The1983 James Hardie 1000 was a motor race forGroup C Touring Cars contested at theMount Panorama Circuit,Bathurst,New South Wales,Australia on 2 October 1983. It was the 24th "Bathurst 1000" and the third to carry the James Hardie 1000 name. The race, which took place as part of Round 4 of the1983 Australian Endurance Championship, was contested over 163 laps of the 6.172 km circuit, a total distance of 1006.036 km.
TheHolden Dealer Team took a controversial, but legal, victory with the team's secondHolden VH Commodore SS driven byJohn Harvey,Peter Brock andLarry Perkins. Harvey and Phil Brock qualified the car but after the #05 car blew its engine on lap 8, Peter Brock and Perkins transferred themselves into Harvey's car. Phil Brock never drove the car on race day and was forced to spectate as his three teammates won the race in the car he qualified in, a decision that he claimed was made by Perkins as team manager despite Perkins being the slowest qualifier of the quartet and despite it also being legal for four drivers to drive one car (something Perkins refutes claiming the rules only allowed a maximum of three drivers per car). The car was also the car which Peter Brock and Larry Perkins had won the race in1982 and updated to 1983 specs, meaning this Holden Commodore became the first race car to win the Bathurst 1000 twice. The Holden Dealer Team Commodore finished a lap ahead ofAllan Moffat and Japanese driverYoshimi Katayama in theirPeter Stuyvesant sponsoredMazda RX-7. It would be the closest Mazda would get to winning the race. Third was theSTPRoadways Racing Holden Commodore driven by 1982 pole sitterAllan Grice and1969 winnerColin Bond.
Only three cars in the race were driven by drivers who had both previously won the race. The three cars were: the #05Holden Dealer Team (enteredHolden VH Commodore SS of defending race winners Brock and Perkins), the #17Ford XE Falcon ofDick Johnson andKevin Bartlett, and the #16Nissan Bluebird Turbo ofFred Gibson andJohn French.
Entries were divided into two classes based on engine capacity:[1]
For cars of over 3000cc engine capacity, it featuredBMW 635 CSi,Chevrolet Camaro,Ford Falcon,Holden Commodore,Mazda RX-7 andNissan Bluebird.[1]
For cars of under 3000cc engine capacity, it featuredAlfa Romeo GTV6,Audi 5+5,Ford Capri,Isuzu Gemini andNissan Pulsar.[1]the race for the under 3 litre class was won by Australian Driver Allan "ACE" Cant and co driver and team owner NZ born Les Grose in the #64 wideline windows ford capri.
The final order of the first ten grid positions was established in the "Hardies Heroes" session on the day before the race.[2] This involved the fastest eight cars from qualifying plus two others at the discretion of the organisers contesting two, single timed laps, one car at a time.[2] The fastest lap of each car set its grid position.[2]
| Pos | No | Entrants | Driver | Car | HH | Qual |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pole | 05 | Marlboro Holden Dealer Team |  Peter Brock | Holden VH Commodore SS | 2:16.270 | 2:15.3 |
| 2 | 15 | Nissan Motor Co. Australia P/L | George Fury | Nissan Bluebird Turbo | 2:17.509 | 2:17.2 |
| 3 | 3 | Cadbury-Schweppes Pty. Ltd. | David Parsons | Holden VH Commodore SS | 2:18.212 | 2:17.8 |
| 4 | 31 | JPS Team BMW |  Jim Richards | BMW 635 CSi | 2:18.414 | 2:17.6 |
| 5 | 25 | Marlboro Holden Dealer Team | John Harvey | Holden VH Commodore SS | 2:18.549 | 2:18.0 |
| 6 | 22 | Cullen Automotive Industries | Warren Cullen | Holden VH Commodore SS | 2:18.563 | 2:18.3 |
| 7 | 11 | Soundwave Discos | Garry Rogers | Holden VH Commodore SS | 2:18.648 | 2:18.5 |
| 8 | 6 | STPRoadways Racing | Allan Grice | Holden VH Commodore SS | 2:18.963 | 2:17.8 |
| 9 | 4 | John Sands Racing | Bob Morris | Holden VH Commodore SS | 2:21.184 | 2:19.1 |
| 10 | 17 | Palmer Tube Mills | Dick Johnson | Ford XE Falcon | No time | 2:16.3 |
* This wasPeter Brock's record 5th pole position at Bathurst having previously taken pole in1974,1977,1978 and1979. This saw him move one clear ofAllan Moffat who had been on pole four times. It was also the last time he would set pole driving aHolden, though he did sit on pole in1997, but it was his co-driverMark Skaife who had set the time in the runoff
*Dick Johnson crashed in Hardies Heroes destroying his Greens-TufFalcon. In a show of goodwill no other teams in the race objected to the replacement #17 car starting the race from 10th position.
* 1983 saw the first appearance byBMW in Hardies Heroes withJim Richards qualifying hisJPS Team BMW635 CSi in 4th place.BMW became the 6th manufacturer to appear in Hardies Heroes followingHolden,Ford,Chevrolet,Mazda andNissan. The BMW was also the first6 cyl engined car to appear in the runoff.
*1983 Australian Touring Car Champion and winner of the recentCastrol 400 atSandown Allan Moffat was expected to easily make the top ten with his13B poweredMazda RX-7, but could only qualify the car 14th, two places behind teammateGregg Hansford whose car was running the less powerful12A engine. This led to accusations of sandbagging by other leading teams, especially theHolden Dealer Team which claimed that Moffat was deliberately holding the car back in qualifying rather than showing its real speed.
* The four-cylinder (Z18ET)Nissan Bluebird Turbo driven byGeorge Fury was the first non-V8 powered car to start on the front row at Bathurst sincePeter Brock started second in1973 in a6cylHolden LJ Torana GTR XU-1.
* With sevenVH Commodore's in the top 10 this was Holden's greatest representation ever in the runoff. On the other side of the coin, Johnson's Falcon was the onlyFord in the top 10, the lowest ever number for that manufacturer.
Full results of the 1983 James Hardie 1000 were:
