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This weekend, the Virgin Australia Supercars Championship heads to Queensland Raceway for some sprint race action in the Coates Hire Ipswich Super Sprint.
But it’s easy to overlook that, for a time, the Ipswich layout was actually the home to the annual, pre-Bathurst 500-kilometre endurance race.
After two years of hosting a sprint and endurance round in 1999 and 2000, the decision was made for QR’s sole round to be the endurance race from 2001 onwards with ’02 proving to be the final time the ‘500 was held there before it reverted back to Sandown.
But the 2002 Queensland 500 turned out to be a stunning race with plenty of talking points.
As our photo from the V8 Sleuth archives shows, Stone Brothers Racing’s David Besnard and Simon Wills claimed victory in their Caltex Havoline Falcon after the Kmart-driven Commodore of Greg Murphy coughed and spluttered itself out of the lead.
The win proved to be the first for both drivers in their V8 Supercars careers, Wills in fact acting as a fill-in for Wayne Gardner who was only available for Bathurst.
The duo led 43 of the 161 laps to break a stranglehold on the championship by Holden given Commodore drivers had won the last 12 rounds in a row dating back a full 12 months!
Steven Richards and Russell Ingall were second in their Castrol Commodore while Garth Tander and Jason Bargwanna – in their fifth and final year as teammates – rounded out the podium in the Valvoline GRM Commodore.
They’d been in a big scrap with John Bowe’s OzEmail Falcon for the final podium spot, however Bowe was handed a pit lane penalty for a ‘bump and run’ pass on the GRM Holden, eventually finishing ninth.
Some of the stars of the race were the Holden Racing Team’s #2 combination Jim Richards and Tony Longhurst, who claimed fourth from 20th on the grid after team regulars Mark Skaife and Jason Bright went out with engine dramas.
The 2002 Queensland 500 race was notable for a range of other factors. Jamie Whincup made his V8 Supercars Championship debut in the second GRM Commodore alongside speedway ace Max Dumesny, also clinching the national Formula Ford title on the same weekend.
Now-Penske IndyCar star Will Power was in the field, sharing Mark Larkham’s Orrcon Falcon to 11th place and the first of the cars not to finish on the lead lap. It marked his very first appearance in the V8 Supercars Championship Series (as it was then known).
The pole-sitting Pirtek/SBR Falcon of Marcos Ambrose (sharing with Paul Weel) finished up fifth; the Tasmanian superstar in the middle of an incredible run given he took five consecutive poles at Queensland Raceway between 2001 and 2005 for SBR.
All up, 26 of the 35 starters finished the race with motorcycle ace Daryl Beattie popping up to make his debut in an Imrie Motor Sport Commodore among them – he and Christian D’Agostin finished 25th.
