| Bob Jane | |
|---|---|
| Nationality | Australian |
| Retired | 1981 |
| Australian Touring Car Championship | |
| Years active | 1962-74 |
| Teams | Bob Jane Autoland |
| Wins | 10 |
| Best finish | 1st in 1962, 1963, 1971 & 1972 Australian Touring Car Championship |
| Previous series | |
| 1961-63 1965-66 1965-66 1966 1970 1980-81 |
Australian GT Championship Tasman Series Australian Drivers' Championship Australian 1½ Litre Champ. Australian Sports Car Champ. Australian Sports Sedan Champ. |
| Championship titles | |
| 1961 1962 1962 1963 1963 1963 1964 1971 1972 |
Armstrong 500 Australian Touring Car Champ. Armstrong 500 Australian Touring Car Champ. Australian GT Championship Armstrong 500 Armstrong 500 Australian Touring Car Champ. Australian Touring Car Champ. |
| Awards | |
| 2002 | V8 Supercar Hall of Fame |
Robert "Bob" Jane (born 1929) is an Australian former race car driver and prominent businessman. A four-time winner of the Armstrong 500, the race that became the prestigious Bathurst 1000 and a four-time Australian Touring Car Champion, Jane is perhaps known best nowadays for his chain of tyre retailers, Bob Jane T-Marts. Jane was inducted into the V8 Supercar Hall of Fame in 2000.
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Jane grew up in Brunswick, an inner-city suburb of Melbourne. In the 1950s, he started Bob Jane Autoland, a company which distributed parts for Jaguar and Alfa Romeo. Through this venture, a love of cars and motorsport blossomed and he first entered competitive racing in Australia in 1956; by 1960, he was racing with some of Australia's top sedan drivers.
In 1961, Jane and co-driver Harry Firth won the Armstrong 500 at Phillip Island, Victoria, driving a Mercedes-Benz 220SE. Jane and Firth won the race again the following year, the last before the event moved to Mount Panorama at Bathurst, New South Wales, retaining the Armstrong 500 name. Jane, driving for the Ford works team, won a further two Armstrong 500s at the new venue, the first with Firth in 1963 and the second in 1964 with George Reynolds as co-driver. Despite the change of venue, Jane is officially credited with winning Australia's most famous endurance race four times in a row, something no other driver has ever done.
Jane won the Australian Touring Car Championship (now known as the V8 Supercar Championship Series) in 1962, 1963, 1971 and 1972. His 1971 ATCC win was in a Chevrolet Camaro ZL-1 with a 427 cubic inch engine. Jane was forced by a rule change to replace the 427 engine with a 350 cubic inch engine for the 1972 championship but the Camaro still managed to beat the opposition, which included Allan Moffat's famous Boss 302 Mustang. Of the 38 races he started in the ATCC, he finished on the podium 21 times. Bob Jane also won the Marlboro Sports Sedan Series in 1974 and 1975 at his own Calder Park Raceway driving a modified Holden Monaro. He also won the 1963 Australian GT Championship at the wheel of a Jaguar E-type.
He retired from racing in 1986.
Jane's passion for motor racing also carried with it a vast knowledge for choosing the right equipment for his race cars.
He had a particularly keen interest in tyres and his expertise made him well-known in racing circles. Through his parts business, Bob Jane Autoland, he imported high-performance tyres from Germany. Not only were these tyres snapped up by his customers, but they gave him a competitive edge in Australia as racing tyres were not as heavily regulated as they are today.
In 1965, Jane opened the first Bob Jane T-Marts store in Melbourne. The company remains an independent, family-owned business to this day; Bob's son, Rodney Jane, is the current CEO. In 2011 82-year-old Jane resigned as chairman of T-Marts citing difficulties in the relationship with his son Rodney.[1]
From 2002 to 2004, Bob Jane T-Marts held the naming rights sponsorship for the Bathurst 1000, the race Jane dominated early in his career. The company also holds the naming rights to Bob Jane Stadium, home of South Melbourne FC.
From 1980 to 1984, the Australian Grand Prix was held at his Calder Park Raceway in the outer suburbs of Melbourne. Although from 1981 the races were run under Formula Mondiale regulations, Jane succeeded in attracting many of the best Formula 1 drivers of the era; setting the stage for the first ever Australian Formula 1 World Championship Grand Prix, which was held in Adelaide in 1985.
Jane is credited with bringing stock car racing to Australia. Long resistant to oval racing (seeing it as dull and monotonous when compared to circuit racing), Australian motorsport fans finally had their own superspeedway when Jane spent A$54 million building the Thunderdome on the grounds of Calder Park Raceway. Opened on 3 August 1987, the Thunderdome played host to the first NASCAR event held outside North America on 28 February 1988. Several prominent drivers from the United States came to Australia for this race including Bobby Allison, Neil Bonnett and others from the Winston West Series.
On 23 February 2007, Bob Jane was granted a 12 month intervention order against his estranged wife, Laree Jane (born 1967). At the time, she was 39 and they had been married for 20 years. He accused her of threatening to shoot him and threatening him with a kitchen knife.[2] In a Victorian County Court, on 22 January 2009, a jury found Laree Jane not guilty of five charges, including assault, related to the domestic dispute.[3]
An article published by Fairfax on 22 May 2008 discussed an ongoing court case between Bob Jane and his estranged wife Laree Jane. Laree is accused of having over $1.5 million worth of credit card debts at one stage, and signing a mortgage on Bob's house in order to pay for them. While Bob believes the signature on the mortgage looks like his own, he has no recollection of signing the document:
The tyre tycoon Bob Jane admits the signature looks like his but yesterday he denied signing a mortgage to pay off $1.5 million of his former wife's credit card debts.
Laree owned more than 41 credit cards, and Bob has made it public that she often went over her yearly $800,000 limit imposed on her credit cards.
| Sporting positions | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by John Roxburgh Frank Coad |
Winner of the Phillip Island / Bathurst 500 1961, 1962, 1963 & 1964 (with Harry Firth and George Reynolds) |
Succeeded by Barry Seton Midge Bosworth |
| Preceded by Bill Pitt |
Winner of the Australian Touring Car Championship 1962 & 1963 |
Succeeded by Ian Geoghegan |
| Preceded by Norm Beechey |
Winner of the Australian Touring Car Championship 1971 & 1972 |
Succeeded by Allan Moffat |
| Records | ||
| Preceded by established |
Most Australian Touring round wins 7 (1960 - 1973), 2nd win at the 1963 Australian Touring Car Championship |
Succeeded by Ian Geoghegan 8 wins (1961 - 1978) |
| Preceded by Ian Geoghegan 8 wins (1961 - 1978) |
Most Australian Touring round wins 10 (1960 - 1973), 9th win at the Round 6 1972 Australian Touring Car Championship |
Succeeded by Allan Moffat 25 wins (1964 - 1988) |
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