Goldfields "100"

Welkom, 11 Nov 1978

All cars are 1.6-litre F/Atl unless noted.

Notes on the cars:

1. March 78B (Ian Scheckter): Ian Scheckter had a new Team Lexington March 78B for the start of the South African Formula Atlantic series. He retained the car for the 1978/79 season (October to May) and by December 1978 it had been updated with the same sidepods as the new March 79B. When Scheckter acquired a new F2-chassis 79A, the 78B/79B was sold to Clive Cooke, who raced it for the first time at Kyalami in January 1979. The car was due to be converted to a BMW engine for the Formula SA series, but Cooke did not appear. Sold to Jeff Waberski's DAW Supplies team in 1980, and fitted with a Mazda engine for Bernard Tilanus to drive. He won three of the first four races of the season, but while the March was being taken to Killarney for the Cape South Easter Trophy in March 1980, the transporter caught fire just outside Parys and exploded. The March was "completely destroyed" according to press reports, and the team's second car, a Wheatcroft R18 that was being towed on a trailer, was also badly damaged.
2. March 77B [8] (Trevor van Rooyen): New to Eddie Pinto and Team Gunston for Roy Klomfass to race in South African Formula Atlantic in 1977, using Swindon BDA engines. Retained by Team Gunston in 1978 for new driver Trevor van Rooyen. Retained again by Team Gunston for the 1978/79 season, when it was a spare car to Van Rooyen's new March 79B and was driven that season by Basil Van Rooyen at Kyalami in October 1978 (when Trevor was unwell), by Dave Charlton at Killarney later that month, and then by Trevor at two races. Later in 1979, it was raced twice by John Love. It was unused in 1980, then sold to Jeff Waberski after his DAW Supplies team's ex-Ian Scheckter March 78B was destroyed in a transporter fire. The 77B was fitted with a Mazda engine and raced by Bernard Tilanus for DAW Supplies from June 1981 onwards. It was raced by Dave Charlton for DAW around March/April 1982, then by Billy Maloney as a DAW entry later in 1982. Maloney crashed the car at some point, and acquired a March 782 to replace it in April 1983. The 77B was sold to Klaus Grogor's House of Sports Cars team for Grogor to drive in the 1983 season, and then retained by Grogor unused through 1984 and 1985. It was then sold to Gary Harrison who intended to convert it into a sports car for the 'Can-Am' series that absorbed Formula SA in 1986, but he only used in single seater form. The car was acquired by Dorino Treccani during the 1990s and sold to Andrew and Stuart Thompson in 2000.
3. March 79B [1] (Roy Klomfass): New to Alex Blignaut's Team Texan for Roy Klomfass to race in South African Formula Atlantic from October 1978 onwards. When the Formula SA rules were introduced in June 1979, it was fitted at first with a 2-litre BMW engine but this was not a success and it was quickly fitted with a Ford V6. At the end of the season, it is believed to have been sold with other South African Formula Atlantic cars to Ted Titmas (Van Nuys, CA). Chris Townsend reports that the car was sold to brothers Tom and Steve Shelton (Fort Lauderdale, FL) and is likely to be the car driven by Tom, as Steve had already owned chassis 79B-10 since the start of 1979. The two 79Bs were advertised together at the end of 1981, and the ex-Titmas car went to Ron Levanduski (Elmira, NY) who raced it for the next five seasons. Levanduski sold it to Joe Ostrowski (Trenton, NJ) in July 1987. Ostrowski sold the car at the end of 1989 when he bought a newer March 81A. Subsequent history unknown.
4. Chevron B45 [45-78-01] (Tony Martin): New to South Coast Motors for Tony Martin to race in the South African Formula Atlantic series in 1978, sponsored by the United Tobacco Company's Lucky Strike brand, and initially wearing Chevron B39 bodywork. Retained for 1979, but Martin also had an older Chevron B34 which was used at several races. The B45 was then fitted with a 3-litre Ford V6 engine for the new Formula South Africa that started in July 1979. It was also rebuilt by Ken Gillibrand as a "wing car", but this was not a success and it was rebuilt to more standard specification. It was fitted with a Mazda engine for 1980 and entered by South Coast Motors for Len Booysen to drive in the first few races of the season, but Martin had to take over the car when his preferred B34 was damaged in a towing accident. He was very successful in the car that season, but reports only gave it as a BP Racing Propart Chevron or a BP McCarthy Chevron, so it's unclear when he used his rebuilt B34. Martin bought an ex-F2 Maurer MM80 for 1981. The B45 was later destroyed in a garage fire.
5. March 77B [18] (Derek Bell): New to Alex Blignaut for Nols Nieman to race in the South African Formula Atlantic series in early 1977, with Benson & Hedges sponsorship. Retained by Blignaut's Benson & Hedges team for Nieman again in 1978. Raced for Blignaut by Derek Bell in November 1978, then by Sarel van der Merwe in May 1979, after which it was given by Blignaut to Tony Martin's South Coast Motors team as a spare car. It was entered for Billy Scheepers in January, then rented to Roy Moss for the Goldfields race in February. Bernard Tilanus then borrowed it for the Killarney race in March after his DAW March 78B had been destroyed in a transporter fire. In July 1980, it was sold to Jeff Waberski's DAW Supplies team for Wayne Taylor to drive. Then in October 1980, it was sold on to Mel Lahner's Rackrite Racing. Taylor moved with the car, and raced it at Kyalami on 4 October and then in the first few months of the 1981 season. It was then taken over by Trevor van Rooyen who found the weight penalty on his ground-effect March 802 was too great. He raced the 77B for the rest of the 1981 season. It was retained for 1982, when Rackrite ran the car for Andre du Plessis and Mike Domingo. It was retained again for 1983, when driven by Gavin Lahner and Kevin Heath. It was not used again after that, but was retained by Mel Lahner until sold to Andrew Thompson in 1984. It was later restored for Ian Schofield.
