Tassie Hall of Fame inducts track legends, stalwarts

The world-famous Longford Grand Prix track has been immortalised with an induction into the Tasmanian Motorsport Hall of Fame, along with race engineer Peter Turnbull, and official and administrator Steven Chopping OAM, who reached the worldwide pinnacle of the sport.

The Longford track came into being in 1953 when it hosted its first race meeting – a combined motorcycle and car racing event which attracted 40,000 spectators over three days of competition.

The 7.2 km circuit hosted 14 international meetings up until 1968, attracting no less than seven reigning world champions, including Sir Jack Brabham.

Longford also hosted the final round of the Tasman Cup, held over eight rounds in Australia and New Zealand in the 1960s, as well as the Australian Grand Prix in 1959 and 1965 and the Australian Tourist Trophy for Sports Cars in 1960, 1964 and 1966.

Motorcycles were an integral part of the programme up until 1966 for both solos and sidecars, with the Australian TT held at Longford in 1953, 1959 and 1965, and the Australian Grand Prix in 1960 and 1966.

Escalating costs and major upgrades required to meet ever increasing safety requirements spelled the demise of the circuit in early 1969.

Steven Chopping began competing in car club events at 16 years of age, racing in autocross and grass roots level meetings including club day speed events.

He continued with lower level competition until 1974, when he purchased an Elfin Formula Ford, going on to race in Formula Ford, Formula 2, Formula Vees and a variety of sports sedans and production cars until 1984.

Steve Chopping. Image: SUPPLIED

Off the track he had many roles, including president of the Hobart Sporting Car Club, the Tasmanian correspondent for Racing Car News magazine and Motoring News International from 1966 to 1980.

He also had a weekly radio programme on 7HT from 1972 to 1979, a weekly column in the Saturday Evening Mercury newspaper from 1970 to 1980, and commentated on ABC TV live motorsport broadcasts.

During over 40 years involvement in motorsport, Steven rose through the ranks of officialdom, including roles as chairman of stewards for the Australian Rally Championship, the Australian V8 Supercars Championship, 14 years as an official steward for the Australian Formula One Grand Prix, being an international Formula One steward for seven years, chairman of stewards for Formula 2 and Formula 3, as well as the World Touring Car Championship.

Steven was named FIA international steward of the year in 2013 and awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia in 2017 for his services to motorsport.

Peter Turnbull started racing in 1964, competing in hillclimbs and motorkhanas with the North West Car Club and the Morris 850 Club, before taking up circuit racing.

By then, Peter and Tony Hamilton had already built the first Turnham race car in what was to become a long line of Turnhams over the next 50-plus years.

The name came from Turn for Turnbull and Ham for Hamilton. During his racing career, Peter has competed at 45 different motor racing circuits around Australia.

Peter Turnbull. Image: SUPPLIED

Back home in Tasmania, Peter also met with success with wins and placings in numerous races at Baskerville and Symmons Plains between 1969 and 1984.

The Turnham cars he built also had considerable success and it was not uncommon in the early 1970s to see up to five cars built by Peter competing in the same race.

Over the years, he built and fabricated a number of sports cars, clubmans, and Formula Vees.

Between 1966 and 1978, Peter built three sports racing cars and three clubman cars, but they were known by 15 different names and underwent modification to more than 20 different motor and body configurations and meeting with considerable success at the hands of various drivers.

One of the most successful Turnham cars was the Turnham Bandit, built for Andrew Walker in 2003 for hillclimb racing in NSW.

Over the next 10 years, Andrew, and Peter, who drove the car occasionally, had considerable success, with Andrew winning his class and setting a course record at the King Edward Hillclimb, Peter winning his class and setting a class record at the Ringwood Hillclimb, and Andrew finishing on the podium for his class on three occasions in the NSW Hillclimb Championships.

The Tasmanian Motorsport Hall of Fame is prestigious in the Apple Isle and was founded in 1989, well before the Australian Motorsport Hall of Fame’s establishment in 2016.

Congratulations to Peter, Steven, and the Longford motor racing community.

-MARTIN AGATYN

Top image: The Lotuses of Graham Hill and Jim Clark and the Dino Ferrari of Chris Amon lead the Tasman Series field off Long Bridge during the last Longford event in 1968. Image: SUPPLIED

There’s lots more loaded into a bumper edition of AUTO ACTION magazine, on sale at newsagents and available digitally here.

For more of the latest motorsport news, subscribe to AUTO ACTION magazine.