Jim Richards (racing driver)

Career

Richards first made his mark in Australia at the 1974 Hardie-Ferodo 1000 with a masterful display of wet weather driving during the race, recording faster lap times than any of his opposition in the latter part of the event while driving a V8 Holden LH Torana SL/R 5000 with fellow Kiwi Rod Coppins which finished in third place. This and other wet weather drives over his career gave Richards the reputation of being a 'rainmaster' which many Australian's cynically attributed to living in rainy New Zealand, though Richards himself believes it is more from the car control he learned early in his career racing dirt track speedway.

In mid-1975 Richards moved to Australia and was quickly competitive in sports sedan races driving his Sidchrome-sponsored Mustang. He was co-driver for John Goss in 1976 at Bathurst.

Then in 1978 Richards began a successful stint at the Holden Dealer Team as Peter Brock's co-driver at Bathurst, netting Richards three Bathurst 1000 titles in a row. Brock later recalled that at the time he only knew Richards as a casual acquaintance and fellow driver, but after the Wanneroo Park round of the 1978 Australian Touring Car Championship, the pair shared a Ford Falcon panel van for the drive from Perth back to Melbourne (which they allegedly covered in approximately 24 hours for what is normally a 2-3 day trip). Upon returning home to Melbourne, Brock suggested Richards for the job of his co-driver for that years Hardie-Ferodo 1000 at Bathurst. He was hired by HDT team manager John Shepherd and although only driving once a year for the team, the Brock/Richards combination would win Bathurst in 1978, 1979 and 1980.

In 1982, Richards was hired by JPS Team BMW team manager Frank Gardner as the teams lead driver to drive the teams BMW 635 CSi. While results under the locally developed Group C regulations were lacking, when Australian touring car racing changed to the international Group A regulations in 1985, the BMW was suddenly a frequent race winner. Richards easily won the 1985 Australian Touring Car Championship and the 1985 Australian Endurance Championship. The 635 CSi was replaced by the smaller capacity BMW M3 in 1987, and Richard's would again come to the fore, winning the 1987 Australian Touring Car Championship.

Gardner shut down the JPS team at the end of 1987, and Richards re-joined Peter Brock's team for 1988, with the old HDT now running the BMW M3s after spending the previous 19 years racing Holdens. By 1988, however, the M3 had been overtaken as the car to have by the all-powerful Ford Sierra RS500, and the wins of 1987 were now struggles for places. At the end of the year, Brock's team decided to race Sierras in 1989 while Richards was snapped up by the Fred Gibson to race for his factory-backed Nissan team.

Driving for Nissan, Richards won his third ATCC in 1990 driving both the Nissan Skyline HR31 GTS-R and 4WD, twin turbo R32 GT-R, affectionately known as "Godzilla". He would repeat as champion in 1991, finishing the ATCC ahead of his young team mate Mark Skaife. Skaife then put the GT-R on pole position at Bathurst, before he and Richards cruised to victory in race record time, a lap ahead of the Holden Commodore of defending race winners Win Percy and Allan Grice.

Richards finished second to Skaife in the 1992 ATCC, before the pair then won their second straight Bathurst 1000 in a crash-shortened race which saw Jim crash the GT-R in a downpour on lap 145. However, as there had been a separate crash on that lap (which Richards later became a part of while trying to drive back to the pits), the red flag was shown and the race was declared. As the rules state that the results would be from the previous lap, this saw a surprised Richards and Skaife declared race winners. On a personal note, the 1992 Tooheys 1000 was a sad occasion for Richards when his longtime friend and former JPS BMW team mate, 1967 Formula One World Champion Denny Hulme died at the wheel of his BMW M3 on lap 32 after suffering a heart attack.

Richards was only informed of Hulme's passing just before he and Skaife took to the podium as winners, and as the unruly crowd below booed the pair (they wanted the second placed Sierra of Dick Johnson and John Bowe declared winners as they did not like a Japanese car dominating as the GT-R did), the normally gentlemanly Richards let fly with his now famous speech:

His other Australian title wins were:

His Bathurst wins have been:

He has also won the Sandown 500 in 1985 with Tony Longhurst in a BMW 635 CSi, and again in 1989 with Mark Skaife in a Nissan Skyline HR31 GTS-R.

Recently, Richards has driven in the Targa Tasmania as well as numerous other tarmac rallies in the Australian Targa Championship and other tarmac rallies, driving for Porsche. Partnering Richards as navigator has been motor racing journalist and commentator Barry Oliver. The pairing of Richards and Oliver (affectionately known as Team Grandpa in later years) has won the Targa Tasmania a record 8 times. Richards and Oliver made their debut in Targa in 1993 in a Porsche 968 CS. His final victory saw him become only the fourth winner of the event in a two-wheel-drive car, and is the last person to do so, holding off more fancied four-wheel-drive rivals over a wet Day 5 to win his last Targa Tasmania title.

Targa Tasmania wins:

Complete World Sportscar Championship results

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap)

Complete World Touring Car Championship results

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap)

† Not eligible for series points

Complete Asia-Pacific Touring Car Championship results

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap)

Complete Bathurst 1000 results

Jim Richards won the Bathurst 1000 seven times. His first three wins were in 1978, 1979 and 1980 with Peter Brock who himself won the race a record nine times (Richard's seven wins puts him second all time to Brock who won 9 times). Richards also had three wins with Mark Skaife and once with Swedish driver Rickard Rydell. Of his record 36 race starts, 22 were with a factory backed team for either Holden, BMW, Nissan or Volvo with only victory in a BMW eluding him. He finished on the podium 13 times with seven wins, three seconds and three thirds, plus one class win.

* Super Touring races

1992 Bathurst 1000

Richards is noted for his speech when he and co-driver Mark Skaife were loudly booed by the crowd after winning the 1992 Bathurst 1000 whereas normally winners were greeted with support. Skaife gave a short speech after which Richards said very few words, "I'm just really stunned for words, I can't believe the reception. I thought Australian race fans had a lot more to go than this, this is bloody disgraceful. I'll keep racing but I tell you what this is going to remain with me for a long time. You're a pack of arseholes." Podium MC and Channel 7 commentator Gary Wilkinson then suggested he could cool the crowd down with a champagne bath, to which Richards replied "I wouldn't bother."

Due to appalling weather conditions with heavy rain with multiple cars crashed and stopped on the side of the race track the race was stopped on lap 145. On lap 144 Richards, who had already crashed once rendering the car heavily damaged and barely drivable, slid off the road and came to a stop behind another crashed car. He had been leading at the time his car left the road but was overtaken by Ford driver Dick Johnson, who assumed the lead, and several other cars before the red flag was waved which ended the race. The race results were to be wound back to the last completed lap, lap 144, which would have seen Johnson the winner, but due to the large number of crashes on lap 144 the race was woundback an additional lap which meant Richards and Skaife were declared winners. This decision was unpopular with the crowd who were primarily being divided between Holden and Ford supporters and who didn't like a crashed and undriveable car being the winner.

Richards later apologised for the outburst, citing the fact that he had been told just before going out onto the podium that his longtime friend and former JPS BMW team mate Denny Hulme had died from a heart attack which he suffered while driving in the early part of the race.