a lady who embodied the principles of female equality a la Germaine Greer. Mary was to become a staunch supporter and ally in my questionable adventures. She has been a very special person to me professionally and personally. I digress.

A few gifted national servicemen - the 'Kings of the Call-up' as one paper reported - were selected for an officer training course. The Scheyville Officer Training Unit near Windsor west of Sydney, aimed to make a platoon commander of a national serviceman within six months. As such, it was the toughest officer training course ever devised in Australia. The elite Portsea Cadet School in Victoria had tried and failed to create a platoon commander within that time. About 120 cadets from each intake of 2,500 national servicemen were selected for Scheyville, according to their intelligence and personality. In total, Scheyville produced 1,871 second lieutenants between 1965 and 1973, compared with Portsea's 1,287 and Duntroon's 465.

Named after the prominent Freemason William Schey, the school demanded the 'best of the best - and then some', recalled David Sabben, a cadet. It was a case of being 'broken, remoulded, trained, challenged and tested', wrote Gary McKay. A near unbearable, continuous assessment process yielded a 30 to 40 per cent failure rate. It is impossible to comprehend the challenge facing the Scheyville cadet without grasping the demands on a platoon commander: the platoon is the core combat unit and Vietnam the ultimate platoon- level war. The platoon commander must lead thirty men into a combat zone; excel at navigation, tactics, advanced weapons and a multitude of other things; understand the strengths and weaknesses of his men; command their respect and loyalty; and conquer his fear. 
   ~ Vietnam The Australian War, Paul Ham

Now I happened to have a mate back then who had been conscripted and sent to Scheyville and whose imperturbable approach to life would have dismissed Ham's insights as unseemly exaggerations. However as I was heading out on one of my infamous escapades in the Hillman Hunter to film Fin in a rally in the Blue Mountains I thought I might just call in and say hullo. And I did, even though at the time I had no idea where Scheyville was. I think my mate was as pleased to see me as I was him. But can you imagine pulling that stunt to-day? Drive a news vehicle unannounced, into an operating army training camp, during war time, and seek out through 'informal' means a mate you knew was there? The visit didn't last long as I think he had already done KP duty for some previous infraction of the rules and I didn't want to cause him any further trouble. I can't remember anything much more of the conversation but I will never forget him. His name... Gunther Schmid.

It was during my pursuit of footage of the Rally of the Hills in the Blue Mountains that the Hillman suffered terminal brake failure while I was trying to stay in front of the competitors. That I had already passed one might explain the fading brakes. Few things are more alarming than approaching a corner at speed only to discover that the brake pedal goes to the floor with no corresponding reduction in speed. It's an 'underwear moment'.

I can still recall the vision that flooded through my mind as the apex of the corner and its ubiquitous white post beckoned - trying to explain to Ken Stone our General Manager, how on a Saturday night I managed to bend a news vehicle on a forest trail 300 miles outside of our viewing area. Lady Luck took a hand and placed it on the wheel. My otherwise lackluster destiny was avoided as the poor old Hillman in a mélange of rocks and gravel bobbled around the corner and I was able to continue without further incident, suitably chastened. But not for long.

Sent to film a motorkhana event for the week-end news I couldn't resist the temptation and in my file is some footage of the gallant Hillman lurching around the course, finally expiring as the battery fell over.

If you'll pardon the cliché, Australia is a big country which in part explains why the Around Australia car trials generated great public interest and accompanying myths and legends. In land mass Australia might encompass Europe but the significant difference is population - read civilisation. Apart from the capital cities Australia is largely concentrated in the south east portion of the vast continent. Driving around it then means coping with endless stretches of emptiness broken only by rare population centres. Even today it remains the country's 'great journey'. The 1970 Around Australia trial was to be no exception particularly as it had been fifteen years since an event of such magnitude had been undertaken and it attracted a whole new collection of competitors including Fin.

