THE Miedecke surname will return to the Touring Car Masters series at this year’s Repco Bathurst 1000.
George Miedecke, the son of 21-time TCM race winner and Aussie motorsport legend Andrew, will make his TCM debut with Whiteline Racing at Mount Panorama this November 30-December 3.
And he will do so in the same 1969 Camaro SS his Dad raced for the Adelaide-based team.
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Miedecke will join Adam Bressington in the two-car Chevrolet Camaro team as the Whiteline squad shuffles its line-up for the final round this year.
It will complete something of a career-long ambition for Miedecke as he follows in his father’s footsteps by driving one of TCMs most iconic cars.
Regular driver Bressington will jump aboard the team’s race winning 1970 Camaro RS at Bathurst: border restrictions unfortunately keeping Queenslander Mark King on the sidelines for the event this year.
“It’s very cool and to be honest, I never thought I would get the opportunity to drive that car,” Miedecke said.
“I spent a lot of my formative years in racing watching Dad drive that car or racing together at the same events like the Clipsal 500.
“It was always a bit of a dream of mine, not necessarily to drive in TCM, but more specifically to drive for Bob and Shaz (Middleton, team owners). They have run such a good show for such a long time.
“Dad drove that car for six or seven years straight and that car and my early years of racing, are super connected.”
Miedecke, who continues to race – his last start came in the Bathurst 6 Hour Production Car enduro in April – said while he wasn’t searching for the Bathurst opportunity it was one he couldn’t turn down.
“We’ve got a lot of stuff going on at the moment and I didn’t really need to do this, but when Dad rang me and said Bob had been on the phone and wanted me to drive the car, I said ‘Hell yes! How do I make this happen! It’s really exciting but it’s also a big ask,” he added.
“TCM has a lot of very good cars and really good drivers and I think it will be tough given the amount of practice we get; I’ll still be getting to know the car on the last lap of race four, I reckon.
“At the same time, I’m lucky that over the years I have done a lot of laps at Bathurst – this will be visit number 13 or 14 to the Mountain.”
Miedecke Snr started 49 TCM rounds between his debut in 2010 and retirement from the class in 2016, all of them for Whiteline Racing.
The family relationship goes back even further than that, with Miedecke having raced NASCARs for the team – headed up by Bob and Sharon Middleton – well before they joined TCM.
George’s addition to the grid will further build on the family theme within TCM, with three second-generation drivers set to feature on the Bathurst grid.
Alongside Miedecke, Cameron Mason (son of 2007 TCM series winner Steve) and Jamie Tilley (son of Brad) are also entered.
The Bathurst event, the fourth round of the series, will feature four races to decide the 2021 Touring Car Masters titles across all three classes.
TCM hits the track on Tuesday, November 30, with races on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Nineteen cars are currently entered for the weekend.
