[citation needed] He sailed to England late in 1958 following his ownership of a Mobilgas service station in Avalon on Sydney's northern beaches, and a successful career driving Jaguar XK120s, a C-Type (XKC037) and D-Type (XKD520).

Gardner always preferred engineering cars to driving, and went to England to join Jaguar, but disliked the Midlands in the middle of winter.

Gardner was among a number of Australians who drove in the early years of the Trans-Am, including Allan Moffat, Harry Firth and Horst Kwech.

After returning full-time to Australia in the mid-1970s Gardner won the 1977 Australian Sports Sedan Championship driving a highly modified Chevrolet Corvair.

After Richards qualified the car in a brilliant 4th place in Hardies Heroes, the black and gold BMW was suddenly seen as a dark horse for the race.

On lap 3 the BMW suddenly slowed and Richards headed for the pits where the team found metal filings in the fuel system.

At the time, the long-held Holden and Ford V8 domination of Group C touring car racing in Australia was under serious threat with factory-backed teams from foreign manufacturers the likes of the European BMW, and Japanese marques Mazda and Nissan, and this was unpopular with not only the fans, but some within the sport itself.

The claim of sabotage is actually disputed by Jim Richards and the team's chief mechanic Pip Baker who believe that the dirty fuel could have been a combination of things.

Richards and Longhurst also teamed to win the 1985 Castrol 500 at Sandown Raceway in the 635 CSi with their teammates Neville Crichton and on-loan Nissan driver George Fury finishing 2nd.

Unfortunately for the Gardner-led team, race results weren't as forthcoming with the only wins being in 1988 and later in the Amaroo Park based AMSCAR series.

The factory BMW team continued with Gardner at the helm until 1998 (switching to Supertouring cars in 1994), winning the 1994 (with Longhurst), 1995 and 1997 (with Paul Morris) Super Touring titles.

Gardner had a passion for road driver training and had commenced to do that at Bob Jane's Calder Race Track in Melbourne.

In 1990 he founded his own Performance Driving Centre between Brisbane and the Gold Coast in Queensland and was awarded the Order of Australia (the equivalent of a knighthood in the UK) for his services to motor racing.

He was also a brilliant public speaker and could hold a crowd with his fund of hilarious and often risque stories about his own experiences and other drivers and characters within motor racing.

In 1973 Patrick Stephens Ltd., published a book penned by Gardner entitled "Racing Drivers Manual" in collaboration with Castrol Oils Ltd.

He died in his home at Mermaid Waters in Queensland on 29 August 2009 at the age of 78 following a long battle with illness associated with his racing and engineering career.