Bob Jane was amongst the competitors when racing began at Calder on 14 January 1962. He bought the one-mile club venue in the early-1970s and set about transforming it. The road course was extended in 1986 and 1.119-mile 24-degree “Thunderdome” oval added a year later. Jane promoted the non-championship Australian Grand Prix for five years from 1980. That initial event pitched F1 against F5000 and Formula Pacific and was won by newly crowned world champion Alan Jones’s Williams FW07-Ford. The race switched to Formula Pacific for the next four years but continued to attract overseas drivers. Alain Prost won in 1982, and emerging talent Roberto Moreno was a three-time winner. The combined road course and oval was used for a round of the 1987 World Touring Car Championship.
