Porsche Mt. Buller Sprint, Victoria, 2005

Mt Buller is an skiing mountain in northern Victoria. It is the closest alpine resort to a capital city in Australia. The summit of Mt Buller is 1804 metres above sea level.

Mt Buller is 248km or a three hour drive from Melbourne via either the Hume Highway or the Melba Highway through the Yarra Valley. The closest town to Mt Buller is historic Mansfield, the home of Ned Kelly and the Kelly Gang of bushrangers.

Mt Buller is in the middle of Victoria's high country, in the Great Dividing Ranges.

Most people go to Mt Buller in the winter to ski, snow board and toboggan. There are 27 chair lifts to get up the mountain and there are around 30 ski trails.

Other popular activities in winter are snow shoeing and snow tubing.

Popular pastimes in the summer are bike riding and walking around the mountain. There are also tennis courts and a cinema.

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In 2004 the inaugural Porsche Mt Buller Sprint was run and won by Alex Davidson, in a Porsche.

This year's event was won by Jim Richards, partnered by long-term co-driver Barry Oliver, with whom he has shared seven Targa Tasmania wins.

Richards finished 46 seconds ahead of last year’s winner, reigning Porsche Carrera Cup champion, Alex Davison and his co-driver, Paul Flintoft.

In third place, a further 23 seconds back, were Queensland-based performance driving instructor Alistair Bye and Michael Sherrin, while fourth place went to Tony Quinn and Keith Wenn, with Kevin Weeks and Jammeil Taylor in fifth.

The Porsche Mt Buller Sprint is a special stage tarmac rally contested on the 16km Mt Buller tourist road to Mt Buller Village, in the Victorian high country, 180km NE of Melbourne. The road was closed to traffic during the competition, which was run last weekend, January 21-23 inclusive.

Richards and Oliver also set the fastest stage time on the event, posting 8m:45.50 on their fifth run on the 16km stage.

All the top five crews were driving recent model Porsches, but the top 10 included a Daytona Coupe, a Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 6 and two brand-new Australian built competition specials ­ the Skelta G-Force and the Holden-powered Elfin Clubman.

Ninety crews came from WA, NSW, Tasmania, South Australia, Queensland, Victoria and the ACT to compete in the three-day event.

Visit the Porsche Mt. Buller Sprint official website for more information, including Entrant's List, Stage by stage results and more photos.

Gary Young's Evo VIII in action at Mt. Buller

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[Photos courtesy of Tim Jones, Perfect Prints]