Brock: of the Knotted Crowd, a Thin, Bearded Man Scribblers
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the book on 18 gilt-edged years. At the front General Motors, riding shotgun with various Brock: of the knotted crowd, a thin, bearded man scribblers. He'd done it often, and we knew looked on intensely, showing no emotion. The each other pretty well - professionally – after papers called him The Guru, but his name is Le Mans, the stories on HDT and all those Countdown to Dowker – Dr Eric Dowker. races over all those years. I even owned one of his cars - a special he'd knocked up under Catastrophe Then John Harvey turned and melted into the the old mate’s act. Even so, it was time to ask crowd, as the backslappers and the media a delicate question: descended on Peter Brock. Quietly, in an Edited by Ian Williams uncrowded corner, Harvey gave vent to his "What's this new gizmo I keep hearing This article has been reprinted with the feelings. “The warning bells have been ringing whispers about, Brocky, that one that permission of the Editor from Wheels for six months and l've said to him, 'Can't you fixes unleaded fuel?" Magazine’s April 1987 edition. hear them?" Neatly and with good humour, he skirted the Harvey spoke with great sadness and question but offered to tell me more when he resignation about a partner he'd worked with was ready. for 12 years. "Next week is our last chance, and if that doesn't work, then it's all over. The gizmo first appeared - unannounced - on He'll have to compromise, but I can't see that one of his cars just prior to the VL launch. lt happening in his present frame of mind. l'll was attached to the plenum chamber, but support him, yeah, until lt looks totally Holden didn't know what it was and neither hopeless. But if we can't get cars from Holden did anyone else. Brock wasn't saying, then we're buggered. That's the although scuttlebutt suggested he'd bottomline ..." developed an anti-pinging device to get more compression - and thus more power - into Five days later John Harvey, the most loyal unleaded V8 engines. lf he'd done that, he knight The King of Bathurst ever had, joined was sitting on a fortune. Allan Moffat and so many others by resigning his commission. For Peter Brock, the Meanwhile there were stories emanating countdown had finally reached zero. from the racing team that no journalist could believe, let alone print. Magnets in the dyno ZERO MINUS 22 MONTHS room, magnets under the bonnet of race cars, Peter Brock, one of Australia's best loved Sunday, June 17, 1984. Le Mans. crystals too, and strips of shiny foil ... surely Brock was shattered. Mentally and physically. not we said. After all, this is Brock we're and most successful sportsmen, has reached the end of his l8 year association with Living in the same chateau, sharing the same talking about. Holden. Phil Scott tells how. dinner table, it wasn't hard to observe the effort Brock expended. The fraught Sarthe 24 Time passed and the rumours gathered The background music was bright and brassy: Hour campaign with Larry Perkins had left strength. Ray Borrett, Holden engineer and him drained, and after all that buildup, all the factory link man with the HDT, would just the rollicking Glen Miller number In the Mood. John Harvey, cigarette in hand was feeling publicity, the defeat hurt very badly. Brock shrug his shoulders when l’d mention Brock’s had failed and he returned to Australia ailing, box. He'd tell me l'd better ask Peter about it. neither bright nor particularly brassy. The black dinner suit perfectly matched his desperately in need of rest and relief from the Ray, one of Holden's straight arrows and a disposition. unrelenting stress of the previous month. friend of Brock, was uncharacteristically ill at ease on the subject. He had good reason, for Harvey knew what he was looking at: he saw His wife Bev introduced him to Dr Eric ultimately it would be a major factor in Brock Dowker, a chiropractor and natural health warning him off the HDT site. Other Holden beyond the black-tie glitter, the chandeliers, celebrities and television cameras. John wizard. Brock looked terrible. There were executives and key members of the racing Harvey believed he was witnessing the final rumours he had cancer, others said he'd team were perplexed. Dr Dowker's influence moments in a countdown to self destruction. suffered fibreglass poisoning driving the Bob was becoming more apparent and it created He was watching a mate commit - at very Jane Monza. some unease in the corridors of power and on the workshop floor. Unease is probably the