Channel 3, in conjunction with the local Ford dealer Klosters, had agreed to sponsor him in a bright red Falcon GTHO, the first generation of what we now call 'muscle cars'. It was big. It was bold. It was fast, very fast. But it was also heavy and very, very thirsty. It could swallow twice the fuel of its more sedate suburban counterpart. And it had to carry three people around Australia; Fin, Neil Dickinson as navigator and Don Anderson as co-driver/navigator.

I was fortunate to be despatched to film the adventure, partly for Channel 3's news and partly to provide "pool" footage - film that was made available to all the networks. I found myself facing an adventure that had been a boyhood fantasy viewed from the interior of a 'vehicle' constructed from packing cases from the small retail business my parents ran in suburban Mayfield in 1955. 

The era of live coverage and electronic news gathering was but a low buzz on the industry horizon. We were shooting black and white 16mm film which had to be despatched to Sydney or in my case Newcastle for processing which invariably meant that it was out of date by the time it was broadcast. 

For reasons that I cannot recall I travelled the first part of the Trial to Alice Springs in the BF Goodrich Tyres service vehicle which denied me any action. I did however learn to siphon petrol from a drum into a car's - or in this case, truck's - tank, unfortunately inhaling the fumes along the way leading to a bout of 'drunkenness' on a desert night. My travelling companions chuckled knowingly. It was an unforgettable experience.

On arrival in the Alice (Alice Springs) I persuaded a local car club member who was manning the control point to loan me his car, of all things a Beetle. Beggars can't be choosers and as my reputation had fortunately not preceded me I unhesitatingly accepted his offer, quickly heading south in search of a suitable corner that might provide some rally action. Corners are a little sparse between the Alice and Adelaide and I was forced instead to settle for telephoto shots of the cars in the shimmering heat of the day. Eagerly I scanned the horizon hoping to secure a shot of our Falcon but it was not until the wee hours of the following morning that it emerged from the freezing darkness of a desert winter's night to lope along Todd Street and on to the welcoming plates of a hoist. My harsh filming light revealed a somewhat scarred and extremely dirty vehicle with a crew to match. My flying 'Fordie' now a decrepit semblance of everyman's motoring desire, Murray Finlay in the raw, not the polished image normally served up to viewers.

It was to be the only time throughout the duration of the Trial that I saw them or crucially, secured any footage of them. From the Alice I joined the Ampol press plane which largely focussed on the Trial leaders, significantly diminishing any contact opportunities. The scribes were content to travel to checkpoints where they could garner information as to the progress of the event for their daily updates. It made for dull television footage so much so that I cannot recall shooting anything interesting for the remainder of the Trial.

A small town called Warwick in Queensland was to be the end of our grand adventure at which point the car was in need of some significant work if it was to remain competitive. Contrasted with this was the lost time needed to effect repairs which would have consigned our efforts to oblivion so the pragmatic decision was taken to make a dignified withdrawal from the event and return to Newcastle. It was a disappointing ending but for me perhaps the start of a series of motoring adventures and escapades that were to punctuate my career.

Fin managed to have the 'Flying Fordie' overhauled, eventually competing in the Rally of the Hills the event I earlier mentioned which taught me about the deficiencies of Hillman Hunter Station Wagons as rally vehicles. His entry into the Southern Cross Rally in 1971 is entry into the was to cement my enthusiasm for the sport while unknowingly opening the door to my further professional development.

Rollands Plains is somewhere west of Telegraph Point on the NSW Mid North Coast. The 1971 Southern Cross Rally was to pass somewhere through that area. So on the Friday night having filmed the trots at Broadmeadow I picked up my lifelong friend Greg Harman, he had stuck with me despite his unnerving initial experiences in the Hillman, and headed north in search of the Southern Cross - rally that is... still in the Hillman.

In Port Macquarie we were given directions which would hopefully led us to the competing cars. Luck was again on our side and in the grey and overcast dawn I was able to capture a shot of Fin in full flight negotiating a downhill left hander. In the hope of capturing more action we joined the rally route - some lessons I never learned. Having selected a potential action spot I secured the Hillman in a safe location and waited in the gravel of a downhill left hander. Unfortunately it was all a bit pedestrian until a guy in a Colt arrived on the scene. As he did I zoomed out and waited for him to pass by. Then came the sickening sound of locked wheels on gravel. I was more than familiar with the experience from the driver's seat, but when you're huddled on the point of impact it has a whole different feel to it. Now a Colt was not a big car but when the front wheel fills the frame on a wide angle lens it is big. Accordingly impressive, and created another of those 'underwear moments.' And good for the adrenalin.

