IT’S a part of Mount Panorama as iconic as any of its famed corners – but how did the big sign on the side of the mountain come to be?
The big, bold, white letters have been an eye-catching feature of the circuit since 1989 – as you might recall from our Trivia Quiz episode of the V8 Sleuth Podcast earlier this year! – and is always a welcome sight for everyone travelling to Mount Panorama, whether as a driver, mechanic, team member or spectator.
The latest issue of Australian Muscle Car Magazine outlines the story of where the idea came from, how it was executed, and the remarkable numbers around its size and its maintenance.
Headlining AMC Issue 120 is a cover story on a rare surviving Holden Dealer Team Torana LC XU-1, the very machine taken by Harry Firth to the Macau Grand Prix in 1971 for a young Peter Brock to drive in the Guia Trophy race.
The ‘Yellow Dolly’ hued machine served as one of the HDT cars for just over 12 months, taking in a Bathurst 500 start amid a host of Series Production racing before its adventure to Macau, where both Brock’s HDT Torana and Allan Moffat’s works Ford Falcon GT-HO Phase III took on a variety of exotic race machinery on the fast but narrow street circuit.
Issue 120 takes a deeper look at the LC version of the XU-1 Torana, often overshadowed by its younger sibling the LJ-model but no less important in Holden’s racing history.
The last issue to go to sale with Holden as an active brand also covers its triumph in the 2020 Bathurst 1000, paired with a retrospective on its first major Australian Touring Car Championship triumph in 1970 courtesy of Norm Beechey’s ‘Trans-Aus’ Improved Production Monaro HT GTS 350.
Also featured is a look at the design and development of ‘Project Barra’, Ford’s BA Falcon, while the Muscle Man profile focuses on open-wheel and touring car veteran Bob Muir.
