Sept 8th 2006
Australian motor sport legend Peter Brock has died after his car hit a tree during a rally in Western Australia today.
Brock was competing on the first day of the Targa West Rally when his vehicle hit a tree near the small community of Gidgegannup, about 40 kilometres east of Perth.
The Confederation of Australian Motorsport says the crash happened just about midday local time.
Brock's co-driver has been taken to hospital in a stable condition.
Brock was 61 years old. No other cars are believed to have been involved.
Known as 'Peter Perfect' and the 'King of the Mountain', Brock won the Bathurst 1000 nine times in the 1970s and 1980s and won the 1979 race by a record six laps.
He retired from full-time racing in 1997 but returned to Bathurst to win the 24-hour race in 2003.
All of us here at FATE Racing would like to pass on our condolences to the Brock family. He will be surely missed.
19th September 2006
Australia holds state funeral for motor racing legend Peter Brock
His friends farewelled a man they knew as a great bloke, a great mate, a great Australian and a very good driver.
But it was his daughter Alexandra who told Australia something of what Peter Brock, the motor racing legend, was really like.
"He was the single most genuine person I have ever come across," she told the mourners at her father's state funeral in Melbourne on Tuesday.
"But Dad was a fallible man," said a sobbing Alexandra, 23, mother of Brock's only grandchild.
"He could piss you off, he could rub you the wrong way.
"But he could also make you feel so special and so happy."
But in an insight into the lives of the family of a public figure, she didn't tell it all, preferring to keep some of their more cherished times to herself.
"I have shared my dad with the public my whole life," Alexandra said.
"So I'm going to keep those memories now with my brothers."
Throughout the tributes and eulogies for the man known even to the clergy who officiated at the service as Brocky, an image was painted of a man more interested in listening to others than talking about himself.
The former champion AFL footballer Peter Daicos described Brock as someone who "made you feel like an instant friend ... he made you feel that it was you that was important.
"I thank him for being so real," Daicos said.
His friend and fellow race car driver Neil Crompton told mourners that Brock, who died in a rally smash in Western Australia on September 8, was a "world champion positive thinker".
Brock was also a complex and singular man, he said.
"PB didn't want to be constrained by time, or anything else," Crompton said.
"He defied gravity."
One of his closest confidantes, Eric Dowker, spoke of a humble and caring man who was owned by a nation.
"Any person could talk to him about anything at any time," Mr Dowker said.
"It is not often a whole country misses a person ... Peter Brock embodied our nation and he raced for us."
Around 500 of those he raced for, many dressed in the red and black Holden racing team colours, squeezed into St Paul's Cathedral for Brock's state funeral, joining another 600 of his family, friends and dignitaries.
Each of them would have liked to have spoken, and you knew they would all have said much the same thing about the man they knew as Peter Perfect, or the King of the Mountain, for his nine Bathurst 1000 victories.
For all the heartfelt words spoken over Brock's flag-draped coffin, there was another aspect of his life not mentioned in the eulogies, but which was also on display during the funeral service.
Brock's current partner Julie Bamford led the family party into the cathedral, followed close behind by Bev Brock, the mother of his three children and his companion of 28 years.
The two women who once had a close friendship and who have had only minimal contact since his death were seated on the same, front row pew only three seats apart.
As she brushed past on her way to her seat, Bev Brock, cradling her baby grandson Oliver, appeared to briefly acknowledge Ms Bamford.
Later, Ms Brock was referred to as "the first lady ... in every Australian's eyes" by Aboriginal art gallery owner Colin McKinnon.
In her prayers, the Precentor of St Paul's, Canon Anne Wentzel, mentioned both Ms Bamford and Ms Brock as partners of the man they were mourning.
The two women later joined the procession from the cathedral as near to each other as they have been in some time, one on each side of Canon Wentzel.
Outside it seemed that every Holden driver and Peter Brock fan in Melbourne had come to say goodbye.
Brock's coffin, covered by the Australian flag and accompanied by one of his racing helmets, was taken away by a hearse, a Holden, of course, with "Brocky" number plates.
The car company for whom he won so many races also supplied a fleet of new Statesman cars for the cortege.
As they moved off toward the sweeping right-hander out of Flinders Street, Holden caps were doffed and tears were mixed with applause for a man who lived life as he drove his race cars - at full tilt.