Fortunately the driver managed to stay on the road. Covered with dust and some incidental flora I had nevertheless survived what was to become one of several interesting incidents that were to distinguish my involvement with motorsport and cause people to question my sanity... with some validation. It wasn't until after the footage was aired on the Saturday night bulletin, along with the trots, that I realised that I hadn't been to bed since Thursday night. It was to become a template for the next twenty five years of my career.

As Fin was a rally person Jim Sullivan was a bitumen specialist reinforcing his racing credentials at Oran Park with notable wins in a Mini. It was that same competitive drive that gave him the class win in the in the 1971 Australian Hill Climb Championships held in Newcastle's King Edward Park, His win was a little overshadowed by a spectacular accident as one of his fellow competitors in a furious attempt to better his time totalled his car instead. Along with colleagues Allan Blackwell, Ricki Howes and Mary Boddy I volunteered my services to put together a film of the event. Although probably unaware of it at the time, Channel 3 'donated' the use of cameras and equipment towards the cause. 

With final times being tallied the event was reaching its climax when Lindsay Siebler accelerated off the line in his plum coloured Mini in a last ditch effort to better Jim's fastest time. I was positioned at the edge of the track above the sunken gardens with a telephoto shot looking down towards an off-camber uphill right-hander. Joe Roohan in his Mini quickly validated my choice of position as the off-camber corner speared him into a retaining wall. I thought I had the shot of the day but then Lindsay Siebler arrived at the same point and in an even more untidy manner than his predecessor. He was not so fortunate.

Through my lens Siebler's Mini appeared to waltz around the corner before setting sail for the sunken gardens, tripping over the edge then somersaulting down the verges, a plum and green shower of Mini bits and grass. And I had the only front row seat in the house to view the spectacle. It was to be the shot of the day and indeed of the film. But Lady Luck played a part not so much for ensuring that I was in the right place at the right time but for encouraging the Mini to trip when it did for had it continued on its wayward trajectory I was the next point of contact. Needless to say that area is now out of bounds to all personnel. A wan smile it might have been on the part of Ms Luck, but Siebler walked away uninjured save for his pride and bank balance which would have both been significantly dented.

Three of rallying's great hazards are dust, mud and trees. Dust because you cannot see through that which you have not already swallowed; mud because of the potential to slip off the road or get bogged plus it is generally accompanied by rain. And trees. Trees? Well they just jump out at you regardless of the conditions. 

Mud was the defining characteristic of the 1973 Southern Cross Rally, acknowledged as the wettest Cross ever run. And in our first ever private venture Jim and I had negotiated to make a film of the event for its sponsors, Total Oil and the Port Macquarie Tourist Authority. A major goal of mine beckoned with its implicit pressures and tensions. I did not need rain and certainly not in the volumes that were to drench the event over its four day duration.

But it did create some great footage as the bigger cars wallowed in the muddy conditions on a goat track out the back of Awaba on Lake Macquarie's western shores. It was telling vision even if only the first competitive stage as the combination of rain and mud was to swamp the majority of the competitors, a bedraggled 9 cars out of 60 completing the event.

At least the competitors in their cars were dry. Jim and I were committed to standing in the rain and mud awaiting their arrival in hopefully spectacular  fashion. The conditions meant that at times the field was running up to two hours behind its scheduled time. It was an interminably long and cold wait to capture fleeting images and all the time the bloody rain. The long nights stretched unforgivingly into the daylight hours severely curtailing the time for much needed sleep. Four hours was generous. 

