CHAZ Mostert’s victory in Sunday’s final race of the Tasmania SuperSprint snapped a number of well-publicised droughts in the Repco Supercars Championship.
It was Mostert’s first win since Albert Park in March 2019 and Walkinshaw Andretti United’s first since Scott Pye’s breakthrough at the same venue 12 months earlier.
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Sunday’s result was also Mostert’s first win at Symmons Plains in his 17th start at the venue, and the team’s first Tassie win since 2009, when it was competing as the Holden Racing Team.
While those were the stats that mattered, keen V8 Sleuth fans will enjoy learning of a far longer drought that was broken; that for the number #25.
The last win for a #25 car in the ATCC/Supercars Championship came all the way back in July 1994, when Tony Longhurst took his Logamo Racing Holden Commodore VP to victory in Race 1 at Barbagallo.
Adding to the stat, both wins for #25 were achieved by leading home car #11, which in 1994 was driven by Larry Perkins and on Sunday Anton de Pasquale!
Mostert was just two years old when that Barbagallo race took place while de Pasquale was not born for another 14 months.
The Longhurst and Perkins VPs both feature in V8 Sleuth’s upcoming book, Perkins Engineering: The Cars 1986-2008, which can be pre-ordered now in the V8 Sleuth Bookshop.
Mostert chose #25 when he moved to WAU at the start of last year, opting for a “fresh start” with the squad which had traditionally run #2 and #22.
It had last been used by James Courtney at WAU in 2018 in place of #22 as the team celebrated 25 years of support from Mobil 1.
That was the first time #25 had been run in nearly 10 years, dating back to its five-year stretch with Britek Motorsport for Steven Owen, Warren Luff and then team owner Jason Bright himself.
Longhurst had earlier made #25 his trademark, campaigning it with JPS Team BMW in 1986 (the number signifying the sponsor’s 25-packs) and then with his own team from 1989 through until the end of 1999.
He achieved five wins with the number; four of those coming with BMW M3s across the 1991 and ’92 seasons and the last during his single season aboard the Benson & Hedges Commodore.
Outside of Longhurst and Mostert, the #25’s only other ATCC/Supercars Championship race win was scored by none other than Peter Brock at Sandown in 1977, driving a Bill Patterson Racing Torana.