6. March 76B ['MD'/"1A"] (Mike Domingo): A car built up by Mike Domingo at the start of 1977 using a monocoque that Ian Scheckter had damaged when testing 76B/1 after the race at Aldo Scribante in March 1976. Domingo's car is usually referred to as "76B/1 (A)" as it built around the first tub from 76B/1. It was raced by Mike Domingo through 1977, 1978 and 1979, still with its BDA engine. It was then rebuilt with a Mazda engine for 1980, but was damaged at Kyalami in January. The car was rebuilt, but the Domingos also acquired Alex Blignaut's 76B/19 which was built up for Roy Klomfass to drive. When Klomfass declined the drive, Mike Domingo moved to the ex-Blignaut car, leaving his original car redundant. The ex-Scheckter tub and associated spares were sold in mid-1980 to Vernon Bricknell as spares for the March 76B-1 he had just acquired from the DAW Supplies team. When Bricknell sold 76B-1 to the Pretoria Brick Racing Team in early 1981, the remains of the Domingo car remained with Bricknell until damaged when the building in which they were being stored collapsed. The tub was scrapped and the remaining parts sold to Trevor Trautmann for a sports car project. At this stage, the Domingo 76B had effectively ceased to exist.
7. March 77B ['AT'] (Bobby Scott): Built by Andrew Thompson in South Africa in 1978 using an unused monocoque that had been supplied as a spare for Ian Scheckter's March 77B/7. Thompson acquired the tub and all the other 77B spares from Ken Howes before 77B/7 was sold back to the UK. He built all these into a new car using the Hewland FT200 gearbox from the ex-Dave Charlton/Alex Blignaut March 76B/19. The resulting car was raced by Bobby Scott through the 1978/79 season, sponsored by Rembrandt through its Sportsman Lager and then Kronenbräu 1308 Lager brands. It was rented from Thompson by Graham Duxbury for a race in October 1979, still with its BDA engine, and then sold to Hagen Wulf and Ivor Raasch who fitted a Mazda engine for the 1980 season. It was also raced by Allan McDonald that season. It was then sold to Graham Duxbury who raced it very successfully in 1981. Retained for the first few races of 1982 until Duxbury's new March 82A arrived and then sold to Ivan Moavero who used it for the rest of that season. Sold to Steve Herbst for 1983, but in August he swapped it for Roy Moss's March 792. Raced by Moss until the end of 1984. He then sold it to Terry Moss, who was unrelated, for the 1985 season, but Moss crashed the car at Kyalami in April, destroying the front of the monocoque. Moss built up a March 782 using parts salvaged from the 77B, but the tub was scrapped. The 77B effectively ceased to exist at this point.
8. Modus M3 ['MD'/"022A"] (Yunus Domingo): Mike Domingo built up a Modus M3 for 1976 using what is believed to have been the first monocoque from Modus M3/022, which was replaced after an accident in July 1975. Raced by Mike Domingo in the South African Formula Atlantic series in 1976. Sold to John Simpson for 1977, but he crashed the car in practice at Welkom, his second event. The car returned to Team Domingo and was eventually repaired, apparently using a spare monocoque supplied to Dave Charlton in March 1976. It was raced by Yunus Domingo at least twice in 1979, and then by Jan Klinkert at Kyalami in May 1979. The car then remained with the Domingo family until 1995, when it was bought by Sam Thomas. Shortly afterwards, he sold it to to John McKercher. At this point it was found to have tub number 043-2-76, assumed to be a spare monocoque supplied to either Dave Charlton or Mike Domingo after their cars were built in 1976. Restored and used by McKercher in South African historic racing.

Sources

Note that the identification of individual cars in these results is based on the material presented elsewhere in this site and may in some cases contradict the organisers' published results.

The South African race results were originally compiled by Chris Townsend based on material in Autosport and Motoring News plus information supplied by a wide range of contributors. One of the contributors was later found to have used erroneous information, and the results have in some places been reworked using reports and results in South African newspapers such as the Rand Daily Mail.

All comments, clarifications, corrections and additions are most welcome. Please email Allen (allen@oldracingcars.com) if you can help in any way with our research.

Individual sources for this event

Autosport 16 Nov 1978 p8, Motoring News 23 Nov 1978 p23, Rand Daily Mail 13 Nov 1978 p3, with some data from 'The Winners Book' by James O'Keefe. Chris Townsend also credited the Peter MacIntosh archive.