The continuing challenge was to keep the equipment dry and functioning... and safe. With a generator, lights and cables our night set ups were a source of constant anxiety. Lighting a creek crossing carried two additional hazards; the creek which by now was showing the effect of the deluge and the crowd which materialised to watch the event. There's not a whole lot of activity on a winter's night out Bellingen way so the opportunity to watch an odd collection of city slickers attempt to navigate the local creek crossing was a magnet for knowing locals. The more sanguine arrived on tractors.

The only thing missing was the tent. We had an aquatic circus with my lights in the creek providing the necessary illumination. Much to the delight of the animated crowd many cars were to fall victim to the combination of a loose gravel floor in the creek and a heightened water level. The tractor pilots did a roaring trade extricating the hapless crews. The enthusiastic cheers of the crowd as each competitor gamely attempted the crossing helped me ignore the fact that I was knee deep in cold, mountain water, my toes in the early stages of frostbite. But I have never so enjoyed a circus. It lifted my sodden spirits. 

Andrew Cowan was to secure the event, his second of what was to be an unbroken series of six wins in a then new marque, a Mitsubishi Lancer. It was an omnipotent combination forever changing the face of rallying in Australia as the Lancers took a stranglehold on the event continuing with the 1974 Cross. Jim and I had been retained to again produce the official film of the event but also to provide television coverage. Fortunately at that stage Channel 3 was gearing up for colour so it was a relatively straightforward matter of processing the footage then sending a black and white version through the microwave links. It did require getting the unprocessed footage back to Newcastle, a task that fell to Allan Bowman a mate and enthusiast who would spend the night with us spectating then drive the three to four hours back to Newcastle. Rally fans are a little on the crazy side.

The '74 Cross was as dusty as the '73 was wet. It was considerably more comfortable as a result with a lower attrition rate but Andrew Cowan was again to dominate in his Lancer. Even the Gordonville Ford below Bellingen was not to trouble him. It did me for I had chosen to place my lights in the creek. Acknowledging the presence of a crowd I ran the cables under the water so that people wouldn't walk into them and drag the light into the water. The vulnerable plugs and connectors I suspended above the water, secured to the light stands. It was an inadequate approach. At one stage I noticed a diminution in the intensity of the light but with the action fast and furious in front of my lens I quickly dismissed it. It wasn't until it came time to pack up that I discovered one of the lights underwater. To this day I have never understood why the whole system didn't implode. Guess that's why I'm just a cameraman.

Because we were the official film crew we were offered the opportunity of capturing some in car footage of Andrew Cowan and navigator John Bryson in action. I'm there! It was an interesting journey. In the absence of camera brackets I would lean out the window and point the camera forward capturing the wheel, road and anything else that happened along. And in Andrew Cowan's case 'anything' was that part of the trail that wasn't going to bend the car. It was a fascinating insight into the driving philosophy of a man who was probably the leading exponent of endurance rallying and I gained it hanging out of the navigator's window.

Around Australia II

Rarely does one get two bites at the metaphorical cherry but the opportunity to participate in the 1979 Around Australia trial was such a cherry and after all of my rally experiences too irresistible not to bite. For me it was to be the last of the grand motoring escapades so participation was as much privilege as pleasure. In his inimitable style Fin had persuaded Channel 3 and the local Holden dealer, Young & Green, to sponsor him in the two week event. Joining him in the Commodore was Jim who was now working full time as a journalist in the newsroom and a young chemist from Maitland, Lyndon McLeod. With my inclusion as a part of the service crew it became a newsroom event all the more so as Mary Boddy who was now producing the news was married to Dave Boddy who was navigating for one of the Holden Dealer Team (HDT) cars. Objective commentary on the event might have been a little hard to find in the newsroom at the time...

Young and Green loaned us a second hand panel van off the lot as a service vehicle. Unlike the rally car which had comparatively fastidious preparation our service vehicle merely had a grease, oil change and check the tyres prior to the event. Along with a significant amount of spares for our Commodore and my camera gear fighting for some kind of priority, the panel van carried mechanic Ted Hayes, myself and all of our combined luggage including a fair part of that of our competition crew. I don't think that its former life as a NESCA service vehicle was anywhere near as demanding as the future it now faced. Unlike the 1970's Trial I had a set of permanent wheels and a little independence to capture action footage. Nevertheless our priority was to service the Commodore so again my opportunities to capture action footage were limited.

