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Jim Richards (born 2 September 1947) is a New Zealand racing driver who has spent most of his racing life in Australia. While retired from professional racing, Richards continues to compete in the historic category Touring Car Masters while running a team in the Australian GT Championship. After seven Bathurst 1000 victories and four Australian Touring Car Championships, Richards was inducted into the V8 Supercar Hall of Fame and the Australian Motorsport Hall of Fame in 2006. He is the father of racing driver Steven Richards, and between them they have achieved 11 Bathurst 1000 wins, most recently in 2015. ==Career== Richards first made his mark in Australia at the 1974 Hardie-Ferodo 1000 with a masterful display of wet weather driving during the race, recording faster lap times than any of his opposition in the latter part of the event while driving a V8 Holden LH Torana SL/R 5000 L34 with fellow Kiwi Rod Coppins which finished in third place. This and other wet weather drives over his career gave Richards the reputation of being a 'rainmaster' which many Australian's cynically attributed to living in rainy New Zealand, though Richards himself believes it is more from the car control he learned early in his career racing dirt track speedway. In mid-1975 Richards moved to Australia and was quickly competitive in sports sedan races driving his Sidchrome-sponsored Mustang. He was co-driver for John Goss in 1976 at Bathurst. Then in 1978 Richards began a successful stint at the Holden Dealer Team as Peter Brock's co-driver at Bathurst, netting Richards three Bathurst 1000 titles in a row. Brock later recalled that at the time he only knew Richards as a casual acquaintance and fellow driver, but after the Wanneroo Park round of the 1978 Australian Touring Car Championship, the pair shared a Ford Falcon panel van for the drive from Perth back to Melbourne (which they allegedly covered in approximately 24 hours for what is normally a 2-3 day trip). Upon returning home to Melbourne, Brock suggested Richards for the job of his co-driver for that years Hardie-Ferodo 1000 at Bathurst. He was hired by HDT team manager John Shepherd and although only driving once a year for the team, the Brock/Richards combination would win Bathurst in 1978, 1979 and 1980. In 1982, Richards was hired by JPS Team BMW team manager Frank Gardner as the teams lead driver to drive the teams BMW 635 CSi. While results under the locally developed Group C regulations were lacking, when Australian touring car racing changed to the international Group A regulations in 1985, the BMW was suddenly a frequent race winner. Richards easily won the 1985 Australian Touring Car Championship and the 1985 Australian Endurance Championship. The 635 CSi was replaced by the smaller capacity BMW M3 in 1987, and Richard's would again come to the fore, winning the 1987 Australian Touring Car Championship. Gardner shut down the JPS team at the end of 1987, and Richards re-joined Peter Brock's team for 1988, with the old HDT now running the BMW M3s after spending the previous 19 years racing Holdens. By 1988, however, the M3 had been overtaken as the car to have by the all-powerful Ford Sierra RS500, and the wins of 1987 were now struggles for places. At the end of the year, Brock's team decided to race Sierras in 1989 while Richards was snapped up by the Fred Gibson to race for his factory-backed Nissan team. Driving for Nissan, Richards won his third ATCC in 1990 driving both the Nissan Skyline HR31 GTS-R and 4WD, twin turbo R32 GT-R, affectionately known as "Godzilla". He would repeat as champion in 1991, finishing the ATCC ahead of his young team mate Mark Skaife. Skaife then put the GT-R on pole position at Bathurst, before he and Richards cruised to victory in race record time, a lap ahead of the Holden Commodore of defending race winners Win Percy and Allan Grice. Richards finished second to Skaife in the 1992 ATCC, before the pair then won their second straight Bathurst 1000 in a crash-shortened race which saw Jim crash the GT-R in a downpour on lap 145. However, as there had been a separate crash on that lap (which Richards later became a part of while trying to drive back to the pits), the red flag was shown and the race was declared. As the rules state that the results would be from the previous lap, this saw a surprised Richards and Skaife declared race winners. On a personal note, the 1992 Tooheys 1000 was a sad occasion for Richards when his longtime friend and former JPS BMW team mate, Formula One World Champion Denny Hulme died at the wheel of his BMW M3 on lap 32 after suffering a heart attack. Richards was only informed of Hulme's passing just before he and Skaife took to the podium as winners, and as the unruly crowd below booed the pair (they wanted the second placed Sierra of Dick Johnson and John Bowe declared winners as they did not like a Japanese car dominating as the GT-R did), the normally gentlemanly Richards let fly with his now famous speech: His other Australian title wins were: * 1985 Australian Endurance Championship in a BMW 635 CSi * 1985 AMSCAR Series in a BMW 635 CSi * 1986 Australian Endurance Championship in a BMW 635 CSi * 1992 AMSCAR Series in a Nissan Skyline R32 GT-R * 1995 Australian GT Production Car Series in a Porsche 993 RSCS * 1996 Australian NASCAR Championship * 1999 Australian GT Production Car Championship in a Porsche 996 GT3 * 2000 Australian Nations Cup Championship in a Porsche 996 GT3 * 2001 Australian Nations Cup Championship in a Porsche 996 GT3 * 2002 Australian Nations Cup Championship in a Porsche 996 GT3 * 2003 Australian Carrera Cup Championship in a Porsche 996 GT3 Cup His Bathurst wins have been: * 1978 - Peter Brock / Jim Richards (Holden LX Torana SS A9X Hatchback) * 1979 - Peter Brock / Jim Richards (Holden LX Torana SS A9X Hatchback) * 1980 - Peter Brock / Jim Richards (Holden VC Commodore) * 1991 - Mark Skaife / Jim Richards (Nissan R32 GT-R) * 1992 - Mark Skaife / Jim Richards (Nissan Skyline R32 GT-R) * 1998 - Rickard Rydell / Jim Richards (Volvo S40) * 2002 - Mark Skaife / Jim Richards (Holden VX Commodore) He has also won the Sandown 500 in 1985 with Tony Longhurst in a BMW 635 CSi, and again in 1989 with Mark Skaife in a Nissan Skyline HR31 GTS-R. Recently, Richards has driven in the Targa Tasmania as well as numerous other tarmac rallies in the Australian Targa Championship and other tarmac rallies, driving for Porsche. Partnering Richards as navigator has been motor racing journalist and commentator Barry Oliver. The pairing of Richards and Oliver (affectionately known as Team Grandpa in later years) has won the Targa Tasmania a record 8 times. Richards and Oliver made their debut in Targa in 1993 in a Porsche 968 CS.〔(【引用サイトリンク】author=Octagon Australia )〕 His final victory saw him become only the fourth winner of the event in a two-wheel-drive car, and is the last person to do so, holding off more fancied four-wheel-drive rivals over a wet Day 5 to win his last Targa Tasmania title. Targa Tasmania wins: * 1996 - Jim Richards / Barry Oliver (Porsche 993 Turbo) * 1997 - Jim Richards / Barry Oliver (Porsche 993 Turbo) * 1998 - Jim Richards / Barry Oliver (Porsche 993 Turbo) * 2000 - Jim Richards / Barry Oliver (Porsche 996 Turbo) * 2001 - Jim Richards / Barry Oliver (Porsche 996 Turbo) * 2002 - Jim Richards / Barry Oliver (Porsche 996 Turbo) * 2003 - Jim Richards / Barry Oliver (Porsche 996 Turbo) * 2006 - Jim Richards / Barry Oliver (Porsche 997 GT3) 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Jim Richards (racing driver)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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