Winton Festival of Speed
1-3 August 2025
Report by ? Pics by Phil Wisewould
Qualifying
Another fantastic turnout for Historic Touring Cars with over 40 cars entered. With only one grid this year, it will make for interesting racing.
Qualifying didn’t get off the best of starts with an incident not long into the session, with a significant oil spill that caused the session to be red flagged without most of the files completing a lap.
After consultation with the stewards & competitors, it was deemed that another qualifying session needed to happen, so that took the place of our Race 1.
The session this time was completed with Brad Tilley putting his mighty little Mustang on Pole.
A fantastic effort from Marc Tessari to grab a front row spot in his 350 HQ Monaro.
Peter McNiven, Michael Miceli and a returning Chris Stern took the top 5 spots.
The rest of the grid was quite a close battle between Camaro’s, Torana’s and the usual gaggle of Cortina’s & Mini’s with Glenn Miles in the Charger rounding out the top ten.
Race 1
Marc Tessari had some brake issues in the Monaro so was unable to take his place on the front row of the grid leaving a nice gap for Michael Miceli on the second row.
Brad Tilley got a great start and put a gap to the rest before the first corner, with Peter McNiven holding out Miceli in the Mustang to slot into second, with Chris Stern behind Miceli in fourth.
With this race being 10min in duration, the positions up front stayed pretty much the same with some great dicing toward the middle of the field between Peter Meuleman, Geoff Munday and Glenn Miles in the Charger. Adrian Moyle in his first drive in the rotary Mazda had a coming together with Craig Miles in the Charger causing both to DNF.
Brad Tilley crossed the line in first, from Peter McNiven, Miceli in third and it was a great drive from Joshua Axford in the Escort to edge out Chris Stern for fourth. Adam Bressington rounded out the top ten in the Mini.
Race 2
The 50km race saw Marc Tessari returned in the HQ Monaro, albeit at the back of the grid, leaving Brad Tilley & Peter McNiven to battle it out to the first corner. A nice even start between Tilley & McNiven with Tilley taking the first corner due to the inside line, with Miceli in third, Joshua Axford slotting into fourth and Geoff Munday in the Camaro getting the jump on Chris Stern’s Mustang, not far behind. Some good clean racing saw everyone get through turn one and the esses.
By the end of lap one the field had settled in position and the tactics were on to see who could last the 50kms.
Brad Tilley with the failing brakes from last year in his mind, cleared out at the front to create as much buffer as he could before the Mazda’s & Escorts came into their own toward the end of the race. David Murphy in the Torana was carving his way through the field, working his way up to fifth and had Mudany’s Camoaro in his sights. Tilley had now worked his way to a decent lead over McNiven as the field started to stringout. There was some great racing down further in the field between Phil Barrow in the “humpy”,Gordon Cox & Anthony Green both in Cortina’s with the old Holden winning out.
Due to some time constraints we didn’t quite get to the 50km, but with Peter McNiven reducing the gap toward the closing stages, it was not going to be a repeat of last year’s dramatic finish, with Brad Tilley in another great drive taking the chequered flag ahead of McNiven, a well earned third for Joshua Axford holding out Michael Miceli in the Mustang with Geoff Munday in fifth. The great battles continued down the field with Gary Finemore rounding out the top ten just ahead of the Monaro of Tessari, who came from the back of the grid.