THE car that Dick Johnson drove to his final Australian Touring Car Championship title is set to undergo a restoration with its new owner.
But while the restoration will see it back out on the racetrack, it won’t be going back to its championship-winning guise.
The fourth Ford Sierra RS500 Cosworth built by Dick Johnson Racing, DJR 4 was used by the team across 1988 to 1991.
It was the team’s lead #17 Sierra throughout the 1989 ATCC, with Johnson driving it to five wins across eight rounds to seal his fifth and final championship title.
The car also delivered the team’s sole success in New Zealand through its turbo era, driven to victory by Johnson and John Bowe in that year’s Pukekohe 500.
Infamously, it was also the car that Johnson spun at high speed on Conrod Straight in the early stages of the 1988 Bathurst 1000.
It proved to be the first of just two ‘Great Race’ campaigns for the car; the latter came after it had been sold to Mark Petch and run as a third DJR entry in the 1991 Bathurst enduro for Kiwis Kayne Scott and Gregg Taylor.
The car was raced in New Zealand for the next few years before being purchased and brought back across the Tasman by renowned collector David Bowden.
It remained in the Bowden family’s hands for much of the next three decades and made occasional track appearances, including in Johnson’s match races against Peter Brock at the 2002 Formula 1 Australian Grand Prix.
However, the car has recently been purchased by Terry Lawlor, whose plan is to restore the car back to its 1991 Bathurst guise to compete in Heritage Touring Cars events.
The choice to return it to that point of its life, rather than its 1989 title win, owes to rules around historic racing around a car’s specifications.
By 1991, Ford Sierras were effectively in their ultimate spec; they were able to run six-speed Holinger gearboxes, along with wider-track suspension components and the Ron Harrop/DJR-designed nine-inch differential.
The mechanical work on the car, which will receive a full engine rebuild among a host of work, will be carried by Brad Tilley Auto Garage.
The paintwork and livery, though? That is going to be handled by DJR.
Lawlor has set a tentative deadline of having the car restored and on the grid at the Phillip Island Classic early next year.
Upon completion, it would mean two of the six Sierras built by DJR will be active in racing in our region.
Lance Coupland regularly campaigns DJR 6 in historic racing in his native New Zealand, having purchased it from Lawlor in 2020.
The Bowdens retain DJR 5, the 1989 Bathurst-winning car, and recently recommissioned it for demonstration runs at the Adelaide Motorsport Festival.
The team’s first two cars have lived in the United Kingdom since 1989 and have since been restored to DJR colours, while DJR 3 has remained out of the public eye since its last race in private hands in the early 1990s.
