1964 Tasman Series

1964 Tasman Series
Champion Bruce McLaren
Previous:	none	Next:	1965

The 1964 Tasman Series was an international motor racing series contested in New Zealand and Australia over eight races beginning on 4 January and ending on 2 March. It was the first Tasman Series.

The inaugural series was a battle of the British-based expats, as a two-car team entered under the name of Ecurie Vitesse, led by Australian Jack Brabham. They faced a two-car team of Coopers from Bruce McLaren Motor Racing, led by the Kiwi himself. Although Denny Hulme won the opening round of the series, McLaren a took trifecta of wins in New Zealand setting up the title, but when the teams moved to Australia, Brabham won the first three races, setting up the series for a thrilling finish, however the points system denied that, as Brabham was unable to improve his score, and therefore McLaren emerged as champion. For the record, the last round of the series at Longford was won by the Englishman, Graham Hill, securing a top six points finish in the final standing as a result. Hill won the race at Longford but Brabham was the star, leading until the last laps before transmission failure.

The most successful of the local-based drivers was John Youl. Although the Cooper he was driving was three-years old, he took the aging T55 to six top 5 finishes. Meanwhile, Australian Bib Stillwell only completed in three races, twice beating Youl, including a second place in the Australian Grand Prix. Another quick local was Frank Matich in his Brabham BT7A, taking pole at Warwick Farm. Whilst leading, his suspension broke and was forced to retire. With a further four retirements, Matich only finished one race he entered, a third place at Longford .

Results and standings

Races

Round		Name	Circuit	Date	Winning driver	Winning car	Winning team	Report
New Zealand	1	Levin International	Levin	4 January	Denny Hulme	Brabham-Climax BT4	Ecurie Vitesse	Report
	2	New Zealand Grand Prix	Pukekohe	11 January	Bruce McLaren	Cooper-Climax T70	Bruce McLaren Motor Racing	Report
	3	Lady Wigram Trophy	Wigram	18 January	Bruce McLaren	Cooper-Climax T70	Bruce McLaren Motor Racing	Report
	4	Teretonga International	Teretonga	25 January	Bruce McLaren	Cooper-Climax T70	Bruce McLaren Motor Racing	Report
Australia	5	Australian Grand Prix	Sandown	9 February	Jack Brabham	Brabham-Climax BT7A	Ecurie Vitesse	Report
	6	Warwick Farm International	Warwick Farm	16 February	Jack Brabham	Brabham-Climax BT7A	Ecurie Vitesse	Report
	7	Lakeside International	Lakeside	23 February	Jack Brabham	Brabham-Climax BT7A	Ecurie Vitesse	Report
	8	South Pacific Trophy	Longford	2 March	Graham Hill	Brabham-Climax BT4	Scuderia Veloce	Report
Source:

Standings

One score could be dropped from the Australian races and one could be dropped from the New Zealand races, however the dropped races could not include the Australian Grand Prix or the New Zealand Grand Prix. Dropped scores indicated in brackets.

Position	1	2	3	4	5	6
Points	9	6	4	3	2	1

Pos Driver LEV PUK WIG TER SAN WAR LAK LON Pts 1 Bruce McLaren (3) 1 1 1 Ret 2 (3) 2 39 (47) 2 Jack Brabham Ret 2 1 1 1 Ret 33 3 Denny Hulme 1 2 3 Ret 5 5 9 23 4 Timmy Mayer 2 3 8 2 4 3 Ret DNS 23 5 John Youl 4 4 4 DNS 3 Ret 2 5 21 6 Graham Hill 4 1 12 7 Bib Stillwell 2 6 4 10 8 Jim Palmer (6) 5 5 3 6 10 8 9 (10) 9 Tony Shelly 5 6 (6) 4 8 7 5 7 8 (9) 10 Frank Matich Ret Ret Ret Ret 3 4 11 Frank Gardner 10 13 4 9 3 12 Bill Thomasen Ret DNS 5 2 13 Roly Levis 7 9 10 6 1 Lex Davison Ret 8 6 1 Glynn Scott Ret Ret 6 1 — Rex Flowers 8 12 7 Ret 12 8 0 — Andy Buchanan 10 7 9 0 — Greg Cusack 11 7 10 0 — Arnold Glass 7 Ret Ret Ret 0 — Jim Boyd Ret 7 0 — Ken Sager 11 11 8 0 — David Young 8 Ret 0 — Neil Whittaker 9 0 — David Walker 9 Ret Ret Ret 0 — Leo Geoghegan Ret 9 0 — Dene Hollier 10 0 — Peter Slocombe 11 0 — Jack Hobden 11 0 — Mel McEwin Ret 12 0 — Chris Amon Ret Ret Ret Ret 0 — Charlie Smith Ret Ret 0 — Jack Hunnam Ret Ret 0 — Bill Patterson Ret Ret 0 — Tony Osborne Ret Ret 0 — Bruce Abernethy Ret 0 — Doug Whiteford Ret 0 — Keith Rilstone Ret 0 — David Fletcher Ret 0 — Wally Mitchell Ret 0 — Lionel Ayers Ret 0 — Barry Porter DNS 0 — Ken Smith DNQ 0 Pos Driver LEV PUK WIG TER SAN WAR LAK LON Pts

Colour Result Gold Winner Silver 2nd place Bronze 3rd place Green Points finish Blue Non-points finish Non-classified finish (NC) Purple Retired (Ret) Red Did not qualify (DNQ) Did not pre-qualify (DNPQ) Black Disqualified (DSQ) White Did not start (DNS) Withdrew (WD) Race cancelled (C) Blank Did not participate (DNP) Excluded (EX)

Key

Abbreviation	Circuit
LAK	Lakeside
LEV	Levin
LON	Longford
PUK	Pukekohe
SAN	Sandown
TER	Teretonga
WAR	Warwick Farm
WIG	Wigram