Three Bathurst antagonists come together: John Woodley
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In the third and final instalment of this three-part series, we hear Woodley’s view of the race, which was eventually won in wet conditions by the 19-year old Boulden on his TZ750 Yamaha. Woodley managed to take out third in the thrilling race behind Crosby; a remarkable effort considering he gave away 250cc to his combatants on his RG500 Suzuki.
“(On winning the Australian 500cc Championship race on the Saturday) Yes (I won), but I got lucky. The sprocket holder bolt was coming loose so it started to affect the swing arm. When I pulled into the pits at the end of the race, it was done; there was none left of the bolt so it was dead lucky.
“I wasn’t at all that confident about winning until about lap eight where I thought ‘I’ve actually got a chance here’, and that’s where my strategy started to develop and I decided I had to lead heading onto Conrod on the last lap to have any chance.
“I put new brake pads on the bike for the warm-up lap, and later on going through Forrest Elbow down through the last turn onto Conrod Straight, the brake lever felt funny, and I wasn’t prepared to do the big dive. Ron was really holding on beautifully and Croz came past.
“While those blokes were too busy dealing with each other, I tried to slither down the right hand side.
“Through McPhillamy I was reasonably strong, but the only time I gave Ron and Croz a lesson was at Forrest Elbow on the last lap where I was able to overtake them there. The strategy was to lead on Conrod and that’s what I did, but I didn’t quite have the mettle to trust the brake at the end.
“That race was probably my most enjoyable. In hindsight, I think I had the best bike for the job and should have won it. I think Croz did a brilliant job on the bike he had and Ron rode a beautiful tactical race with a very fast motorbike and good thinking to use it.
“I became famous because of that race.”
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