Australian MINI Challenge Crash Ends Race

Russell Greenwood Oct 13th, 2008 Link

Ah, thanks Motoringfile - I managed to miss the MINI Challenge on the weekend when it was really the one bit I wanted to see!

Pity they had to can it - oh well - it’s stuffed up the Top 10 Shootout for the V8’s after that also because of debris on the track.

Also to note, it looked from the footage later on in the day when they were driving the car back to the pits that they cut the roof off the car like a sardine box to get the driver out - guess it was easier!

dickdavid Oct 13th, 2008 Link

I’m glad nobody was seriously hurt.

I really enjoyed watching the footage and wish they’d bring that to the states.

Liam Oct 13th, 2008 Link

Russell, it looked like the driver’s door was unable to be opened, hence the tin can option with the roof.

Follow the link below to see the aftermath:
http://www.ausmotive.com/images/MC2008-R6-01.jpg

Cheers
Liam

Lee L Oct 13th, 2008 Link

What happened exactly? Did the wheels hit in just the right way to cause one car to climb so high? IT seemed like they should have just bounced off each other.

bee1000 Oct 13th, 2008 Link

I looks like a classic open-wheel incident where cars touch wheels and one flies over the other. I’m not sure how it happened here, though. If they were turning right, the back side of the front wheels would have extended past the edge of the bodywork, but they were turning left.

Brian Oct 13th, 2008 Link

He hit head on and just a broken ankle. Nice

GregW Oct 13th, 2008 Link

As they say - that’s Motor Racing! Presumably this was held at the same time as the V8 Supercars 1000 kilometre event where this type of accident is common place.
Not widely known outside of Australasia, is that in 1966, the Bathurst 500 mile endurance 130 lap race was won by a Mini Cooper S driven by Rauno Aaltonen and Bob Holden in car number 13 in 7 hours 11 mins. The Cooper S cars took the first 9 places a record which still stands, with 9 retirements.

Liam Oct 13th, 2008 Link

Greg, yes the V8 Supercars were held on the weekend as well. This was one of the main reasons the MINI CHALLENGE race was stopped. The previous race from the V8 feeder category ran overtime with a number of safety car laps, so the schedule was already running a bit late. Darren Berry’s crash was on lap 1 of 6, but with the Top 10 qualifying shootout for the main V8 Supercar category waiting for the prime television slot, and the time taken to remove Darren from his car, the MINI race had to be cancelled.

The most important thing is Darren Berry will be okay and, under the circumstances, his injuries are relatively minor, but it was a real shame the MINIs couldn’t get a full race in on such an important weekend in Australia’s motoring calendar.

Thanks for the heads up on the 1966 race as well, I knew, of course, about the winner, but didn’t realise the Minis dominated so heavily. Wikipedia reveals all:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1966Bathurst1000

Scott Oct 13th, 2008 Link

Ouch!

Anyone else notice that Matt Neal of BTCC fame and Boris Said were both driving at this race?

Someone really needs to copy these races and post the torrents for the rest of us to watch.

Crashton Oct 13th, 2008 Link

Yes I noticed that Neal & Said were listed. Is that our Boris Said?

Mount Panorama is a very daunting circuit. No room at all for an error coming off the mountain. Glad the driver walked away, that looked bad.

Liam Oct 14th, 2008 Link

Neal and Said drove together in the V8 Supercars as well. I imagine they were coming to Australia for that and MINI CHALLENGE asked if they’d like a drive.

Each round the MINI CHALLENGE has one or two spots set aside for their UBER-STAR CAR program where they offer a drive to a celebrity of some description. I was pretty skeptical of it at first, but if you look at it for what it is, a pure marketing exercise, it’s probably a very good ploy and especially in Australia, where our volumes are low, and any cross-media exposure is welcomed.

For example, Grant Denyer (who was leading the Australian MINI CHALLENGE series until he injured his back) is one of those wacky weather dudes for one of the national TV stations down here. He is pretty popular with the ladeez and he also races in a number of other motor sport categories. So he’s no chump. MINI first asked him to race with them when they ran a few factory backed cars in Targa Tasmania a couple of years ago. Denyer’s popularity and appeal gave MINI so much cut through exposure into markets that would have had no idea that Targa Tasmania even existed.

Hmm, there’s a whole lot of waffle for not much good, haha.

MotoringFile » Archive » MINI Challenge Australia Final Round (Video) Dec 8th, 2008 Link

[...] a MINI. It’s also the last weekend of that year for the series that saw quite a few highs and lows. For a full recap of the race check out AUSmotive. For a the full video, click [...]