{"id":350876,"date":"2025-12-16T03:23:13","date_gmt":"2025-12-16T03:23:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/350876\/"},"modified":"2025-12-16T03:23:13","modified_gmt":"2025-12-16T03:23:13","slug":"the-rift-between-ford-icons-moffat-and-marsden","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/350876\/","title":{"rendered":"The rift between Ford icons Moffat and Marsden"},"content":{"rendered":"

THEY were the frontmen of the final years of a glory era for Ford in touring car racing; one the star driver, the other the team manager.<\/p>\n

But that doesn\u2019t mean that Allan Moffat<\/a> and Howard Marsden got along.<\/p>\n

In fact, they fell out after the final race of that era, the outcome of which was the third and final strike against Marsden in Moffat\u2019s mind.<\/p>\n

The story is told in the latest edition of Australian Muscle Car Magazine<\/a>, which contains the first of a two-part Muscle Man feature on Marsden.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Born in England, Marsden worked for touring car and Formula 1 teams in the 1960s before coming to Australia to work for Frank Matich.<\/p>\n

In mid-1971, Ford Australia recruited Marsden to take over its factory racing program, led by its GTHO series production cars, and with a pool of drivers led by Moffat.<\/p>\n

The pair had already had a run-in over tyres in America back in the 1960s when Moffat raced in the Trans-Am Series.<\/p>\n

The next strike came with the decision to delete the spoilers from the Phase III GTHO for the 1972 Bathurst 500, a decision that made the cars less stable in the tricky wet conditions that presented on race day.<\/p>\n

\"\"Moffat pits the spoiler-less XY Falcon GTHO during the \u201972 ManChamp race at Surfers Paradise. Marsden is at the front-right corner. Pic: Supplied<\/p>\n

The last came during the 1973 Phillip Island 500, a race that proved to be the last for Ford\u2019s factory touring car team before the manufacturer pulled the plug on the operation.<\/p>\n

Moffat, locked in a battle with Peter Brock<\/a> as they each tried to claim crucial points for the Manufacturers Championship title, badly flat-spotted a tyre under brakes for the old hairpin beyond what is now Miller Corner.<\/p>\n

\u201cI came into the pits complaining about a vibration,\u201d Moffat recalled. \u201cI was very reluctant ever to quit, but it was really shaking and I came in.<\/p>\n

\u201cI could see the mechanics shaking their heads, but Mr Marsden waved me out and one lap later the tyre blew at Southern Loop.<\/p>\n

\u201cI went off into the bush and thought, \u2018Oh, I\u2019m just gonna go through these bushes\u2019. I didn\u2019t realise there was a lake on the other side.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe car actually stopped about (three metres) from falling in the lake. I was bloody lucky. That wasn\u2019t too happy a day.\u201d<\/p>\n

The crash left Moffat with a broken sternum and a distaste for racing at the circuit due to its then very rough surface, while it also destroyed the XA Falcon which had won that year\u2019s Bathurst 1000.<\/p>\n

Moffat also blamed Marsden for Ford\u2019s decision to quit racing, a charge the latter denied.<\/p>\n

The cover feature for AMC Issue 154 focuses on the first performance-badged Holden, the X2 variant of the HD.<\/p>\n

Along with the Muscle Man profile on Marsden, other features include a look at Tasmanian racer\u2019s Garth Wigston\u2019s famed XW GT road car, Don Holland\u2019s Group C XU-1 Torana that continues to race to this day with his son at the wheel, plus an excerpt from an upcoming book on Lella Lombardi.<\/p>\n

Click here to buy Issue 154 of Australian Muscle Car Magazine.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"THEY were the frontmen of the final years of a glory era for Ford in touring car racing;…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":350877,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,806,805,803,804,85],"class_list":["post-350876","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motosport","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-motor","tag-motor-sports","tag-motosport","tag-motosports","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350876","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=350876"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350876\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/350877"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=350876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=350876"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=350876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}