Endurance of both car and crew is the defining characteristic of long distance events and it exacts a price. The Holden Dealer team for instance had two service vehicles for each of its three competition Commodores plus an aircraft doing monitoring and reconnaissance in acknowledgement of this reality. They were also out to win at almost any price and were duly rewarded with their Commodores securing the first three finishing places in the event. We were significantly less well resourced but that didn't dampen our enthusiasm (but it did drain our energy). As a service crew ensuring we were in the right place at the right time to service our vehicle was paramount which found us one morning with over 100 kilometres to travel and only an hour in which to do it. Fortunately it was somewhere beyond the proverbial 'black stump' and we literally kept the accelerator flat to the floor, the speedo needle hard against its extremity of 140 km/h, for that hour. We arrived in time to see our car roll into the service point coated in mud, its equally muddy interior evidence of some trying times in the swamp. While Ted serviced the mechanicals I sought to remove the mud from the pedals to avoid having the driver's foot slip off at a crucial juncture. Obviously there was no time to film all of this which pretty much summed up most of our service periods.

Real sleep amounted to about two hours in a bed in each of the capital cities. Anything more was grabbed while your mate drove the car. So it was that in that nether world between sleeping and waking I sensed that our van was running extremely smoothly and quietly. I turned to Ted to pass on my observations only to discover him sound asleep, hands still gripping the wheel and the vehicle motionless. We swapped places and I swung the wheel to the right intending to rejoin the road only to find myself heading bush. In his exhausted state Ted had simply run the vehicle off on the right hand side of the road.

Somewhere in South Australia overheating warped the cylinder head on our Commodore. It was not the end of the event for us but it was going to take some time to fix, time which would leave us out of any contention for a finish in the top places. In tandem we crossed the Nullarbor under a radiant moon, nursing the car towards civilisation in the hope that we might find a replacement head to enable us to continue. From time to time we leapfrogged each other to ensure the driver in each car was awake, the descending moon a mocking remainder of the time slipping away in front of us. Civilisation finally appeared early the following afternoon in the form of Norseman, a frontier type town on the desert's fringe. Here lady luck smiled and we were able to simply replace the Commodore's complete short motor (cylinder head, valves, springs etc.) with one from a former taxi. The saving in time was substantial and despite being an aged replacement, the engine performed faultlessly to the finish. 

While Western Australia breathed new life into our campaign it was to claim the lives of another crew. Somewhere outside of Karratha our Commodore was the first to arrive on the scene of the fatal accident although there was little they could do except try to calm the distraught driver. Apparently he had fallen asleep at the wheel, run off the road and rolled the car, killing his two mates. He was to die some years later from a heart attack reportedly attributable to the anxiety of this accident. It was a sombre Fin that recalled the incident on camera when we caught up with them in Port Hedland, his bearded and drawn face reflecting our collective anxieties over risks we unquestionably took in the pursuit of pleasure.

Our poor old panel van not only suffered punctured tyres but also a punctured sump somewhere near Halls Creek in Western Australia. Ever resourceful, Ted simply covered the hole with chewing gum then ground a self tapping screw into the aperture and we were on our way with nary a further drop of oil lost between there and Melbourne. Not so fortunate was one of the HDT service vehicles we passed one night en route to Borroloola in the Northern Territory gulf country. They'd suffered a serious confrontation with some local wildlife which restricted their speed to 40 - 50 km/h. Borroloola is several hundred kilometres from anywhere leaving them an agonisingly slow journey before they could effect repairs. It doesn't pay to smile on another's misfortune, with our ancient packhorse we were probably more liable to mishap than them, though it was difficult to contain a certain feeling of smugness as we watched their headlights rapidly disappear behind us.

