{"id":917119,"date":"2026-10-05T15:34:12","date_gmt":"2026-10-05T15:34:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/917119\/"},"modified":"2026-10-05T15:34:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-05T15:34:12","slug":"motorsport-news-former-peter-brock-co-driver-troy-dunstan-dies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/917119\/","title":{"rendered":"Motorsport news: Former Peter Brock co-driver Troy Dunstan dies"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Former\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tTroy Dunstan. Image: Supplied <\/p>\n

Dunstan passed away aged 64 following a battle with cancer.<\/p>\n

The Gold Coaster was the nephew of leading Australian touring car driver Charlie O\u2019Brien, through which he developed his own love of cars and racing.<\/p>\n

Dunstan honed his talent behind the wheel in Formula Ford, taking the 1991 national title in the Speedtech team set up in partnership with Terry Morris.<\/p>\n

Formula Ford success led to touring car opportunities with Advantage Racing, sharing the #05 Mobil Commodore with Brock in the 1992 Sandown 500.<\/p>\n

Dunstan drove the team\u2019s second car in that year\u2019s Bathurst 1000 with Andrew Miedecke, finishing seventh in his first of four consecutive Great Race starts.<\/p>\n

A 1993 endurance campaign aboard Advantage\u2019s Quix-backed VP Commodore with Steve Harrington netted third at Sandown and fifth at Bathurst.<\/p>\n

Despite those results, a full-time touring car chance never came and Dunstan\u2019s remaining Bathurst starts occured in privateer Holdens alongside Bob Jones and Paul Romano.<\/p>\n

Sadly, Dunstan lost his wife Wendy to cancer earlier this year.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think he was totally underrated as a driver,\u201d O\u2019Brien told Speedcafe.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe had an incredible toughness and it was good to see him get a couple of breaks after his success in Formula Ford, but he probably deserved more.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was also an outstanding mechanic and just had a solid idea of how things worked.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a sad year after losing Wendy and then Troy having his own battle with the same cancer.<\/p>\n

\u201cI guess Troy\u2019s passing is just another example as to why we need to live every day to the fullest.\u201d<\/p>\n

Paul Morris was teammates with Dunstan at Speedtech in the early 1990s, including during the latter\u2019s title-winning season.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Troy Dunstan with Paul Morris. Image: Supplied<\/p>\n

\u201cTroy is the only bloke I knew that could drink 20 rum and cokes, wake up the next morning, eat a pie, have a smoke and then go out and win a motor race!\u201d said Morris.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was my first real teammate and I learned a lot from him. We also had a lot of great times.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was a brilliant mechanic, engineer and a terrific driver. There are not many that could do it all.\u201d<\/p>\n

Paul\u2019s father Terry also paid tribute to Dunstan\u2019s talent as both a driver and mechanic.<\/p>\n

\u201cPaul was a bit of a fan of Troy\u2019s and we met him through the Queensland Gemini Series,\u201d explained Terry.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe then got an introduction to Formula Ford and bought one and Troy had a bit of success.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo we bought a second car and then created Speedtech in partnership with Troy and he built quite a successful business.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was a terrific driver, but I always just marvelled at his hands when he was working on the car and engine, especially when there were some time restraints to get things done.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Owner of BAM Media and founder of Speedcafe.com, Brett \u2018Crusher\u2019 Murray had Dunstan as one of this first driver\/team clients in the sport and travelled to England with him.<\/p>\n

Dunstan contested the prestigious British Formula Ford Festival at Brand Hatch following his Australian Formula Ford title, which was then dubbed the Driver to Europe Series.<\/p>\n

\u201cSpeedtech was my first client for BAM Media and my start in motorsport media and public relations,\u201d said Murray.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was on an extremely steep learning curve as a young bloke, but the job was a little easier when you had a couple of decent racers in Troy and Paul. A couple of blokes who also like to have a good time.<\/p>\n

\u201cNone of us will forget the night after he won his first ever four-wheel race in the Formula Ford at Eastern Creek in Sydney \u2013 that party was a cracker.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen Troy won the Formula Ford title I was fortunate enough to go to the British Formula Ford Festival with him at Brand Hatch.<\/p>\n

\u201cI stayed in a motorhome on track with his mechanics, Brett and Col, and he was terrifically fast before an angry European drove him off the track on the main straight!<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was a ripping bloke, who was a serious racer.\u201d<\/p>\n

Speedcafe.com extends its condolences to Dunstan\u2019s family and friends.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Troy Dunstan. Image: Supplied Dunstan passed away aged 64 following a battle with cancer. The Gold Coaster was…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":917120,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,806,805,803,804,9910,85,484951],"class_list":["post-917119","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-slot2","tag-sports","tag-troy-dunstan"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/917119","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=917119"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/917119\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/917120"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=917119"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=917119"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=917119"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}