least - corporate suicide. At worst, a hero-to- zero slide into oblivion. Under Dowker's guidance, Brock regained his wrong word. Coincidentally or otherwise, first strength, gave up the cigarettes, and Larry Perkins, then engine builder Neil Burns Loyalty, but not blind loyalty was all he had seemingly returned to his old self. At work, it quit. Former Holden National Service left. That and the sliver of hope that even this was business as usual at his burgeoning Manager John Stevenson, who left GMH to Special Vehicles division. At home, Brock had run the road-car side of Brock's business, late, he might be able to salvage a reconciliation from the ashes. a new friend. Dr Dowker had become more had resigned some time earlier. than a chiropractor and health adviser. It had begun a long time ago, this business, ZERO MINUS 12 MONTHS ZERO MINUS NINE MONTHS and it was not of his making. He had tried Tuesday, February 18, 1986. Friday, May 9, 1986 desperately, valiantly, to wind back the clock, Brock was in lhe passenger's seat as we A letter arrived from Peter Brock, asking me reverse the tide . but he was fighting a approached Byron Bay on the official Holden to call in and see him for the run-down on his drive-day for the new VL model Commodore. little "sucker". On an overcast Friday force that defied logic and the normal rules. afternoon, we sat down in his inner office and John Harvey watched as his friend, business He was relaxed and talkative as we punted he talked. I was unprepared for what partner and co-driver Peter Brock took to the along through the northern hinterland, followed: Brock's box had a name. He called it podium and unveiled the car that symbolised towards a lunchtime stop at the Byron Surf The Energy Polarizer, and it wasn't an Club. Brock was doing his usual PR bit for anti-pinging device. In his own words: his obsession. At that moment Brock closed middle. To give my newspaper, The Sun- "lt’s a magic cure - it makes a shithouse car Herald, its due, the story ran uncut on May good." Polarizer rear window sticker 18. lt caused quite a stir in motorsport circles and also within the motor industry. There Uh. huh. How does it work? Eyes flashing, Brocky arced the Momo over were worried looks at Holden. and squeezed down on the gas. The protests "Physics doesn't recognise that this energy of squealing rubber echoed off warehouse It wasn't until several months later that the exists or that it can do these things." he said. walls in the deserted back streets of Port significance of the rear window sticker was "So, the laws of physics are going to have to Melbourne. explained to me. “This sticker, you see, had to be redefined." be positioned exactly - because it acted as an "l know it's good. I know it's teriffic." he said, antenna for the polarizer. The star-spangled Was this really Peter Brock talking, the self- "and I know eventually it will become motif actually gathered energy from the taught engineer, the practical hard-nosed accepted . ." atmosphere...” racer? The words suggested otherwise but the delivery and the manner were totally The automatic kicked down a gear. Brock, ZERO MINUS FIVE MONTHS plausible. animated now, flicked the car left then right September 25, 1986 through a roundabout: Coombe Circuit, England. The Polarizer explained The prototype Calais Director, especially built "l refuse to accept the conventional, you Extracts from the DB Tech description of the Energy by the HDT and Holden emerges from a know. l've always had an inquisitive mind: Polarizer comparison test program against the M5 always read a heap of books and the most BMW, Ford Cosworth Sierra and Mercedes- "The polarizer is a transmitter that sends out outrageous ones are the ones that appeal to Benz 190 2.3-16 in fourth place. The car is on an ultra-high frequency charge that's neither me most. lt gets the brain thinking - what did the first leg of a round-the-world road test electric nor magnetic. lt's a form of energy the human race know at some other time that program initiated by Wheels Magazine, that is called orgone energy ... it makes a car run it doesn't know any more?" to take in the US and Japan. The idea was Quieter, smoother and takes away a lot of begun in February 1985 when editor Peter those oscillations and squeak because the We sped down an indifferent piece of Robinson first spoke to Brock about the idea molecules are in nice alignment. It's the concrete roadway to Yara Bay. Brock was of comparing a Brock Commodore against the difference between flying over a piece of positively effusive: best sports sedans in the world.