Round 3 Hampton Downs - 11 November 2012
I am pleased to say there was no hint of rain for this round compared to the Noah’s Ark deluge we had to survive at the previous round at Pukekohe.
We had a very good entry of 15 cars which included the guest appearances of Richard Ryan in the SLR 5000 Torana and Elliott Crawford in the 69 Corvette. New member Rowan Tonkin was racing for the first time, with our other new member Michael Crawley making his second appearance.
Qualifying went without drama other than Scary being a bit late out of bed and not being allowed to run. Andrew Turner led the way, followed by Steve Swann and Paul Burnet who was running his alloy headed engine again and also on the new Hankook tyres.
Race 1
We started with 14 cars as Mike Dias was lost to mechanical gremlins but was to return later in the day. Scary was allowed to start from the back of the grid and managed to fight his way up to second behind Andrew Turner, third place went to Steve Swann with Veen Smith crossing the line in fourth after battling race long with the pink Torana of Paul Burnet. Veen unfortunately had 10 seconds added to his time for jumping the start and hence was classified in sixth.
Race 2
Mike Dias was back in his VN Commodore but Scary was lost to daughter’s birthday duties, while Elliott had some minor mechanical issues to sort out. This was the first of our two handicap races with the field being led away by Michael Crawley in his Walkinshaw Commodore. There were great dices up and down the field with Andrew Turner leaving his braking for turn one a bit late on one occasion and hence left two 50 metre long Hankook stripes on the asphalt. The final results were Duane Ingley 1st, Mike Dias 2nd with Andrew Turner 3rd after setting a personal best lap time of 1:12.8.
Race 3
This as they say is the money race with prize money provided by Tony Gordon Panel Beaters. We had the full entry of 15 cars starting this race but unfortunately we lost a couple due to mechanical issues being Rowan Tonkin a split radiator hose and Tony van Tiel. There was a great dice as Andrew and Scary fought their way through the field with the final placings being Scary 1st, Andrew Turner 2nd, Veen Smith 3rd.
Another friendly BBQ was held at Scary’s apartment at the conclusion of the racing.