1947 Australian Grand Prix

The 1947 Australian Grand Prix was a Formula Libre motor race held at the Mount Panorama Circuit, near Bathurst in New South Wales, Australia on 6 October 1947. The race, which had 22 starters, was held over 38 laps of the six kilometre circuit, for a total race distance of 241 kilometres.

It was the twelfth Australian Grand Prix and the first to have been held after the conclusion of World War II. Racing in Australia resumed in 1946, but it took until 1947 for a group, in this case the Australian Sporting Car Club, to take on the running of the Grand Prix. Police opposition to racing at Mount Panorama led to the postponement of the race from Easter to October.

The race, a handicap event as was the tradition in the immediate post-war period, was won by Bill Murray racing his MG TC. Murray took the lead on the last lap of the race after a tyre failure on Ray Mitchell's Jeep/Ford Special caused the race leader to slow dramatically. Mitchell limped home for fourth position. Future Grand Prix stars also passed Mitchell, second was taken by Dick Bland in his Mercury Special. Bland would claim two more podiums over the four years but a win would be elusive. Third was taken by Lex Davison driving a 7.6 litre Mercedes-Benz SSK 38/250. Davison would go on to become the Grand Prix's most prolific winner, even though his career would be cut short by his death at Sandown in 1965, Davison would win the race four times. Davison also completed the race in the shortest time, a prelude to the future of the race over the next decade and a half.

Alf Barrett (Alfa Romeo Monza) started the race from scratch, 37 minutes after the first starter, Les Burrows (MG J2).

The Under 1500cc Championship was awarded to Alf Najar and the Over 1500cc Championship to Lex Davison, both titles being decided on net race time, disregarding handicaps.

The race was watched by 20,000 spectators.

Classification

Results as follows.

Pos	No.	Driver	Car / engine	Laps	Time	Handicap
(minutes)	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	Ret	Ret	Ret	Ret	Ret	Ret	Ret	Ret	DNS	DNS	DNS	DNS
21	Australia Bill Murray	MG TC / MG 1.3L	38	2h 39m 46s	25.5
7	Australia Dick Bland	Mercury Special / Mercury 3.7L	38	2h 40m 22s	15.0
5	Australia Lex Davison	Mercedes-Benz SSK 38/250 / Mercedes-Benz 7.6L	38	2h 40m 33s	10.5
11	Australia Ray Mitchell	Jeep/Ford Special / Ford 3.6L	38	2h 41m 09s	17.0
23	Australia Tom Sulman	Sulman Singer Special / Singer 1.0L	38	2h 41m 48s	28.0
15	Australia Alf Najar	MG TB Special / MG 1.3L	38	2h 41m 37s	19.5
14	Australia Harry Monday	Mercury Special / Mercury 3.9L	38	2h 41m 59s	17.0
17	Australia John Barraclough	MG]] 1.3L	38	2h 42m 10s	21.0
13	Australia Dougal MacLachlan	MG TA Special / MG 1.4L	38	2h 43m 55s	19.5
28	Australia Les Burrows	MG J2 / MG 0.8L	38	2h 44m 37s	37.0
19	Australia Ron Ward	MG TB / MG 1.3L	38	2h 45m 37s	25.5
27	Australia Bruce Myers	Riley Imp / Riley 1.1L	38	2h 46m 01s	34.0
18	Australia Bill Nunn	MG TB / MG 1.3L	38	2h 47m 55s	25.5
22	Australia Elliott Forbes-Robinson	MG TC / MG 1.3L	38	2h 48m 28s	25.5
1	Australia Alf Barrett	Alfa Romeo Monza / Alfa Romeo 2.4L	28		Scratch
9	Australia Jack Murray	Bugatti Type 39 / Ford 3.6L (DM Special)	28		15.0
2	Australia Frank Kleinig	Kleinig-Hudson 8 Special / Hudson 4.2L	26		6.0
20	Australia George Pearse	MG TB / MG 1.3L	22		25.5
26	Australia Len Phillips	Austin 7 / Austin 0.8L	20		31.0
3	Australia Hope Bartlett	Riley / Riley 2.0L			7.5
4	Australia Ron Ewing	Buick Special / Buick 3.8L			10.5
16	Australia Walter Mathison	Jaguar SS100 / Standard 2.7L			20.0
8	Australia Alec Mildren	Ford V8 Special / Ford 3.6L			15.0
12	Australia Dennis Curran	Mercury Special / Mercury 3.9L			17.0
29	Australia Ken Tubman	MG K3 Magnette / MG 1.1L s/c			15.0
24	Australia Len Golding	MG NE / MG 1.1L			28.0