HTCAV Driver Profile – Linda Devlin
Words: Chris Ralph
Photos: Devlin Family, Phil Taylor, Trapnell Creations
Your writer is among many amazed Historic Winton competitors who have been hunted down, passed and left behind by a blue Mini driven by… a girl!
This was not a trouncing from a motorsport Costa Semenya equivalent, either, but rather from a diminutive childcare worker with a sweet smile. For nine years, it’s been a nudge in the nadgers for plenty of blokes wondering ‘what’s wrong with this picture?’
Linda Devlin has been handing out regular textbook lessons in motorsport equality since she was barely out of primary school.
Early Start
Linda’s story starts with the earliest possible exposure to the sport - being inside mum Sharon while she sprinted a Mini and going to Bathurst at two weeks old.
From those beginnings, the youngster’s motorsport instinct was developed over a fierce rivalry with her older brother Brian. Both kids pestered dad, Mini racer Barry Devlin, for a go-kart, so one was bought to share, with Barry thinking that Linda would lose interest pretty soon… Not so!
Being underestimated had started early; Linda the Limpet was here to stay.
When Brian graduated to Rookies, leaving his eight-year-old sister still in Midgets, Dad stumped up the readies for another kart. So began a decade of sibling success, with both finishing in the top three every year as they moved up the classes. At age 13, Linda won the series championship.
Families United
Linda’s racing story has been entwined with laconic lanky legend Henry Draper (whose cars she drives) from her first breath - Henry’s wife Roslyn was the midwife who delivered both Devlin babies.
Mini-focused Barry worked for 25 years with Henry at Northern Mini Parts after an apprenticeship on Rolls Royces at Kellow Falkiner in South Yarra. (When Henry sold the business to become, of all things, a thatcher, Barry worked for 15 years as a dyno operator at Holden.)
Throughout this time, the Drapers and Devlins welded their own tight Mini motor racing family. From the late ’80s and through the ’90s, Henry’s blue car and Barry’s red one (now owned by WA’s Syd Jenkins but still garaged and prepared by Barry) were never far apart on the track.
The Drapers – Henry driving and Roslyn navigating - were also Targa Tasmania legends in an 850cc Mini, almost impossible to toss in the handicap system and ridiculously quick in the outright calculations. Who were their crew one year? Barry and Sharon Devlin, of course.
So when ‘Uncle’ Henry saw Linda’s go-karting success, it was odds-on she’d get a go in his famous blue Mini.
Step Up, Stand Out
In 2010, Linda was awarded Fastest Female Driver at a couple of events, but the next year that achievement was well and truly surpassed – Youngest Driver Award at Historic Winton, with 2nd and 3rd outright in Mini races at Baskerville and Wakefield Park respectively.
At the same time, Henry added an ex-Mini Challenge 2008 JCW Mini to the equipe, specifically for Linda and him to share in endurance racing.
The die was well and truly cast.
In 2013, Linda won two races outright at Historic Winton, a Mini Championship event at Wakefield and came 7th Outright in the Winton 300. Over the last six years this pattern has continued, with too many top results to list.
Already a regular class winner in the East Coast Mini Challenge in four states, Linda won again at a wet Morgan Park in Queensland earlier this year. Pole by three seconds translated to a 33-second Race 1 win. Adding strong performances in the dry races that followed netted her the overall victory for the round.
And as reported previously, Linda’s spirited jousting in the blue Mini at Historic Winton gained her a rousing second in the 60th Anniversary Mini Challenge.
Does it stop there? Of course not.
Staying on Track
For a girl like Linda, too much motorsport is never enough. She crews for friends in endurance races and works at Tampered Motorsport track days, doing everything from sign-ons to pit lane recoveries. Until recently, she was also a driving coach and occasional hot lap driver for the V8Race Experience (until the merger with Fastrack). Today, she’s still involved in the pit lane.
The Devlin-Draper family bond remains as tight as ever, too. Childhood battle-buddy brother Brian has chosen cycling as his competitive outlet these days, but still joins the clan in the pits.
With the purchase of the Devlin’s ‘Old Red’ historic Mini, Syd Jenkins has become another honorary Uncle to help cook the snags…
Looking for More
Linda has no intention of slowing down, although saving for a house has tempered the momentum. Cue a motor racing Fairy Godmother who’d like to see a sister slam it to the males in another category? If there’s one out there reading this, Linda’s helmet is always within reach.
And finally, Linda has some words of consolation for vanquished carriers of Y-chromosomes: “Once the helmet is on, we are all equal and it doesn’t matter what gender you are!”
