The 1976 Australian Touring Car Championship was a CAMS sanctioned

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

n motor racing title for

Group C Touring Cars In relation to Australian motorsport, Group C refers to either of two sets of regulations devised by the Confederation of Australian Motor Sport (CAMS) for use in Australian Touring Car Racing from 1965 to 1984. These are not to be confused with t ...

.''Australian Title Conditions'', 1976 CAMS Manual of Motor Sport, pages 81 to 85 It was the 17th running of the

Australian Touring Car Championship The Australian Touring Car Championship (ATCC) is a touring car racing award held in Australia since 1960. The series itself is no longer contested, but the title lives on, with the winner of the Repco Supercars Championship awarded the trophy ...

.Australian Titles, docs.cams.com.au
As archived at www.webcitation.org on 31 October 2013 The championship began at

Symmons Plains Raceway Symmons Plains Raceway is a motor racing circuit in Australia, located about south of Launceston, Tasmania. Since the closure of the Longford circuit in the 1960s it has been Tasmania's premier motor racing facility. The circuit is one of the ...

on 29 February and ended at the

Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit The Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit is a motor racing circuit located near Ventnor, on Phillip Island, Victoria, Australia. The current circuit was first used in 1956. History Road circuit Motor racing on Phillip Island began in 1928 with t ...

on 28 November in the longest season in the history of the series. 1976 saw a substantial change to the ATCC calendar which was expanded to eleven rounds, incorporating the end-of-season long distance Australian Championship of Makes races for the first time. These races included Sandown's Hang Ten 400 and the

Phillip Island 500K The Phillip Island 500 was an annual motor racing event, last held for Supercars at the Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit in Phillip Island, Victoria. The race had three distinct eras; from 1971 to 1977 as an endurance production and later Austra ...

, although notably not the

Bathurst 1000 The Bathurst 1000 (formally known as the Repco Bathurst 1000) is a touring car race held annually on the Mount Panorama Circuit in Bathurst, New South Wales, Australia. It is currently run as part of the Supercars Championship, the most recen ...

. After contesting only selected rounds of the 1975 championship,

Allan Moffat Allan George Moffat OBE (born 10 November 1939 in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada) is a Canadian-Australian racing driver known for his four championships in the Australian Touring Car Championship, six wins in the Sandown 500 and his four ...

won his second Australian Touring Car Championship in 1976. He won the Calder, Oran Park and

Adelaide Adelaide ( ) is the capital city of South Australia, the state's largest city and the fifth-most populous city in Australia. "Adelaide" may refer to either Greater Adelaide (including the Adelaide Hills) or the Adelaide city centre. The dem ...

rounds, building up a mid-season points lead that his rivals could not bridge. At the Hang Ten 400 at Sandown in September, Moffat re-launched his team as the Moffat Ford Dealers team with a new

Ford XB Falcon GT The Ford Falcon (XB) is a full-size car that was produced by Ford Australia from 1973 to 1976. It was the second iteration of the third generation of the Falcon and also included the Ford Fairmont (XB), the luxury-oriented version. Overview The ...

, built after Moffat's original car and transporter were destroyed by fire on the way to the

round in June. Moffat borrowed the Ford Falcon of John Goss for the

and Lakeside rounds to stay in the series until the new car was built.

Barry Seton Barry Seton (known as 'Bo'), (born 5 October 1936), is an Australian racing driver. He won the Bathurst 500 (500-mile race, about 800 km) in 1965 with co-driver Midge Bosworth driving a Ford Cortina GT500.

, driving a

Ford Capri The Ford Capri is a fastback coupé built by Ford of Europe, designed by Philip T. Clark, who was also involved in the design of the Ford Mustang. It used the mechanical components from the Mk2 Ford Cortina and was intended as the Euro ...

in the Up to 3000 cc class, was Moffat's main title threat for most of the year, winning his class four times, with a best finish of sixth outright at

Sandown Sandown is a seaside resort and civil parishes in England, civil parish on the south-east coast of the Isle of Wight, United Kingdom with the resort of Shanklin to the south and the settlement of Lake, Isle of Wight, Lake in between. Together ...

. Seton lost second place in the championship to

Colin Bond Colin John Bond (born 24 February 1942) is a retired Australian racing driver. Bond reached the highest levels in Australian motorsport in 1969 when he was recruited by Harry Firth to the newly formed Holden Dealer Team. He quickly found succ ...

when the Holden Torana driver won the final race of the season at

Phillip Island Phillip Island (Boonwurrung: ''Corriong'', ''Worne'' or ''Millowl'') is an Australian island about south-southeast of Melbourne, Victoria. The island is named after Governor Arthur Phillip, the first Governor of New South Wales, by explorer ...

. Bond had previously won at

and Lakeside, but had mechanical failures that Moffat, even in his borrowed machinery, did not.

Drivers

The following drivers competed in the 1976 Australian Touring Car Championship.

Calendar

The 1976 Australian Touring Car Championship was contested over eleven rounds.Australian Touring Car Championship, Australian Competition Yearbook, 1977 Edition, pages 48 to 73

Class system

Cars competed in two classes, based on engine capacity: * Up to 3000 cc * 3001 to 6000 cc

Points system

Championship points were awarded to drivers on the following basis: Points were only awarded to a driver where the car had completed 75% of race distance and was running at the completion of the final lap. Only the best two results from the four long distance races could be counted by each driver.

Championship standings

Points scored in the long distance races which were not retained for championship totals are shown in the above table within double brackets.

Australian Championship of Makes

The 1976 Australian Championship of Makes was contested over a four-round series, staged concurrently with the final four rounds of the Australian Touring Car Championship. It was the sixth championship for manufacturers to be awarded by CAMS, and the first to be contested under the Australian Championship of Makes name. The title was won by

General Motors-Holden's Holden, formerly known as General Motors-Holden, was an Australian subsidiary company of General Motors. It was an Australian automobile manufacturer, importer, and exporter which sold cars under its own brand, marque in Australia. In its las ...

Class system

Cars competed in four classes based on engine capacity. * Up to 1300 cc * 1301 to 2000 cc * 2001 to 3000 cc * 3001 to 6000 cc

Points system

Championship points were awarded in each class on a 9, 6, 4, 3, 2, 1 basis, with the results of all four races counting towards the championship.

References

{{Australian Touring Car Racing Australian Touring Car Championship seasons

Touring Cars Touring car racing is a motorsport road racing competition with heavily modified road-going cars. It has both similarities to and significant differences from stock car racing, which is popular in the United States. While the cars do not mo ...