Even in winter Darwin is hot, 70 degrees Fahrenheit (21 Celsius) in the middle of the night and this in August the middle of winter. But the two hours sleep felt good as it was to be Townsville before we would again enjoy the luxury of a bed. Well our competitive crew might have enjoyed their time in bed in Townsville limited though that would have been, but with the work we had to perform on the Commodore, Ted and I missed that brief pleasure. Night had overtaken us by the time we farewelled the guys as they headed south for the next competitive stage. Wearily we packed our faithful van and pointed ourselves in the same direction. Insufficient sleep finally caught up with us and after only about 20 minutes Ted pulled over inviting me to continue driving which is one of the worst decisions I have ever made. While fighting to stay awake I was also fighting the car, waltzing down the highway in a sleepless stupor. I can still recall the moment when I woke up long enough to appreciate the parlous state I was in and fortunately, pull off the road. As Ted had done previously I fell asleep still clutching the wheel as we both succumbed to the insistent demands of sleep.

Lady luck was less benevolent in her treatment of an elderly couple who while not competitive, were nevertheless participating for the sheer adventure of the undertaking. Exhaustion too finished their adventure when in a moment of sleep they rolled their car off the road and out of the event. Fortunately they survived the accident able 

to eventually regale their grandkids with their exploits including their eventual demise. It was some time later that we passed their now abandoned car still inverted over the embankment. There was no smugness for us this time, just a chilling sense of 'there but for the grace of you go I'. 

We were now travelling down the east coast but it was hardly the home straight. The finish line in Melbourne was over half a continent away and we very nearly didn't reach Brisbane. In an unpredictable manoeuvre of the type that explains the notoriety of Queensland drivers we had a car execute a right hand turn across our bow ignoring the fact that we were travelling at 80 km/h on a dual carriage freeway into the city. An ageing Holden panel van burdened with half a Commodore worth of spare parts takes considerably longer to stop than most other vehicles. Innocuous it may have seemed to the casual observer but our humble, motorised servant was like a tank on steroids. Lady luck again smiled and we managed to avoid taking him out and ourselves as well but at the expense of a significant amount of tyre compound and a couple of pair of underpants. After all we'd been through our greatest risk still came from the urban cowboy.

Our journey through home territory was both swift and detached. Newcastle had become just another milestone on this endless journey. Ted unfortunately was caught by a speed trap specifically deployed by the police to target the travelling cavalcade. It was hardly a welcome home. We skipped the celebrity checkpoint of Charlestown Square in determined pursuit of the field. With exhaustion again raising its ugly spectre we resorted to using some special 'stay awake' pills which proved ineffectual leaving us reliant instead on mutual vigilance.

Waiting for the cars on the wintry slopes of the southern highlands was a far cry from the heat and humidity of Darwin some days previously. If we had instead driven around Europe the changes would have been perfectly acceptable. In terms of distance covered we had all but travelled around Europe except that we never left the country in which we started our journey. Although it was the last competitive section of the rally with the winning places already secured there was little motivation for the crews to engage in flamboyant behaviour. But it still provided reasonable vision for my camera. 

The finish in Melbourne was something of an anticlimax particularly as we still had to face the return trip home to Newcastle although after all of our travelling it seemed little more than an extended Sunday afternoon drive. Appropriately we gathered with a few beers to compare notes and swap yarns about our shared adventure. The beer however  Quickly diminished the conversation triggering our much needed for sleep that we had for so long denied.

Back in Newcastle the Commodore was overhauled to resemble, superficially at least, a conventional sedan and despite its brief but tortuous history was bought by Mary and Dave as a family hack. But it was hardly to be a gentle retirement the Boddys' taking it out along the Gunbarrel Highway In search of further adventure.

Notwithstanding its many travails the car survived intact until Geoff and Mary's teenage son Geoffrey managed to embarrassingly invert it on the Gun Club road. In an inglorious finale wreckers claimed the Commodore more for its hot rally bits than for any contribution it might make to motoring history.

Our poor old panel van was now a wearying extra 20,000 kilometres older, all in the space of two weeks. I suspect that it was simply detailed and returned to the second hand lot, the self tapper still intact in the sump. I can recall little of what I filmed of the adventure but we did produce a one hour documentary on the experience. Somewhere in the archives is a copy…