The overlooked hero

The bloke who broke Holden’s Bathurst duck is little known outside racing circles and AMC’s readership. Yet there’s so much more to Bruce McPhee’s story and victory than what’s been previously told. With the help of Bruce’s daughter Anne and race mechanic Mark Levenspiel – and previously unseen photographs – we shed new light on the McPhee team’s landmark 1968 Bathurst win and the man himself.

Story: Luke West

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Before Brock, Firth and the Holden Dealer Team there was Bruce McPhee. It might surprise some Holden enthusiasts, especially those blinded by devotion to racing rock star Brock, but the marque’s long history of success on the Mountain began with a character far removed from HDT fold – in more ways than one.

The fact Bruce McPhee was not based in the motor racing epicentre of Melbourne, nor the big smoke of Sydney, but in regional NSW meant he was largely off the radar. McPhee was entrenched on his beloved Central Coast, out of sight and out of mind of ‘the establishment’. Even after he won the 1968 Hardie-Ferodo 500 there was no support from GM-H. Nor, as the years passed, was he widely known outside his own stomping ground. Yet in the Wyong district today, his family, friends and car enthusiasts remain fiercely proud of their man’s achievements.