The 2024 Buckby Motors Rally Tasmania is featuring a who’s-who of Australian rallying behind the wheel, but also some cars of significant history are set to come back to life in the forests of Burnie.
Multiple Possum Bourne Motorsport (PBMS) built Subaru WRXs, which dominated the ARC in the early 2000s, will grace the Bosch Motorsport Australia Rally Championship field, formerly piloted by Subaru Rally Team Australia pilots Cody Crocker and Dean Herridge.
Registered as CNC-932, this chassis was used a spare car by the factory Subaru squad in the mid-2000s.
Herridge, who currently co-hosts the ARC’s coverage on Seven, had a significant crash with his primary car in the 2005 season and had to step into the CNC-932 chassis. Later, with the conclusion of Subaru Australia’s factory rally program at the end of that year, Maximum Motorsport acquired the chassis and campaigned the car in the 2006 and 2007 seasons.
Herridge would go on to win the 2006 Tasmanian ARC rally in the same car.
Today, CNC-932 now belongs to Tasmanian Nic Grave, who has restored it back to gravel trim and is eager for the chassis to return to ARC competition.
Cody Crocker’s 2005 Australian Rally Championship-winning Subaru, CNC-930, will also enter Rally Tasmania.
Ironically, Crocker will also participate in Rally Tasmania albeit aboard a different Subaru WRX. His Subaru will be a former FIA Asia-Pacific Rally Championship car, which coincidentally is also a PBMS-built machine.
CNC-930 is now owned by emerging Tasmanian rally driver Tyler Page, having previously been owned by Craig Brooks – who won multiple Tasmanian Rally Championships with the car.
The Subarus will form part of a massive contingent of MainFix Production Cup entrants, with Tasmanian and 2023 ARC Production Cup winner Bodie Reading in the running to potentially go back-to-back in the Production Cup. Reading trails current points leader Molly Taylor by 44 points heading into Rally Tasmania, with 100 points up for grabs in the Production Cup.
Buckby Motors Rally Tasmania is set to take place in the forests of Burnie on the weekend of 22–24 November, 2024.
