A SUPERCAR famous for more reasons than one is testing today at Sydney Motorsport Park in preparation for the next chapter of its racing life.
The Adam Walton-owned Triple Eight FG Falcon is being entered in the reborn Kumho V8 Touring Car Series this year.
Former Touring Car Masters regular Jamie Tilley will be behind the wheel, with Phillip Island hosting Round 1 on May 12-14.
He’ll have beneath him 888A-015, which debuted at the 2009 Adelaide 500 in the hands of Craig Lowndes.
Both Triple Eight cars that year ran without Ford badges – replaced by ‘Hogster’ icons representing sponsor Hog’s Breath Café – after the marque withdrew its sponsorship.
Lowndes raced the car, which features in a Triple Eight history book available for pre-orders now, at the first four events of the season and took a pair of Winton wins before 888A-015 reverted to spare car status.
It returned for the enduros later that year at Phillip Island and Bathurst, where it was shared by an all-European Triple Eight line-up of Allan Simonsen and James Thompson.
It was actually in 2010 though that the car’s most memorable win came.
Handed over to then Triple Eight customer team Dick Johnson Racing, Jonathon Webb took victory amid the carnage of that wet Homebush race defined by the commentary: “He’s in the fence! They’re both in the fence! They’re all in the fence!”
That of course was as 2010 title contenders Mark Winterbottom, Jamie Whincup and James Courtney all crashed as they tried to hang in on slick tyres through a downpour.
Webb continued in the car the following season before it was run by DJR under the Paul Morris Motorsport banner for Steve Owen in 2012.
That was 888A-015’s final main game season but its significance was far from done.
Andre Heimgartner drove the car to victory at the 2013 Super2 Series round at Queensland Raceway, becoming the category’s youngest ever race winner aged 18 years and 50 days.
It was a mantle the future Supercars Championship race winner would hang onto for almost five years, before Alex Rullo (then 17 years and 324 days) won at Wanneroo Raceway in 2018.
After its Heimgartner season, the former ‘Hogster’ Falcon spent nearly seven years on the sidelines before David Murphy drove it at the 2020 Bathurst Super3 round.
Murphy continued to race the car in selected Super3 rounds in 2021 and 2022.
MORE: ‘Hogster’ back in Vodafone colours for Bathurst 2022
