Today’s AN1 Images Memory Lane takes us back 25 years to 1992 and the unique treble achieved by Mark Skaife in that season.
Our shot shows Skaife aboard the #2 Winfield Nissan GT-R in the final round of that year’s Australian Touring Car Championship at Oran Park on his way to his first of an eventual five titles.
The perfect swansong for the all-conquering GT-R, his ATCC victory that year was only part of a brilliant season that saw the Central Coast speedster claim the Australian Drivers Championship for Formula Brabham open-wheelers and the Tooheys 1000 at Bathurst in October.
But his path to the ATCC crown was far more difficult than it had originally been expected. The sport’s ruling body CAMS introduced a range of changes at the beginning of the season, all designed to even the competition between the Nissan, Ford Sierra, BMW M3 and Holden Commodore.
Fred Gibson’s team ran their cars in a new red and yellow Winfield livery but beneath the bonnet were further changes. A turbo boost pop-off valve reportedly cut up to 30 percent of the car’s power and the weight of the car was bumped up to 1400 kilograms in a bid to bring it back to the field.
And the championship took on a different face with the addition of the Dash for Cash, a short race for the top six qualifiers to decide the grid positions for the first of two races.
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The tight Amaroo Park hosted Round 1 and everyone was shocked as Peter Brock took the first race in his VN Commodore. But Skaife righted the ship in Race 2 to win the race and round.
Second place overall to John Bowe at Sandown solidified Skaife’s place at the top of the championship point score before the #2 Nissan again was forced to finish second to a Sierra – this time to Glenn Seton’s – on the long straights of Symmons Plains.
Victory on the familiar Winton in rural Victoria was always expected with the car’s four wheel drive system playing a critical role and Skaife took home maximum points, but the muck hit the fan in the next round at Lakeside.
There had been accusations from some quarters that the Nissan squad was ‘sand bagging’ and not running to the car’s potential. And to combat that, officials slugged them with another 100-kilogram penalty, raising the minimum weight to 1500 kilograms.
Skaife qualified 10th and would be able to pick his way through the order and finish second but worse was to come. He’d had to change more than one tyre for Race 2 so was sent to the back – seventh in the race and fifth for the round being the result.
Second place in the first ever championship round at Eastern Creek was a good result and a win at Mallala helped put the Nissan back in the title fight. But an eighth at Wanneroo left teammate Jim Richards a chance – the only one among the field – of winning his third straight crown.
Skaife need not have worried as his blitzed to two race wins and the round victory and became the youngest-ever Australian Touring Car Champion, a record surpassed four years later by Craig Lowndes.
But Skaife also clinched the Gold Star on the very same day at Oran Park in his Formula Brabham open wheeler, an achievement highly unlikely to ever occur again.
His 1992 championship scorecard eventually read four round wins from nine, seven race wins from 18 starts and one pole position at Winton. The end result left the-then 25-year-old with 234 championship points, 20 clear of Richards.
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