Motor Sport
The opening round of the Racer Products South Island Endurance Series took place at Teretonga Park in Invercargill on Saturday with a 3 Hour and two 1 Hour races.
Steve Brooks and Bill Riding of Christchurch took a dominant win in the 3 Hour race while Hugh Gardiner of Auckland and Warren Black of Oamaru won the Class 2 and 3 and Class 4 and 5, 1 Hour races respectively.
The anticipated clash between the Audi R8 of Brooks and Riding and the Lamborghini Huracan GT3 of Glen Brazier (Invercargill) and Andrew Waite (Auckland) didn’t eventuate in the 3 Hour race after the Lamborghini battled both battery and ABS braking issues necessitating several pitstops.
The Audi had started on pole with the Lamborghini alongside but Brooks and Riding had a largely trouble-free day and crossed the line after completing 183 laps. They were seven laps ahead of fellow Cantabrians Paul Rickerby/Graham Rhodes in their Marc Mustang with brothers Martin and Allan Dippie of Otago third in their Porsche 992. Brazier and Waite came home fourth with Waite having the consolation of setting the fastest lap of the race with a time of 54.788 seconds. A small field of ten cars started the race and all finished.
Brooks and Riding acknowledged the hard luck suffered by Brazier and Waite while Rickerby and Rhodes said their result “was a team performance”.
Both 1 Hour races provided good racing and exciting finishes.
The Class 2 and 3 race saw Adam Julian of Christchurch (Audi R8) and Invercargill driver Jordan Michels (Marc Mustang) feature in a good battle for the lead until Michels was forced to pit with a slow tyre leak at about 1/3 distance. That dropped him well down the order.
Up front Julian continued to lead with two safety car appearances punctuating the race with the second setting up a ten- minute sprint to the finish. After the final restart Aucklander Hugh Gardiner applied pressure to Julian which caused the Canterbury driver to have a brief moment at the elbow allowing Gardiner to take the lead. Michels had powered back to third and threatened to also get past Julian late in the race. He ended the race third after a good drive back through the field which yielded a lap record of 56.361 seconds.
Gardiner said it was “a very enjoyable, awesome race and acknowledged the good crowd”, while Julian said he had “someone on my tail every lap”. “I got impatient and made a mistake,” he said of the pass by Gardiner. Michels said the tyre issue was a “disaster” but praised his crew for a great job on the tyre change.
Gardiner, Julian and Michels took the spoils in Class 2 while Stephen Scoles of Cromwell (Ginetta G56) took Class 3 from James Paterson (Audi R8) and David Rogers of Auckland (McLaren 570S).
The impressive field of twenty-nine cars in the Class 4 and 5 race provided a great contest with last year’s runner-up Warren Black of Oamaru in his Audi RS3 LMS winning from Pel Arnott of Auckland (Hyundai i30N) and reigning NZ Formula Ford Champion Blake Knowles of Canterbury in a similar Hyundai.
The trio ran in close company all race but Knowles was caught out by a safety car after staying out longer than his rivals. At the flag there were just 1.758 seconds between Black and Arnott with Knowles close behind.
Black said it was “an awesome race and said Arnott and Knowles were pushing him all the way”. Arnott said it was “a lot of fun” and Knowles was happy with the result but said the timing of the safety car was “unfortunate”.
Chris Wall of Lower Hutt led home a Honda Civic trifecta in Class 5 ahead of Donovan Isted and Jordan Rae.