Australian racing legend John Bowe has announced plans to compete in the newly formed Monochrome GT4 Australia in 2024 as the next step in his illustrious career.
The 69-year-old will compete in his final Gulf Western Oil Touring Car Masters round this weekend in Adelaide before his attention turns to the newly formed SRO Motorsports category that will run exclusively on the 2024 Shannons SpeedSeries calendar.
This won’t be Bowe’s first run in a GT4, having previously competed alongside Jacob Lawrence at Shell V-Power Motorsport Park as part of Mobil 1 Australian Production Cars and Monochrome Invited Australia.
Next year, he plans on competing in all six rounds alongside Lawrence in the Randall Industries/Southern BM BMW F82 M4 – with the new format providing a compelling opportunity for teams with two drivers.
Above images: Bob Taylor
Bowe was thrilled to reveal his 2024 plans and looked forward to competing in a new era of GT4 competition.
“It’s really exciting to be able to join the new GT4 series with the Shannons SpeedSeries next year,” Bowe said .
“It’s a new challenge. I decided not to race in TCM anymore because I have been in it for a long time and won a lot of races, but this GT4 series really appeals to me.
“I think the category makes a lot of sense, it’s not for gold or platinum drivers it’s for people that don’t want to race but don’t want to spend millions on a car.
“All the SRO sprint races will be an hour with a compulsory pit stop, so we can share the wheel and the endurance races make it the ideal program.
“I have driven over 60 different race cars in my life, so this is going to be another adventure.”
Having competed alongside Lawrence in one round already, Bowe explained that the opportunity to watch a young driver develop gives him the most satisfaction.
“Peter and Jacob Lawrence are very enthusiastic BMW owners, they are good blokes and they asked me to do a bit of coaching with Jacob,” Bowe explained.
“They then asked me to race with him in Adelaide when they had the round there. We did some fantastic racing so they asked me if I wanted to share the car. I get a great sense of satisfaction out of seeing Jacob go well, he is the real deal and has the racing gene in him.
“It’s going to be fun, I’ll be there all next year and we will see how we go after that.”
The newly formed SRO Motorsports GT4 category will kick off its season in style at the renowned Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit in April, where it will then visit some of Australia’s best circuits before a grand finale at Supercheap Auto Bathurst International in November.
