Templeton Continues Winning Form In Mazda Racing Series
Mac Templeton of Prebbleton #92 leads Rex Edwards of Tauranga #16 with Jesse Gould, Stuart Lawton, and Matt Dodd in pursuit during the action at the opening round of the Nexen Tyre NZ Mazda Racing New Zealand Series at Teretonga Park in Invercargill. photo: Geoff Ridder.
Mac Templeton of Prebbleton in Canterbury continued his recent good form with a strong win in the opening race of Round 1 of the Nexen Tyre NZ Mazda Racing National Series at Teretonga Park in Invercargill on Saturday. The round is also the third and penultimate round of the category’s South Island Series.
Templeton started from pole position after topping qualifying by just 8/100th’s of a second from Will Kitching of Timaru. Rex Edwards of Tauranga and Jesse Gould of Raumati Beach shared the second row, with Stuart Lawton of Paraparaumu and Matt Dodd of Christchurch next on the third.
Templeton won the start and led away with Kitching in hot pursuit, but the Timaru driver ran wide and onto the grass on the exit of the loop on the first lap, dropping down the order to cross the line at the end of the lap in eighth.
Templeton led from Edwards, Gould, Lawton, and Dodd, followed by James Black of Dunedin, the placings remaining steady for the opening laps.
Meanwhile, Kitching set about making amends as he carved his way back up the order. He was sixth by lap 4 and fifth a lap later. Mac Berkett of Nelson had a similar excursion to Kitching’s on lap 5, recovering without losing a place.
With two laps to go, Templeton had opened a margin at the front while Edwards was under attack from Gould and Kitching, now up into fourth place.
Templeton completed a lights-to-flag victory, crossing the line 2.611 seconds ahead of Edwards. Kitching capped his remarkable comeback by snatching third, with Lawton, Gould, and Dodd next, followed by Callum Pratt of Auckland, Black, Berkett, and Bryan Walker of Christchurch completing the top ten.
Templeton was “quite stoked” with the win. Referring to the New Zealand title race of which this is the opening round, he said, “It is early days but this is a good, strong result for my confidence.” Kitching, reflecting on the first lap incident, said, “I had to have a crack. I got loose and it was either go off or spin. It was good fun coming back through the field.”
Tomorrow morning at 10.10 am, the category has a 12-lap race with the top ten from today’s race reversed on the grid, while the third and final race over 10 laps takes place later in the afternoon at 2.38 pm.
The series is racing at Teretonga Park, Invercargill, this weekend as part of the Ascot Park Hotel Teretonga International, Round 5 of the Repco NextGen NZ Championship.
