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Samantha Stevens

Event Wrap: CAMS Supersprint Round 4

Round Four of the CAMS Supersprint Championships was held at Sydney Motor Sport Park on July 20th on the 4.5km extended Brabham Circuit. This was the first time this year that the gigantic field of 99 entrants were treated to this very testing track layout. They enjoyed a great day weather wise, and every driver got the opportunity to complete four solid sessions.
As we have come to expect in recent times, Andre Tan in his Radical was the fastest car on the day with a time of 1.50.179 although Marek Tomaszewski was not that far behind in his Stohr with a very close time of 1.50.793. Andre broke the Type 5 Record and Class 5D Record while Marek broke the Class 5D Record. It should also be noted that Marek also bettered Andre’s old Type 5 record.
Richard Perini was the fastest tin top on the day in his Porsche RSR with a
time of 1.58.837 which broke both the Type 4 and Class 4C Records. Four Type Records were broken and 12 Class Records were broken.
Records broken or set on the day were:
TYPE RECORDS
Type 2 – Warwick Morris in his Porsche with a time of 2.05.547. Warwick also
broke the Class 2C Record. This is the 3rd Type Record that Warwick has
broken this year only missing out at Wakefield Park at Round 1.
Type 4 – Richard Perini in his Porsche RSR with a time of 1.58.837. This is
Richard’s 1st Type Record this year but 3rd Class 4C Record.
Type 5 – Andre Tan in his Radical with a time of 1.50.179. Like Warwick
Morris, Andre has broken 3 Type Records this year, just failing to better
his own Type 5 Record at SMSP North at Round 3.
Type 6 – Kim Tai in his Mitsubishi Evo with a time of 2.01.019. This is
Kim’s 2nd Type Record this year.
CLASS RECORDS
Class 1C – Preston Peiris in his Mazda MPS3 with a time of 2.21.661. Preston
has broken the Class 1C each time he has run this year.
Class 2C – Warwick Morris in his Porsche GT3 with a time of 2.05.547.
Warwick didn’t just break the record, he shattered it, taking a massive
7.583 seconds off the previous record.
Class 3A – Perennial record breaker Jason O’Meara broke his own Class 3A
Record by almost 2 seconds in his Honda Civic with a time of 2.14.980 Class
4A – Chris Muir in his Honda CRX with a time of 2.15.373. This is only the
2nd time out for Chris in this car but he has broken the Class 4A Record
both times that he has run.
Class 4B – David Lawler broke his own Class 4B Record in his Mazda MX5 by
7.401 seconds with a time of 2.18.361. It worth mentioning that both Ed Cory
and Anthony Crott ran in the 2.18s and were both 7 seconds under David’s
previous Class 4B Record. Sorry that you don’t make the record books but
great effort guys.
Class 4C – Richard Perini in his Porsche RSR with a time of 1.58.837.
Another shattered record. Richard took 8.166 seconds off the old Class 4C
Record.
Class 4D – Drew Hall broke the Class 4D Record in his Nissan GTRV R34 with a
time of 2.03.193 Class 5B – Chris Kostakis broke his own Class 5B Record in
his MNR Vortx with a time of 2.01.672. Chris has broken the Class 5B Record
at each of the 4 Championship Rounds this year.
Class 5C – Marek Tomaszewski in his Stohr with a great time of 1.50.793.
Marek broke his own Class 5C record by 2.372 seconds.
Class 5D – Andre Tan broke his own Class 5D Record in his Radical by 1.249
seconds with the fastest time of the day of 1.50.179 Class 6A – Blake Jones
broke the Class 6A Record by 5.876 seconds in his Mitsubish R-Colt with a
time of 2.17.470 Class 6D – Kim Tai smashed the Class 6D Record by just
under 11 seconds in his Mitsubishi Evo with a time of 2.01.019
CLUB CHAMPIONSHIP
The Mazda MX5 Club has broken away from ARDC in the Club Championship
scoring a massive 513 Club points at Round 4 to ARDC’s 361. MX5 Club lead the Club Championship on 1,739 points and are now 156 points ahead of ARDC on 1,583 points. Manly Warringah are coming third with 844 points.
Words and picture by Rob Annesley
Special thanks to Bob Welsh for specific competitor details

 

2014 Muscle Car Masters – Special On-site Member Parking!

In addition to Members and Member Guests receiving complimentary general admission entry to this fabulous event, the ARDC is also pleased to confirm that a special area within the P3 car park (just before the North Paddock vehicular tunnel) has been set aside for free on-site Member parking. Spaces are limited, so it’s absolutely First In = Best Dressed!
To take advantage of this Member benefit and ensure speedy access to the venue on the day, please read the following conditions and instructions carefully:

ID Required
Please bring your current ARDC Membership Card with you. No ID = No Free Entry.

P3 Member Parking is limited
At big events like the Muscle Car Masters, space is always at a premium, and in the instance of wet weather (which can affect ground surface quality), the parking capacity of the P3 hill may be even further reduced. Therefore, once capacity has been reached, Members will be redirected to the nearest available spaces. Thank you in advance for your understanding.

Access to P3 Parking
Access is via the Main Entrance, Gate A off Ferrers Rd. Please have your ARDC Membership Card handy to show to the designated Parking Assist personnel upon arrival at Gate A.

Every person in the car MUST have a valid entry pass to the event.
These include:-
• A Valid ARDC Membership Card or ARDC Members Guest Card(s).
• Pre-purchased MCM event ticket(s).
• Other approved MCM event accreditation.
• A Valid Proof of Age or Concession Card (for Children 12 years and under, or companion card holders).

If you or any person in your vehicle does not have any of the above you will be directed to a priority parking area on Sydney Dragway to park and easily purchase your additional tickets at the ticket box offices at Gate A.
Avoid delays on the day. Please ensure all travellers are ticketed before the event by clicking HERE and ordering now!

2014 MCM Timetable
Parking open: 6.30 a.m.
Gates and Ticket Box Office open: 6.30am
Circuit Activity: 9am – 5:30pm, circuit closed at 6:00pm
A timetable and full travel information will be released on MuscleCarMasters.com.au and SydneyMotorsportPark.com.au closer to the event.

Event Wrap – NSW Motor Race Championships Round 3

A good field of 195 competitors enjoyed the first day of Round Three of the NSW Motor Race Championships under warm clear blue skies on Saturday June 21st. Early morning racing on Sunday however was thrown a curve ball with showers and a wet and slippery track with which to contend.
With both practice and qualifying sessions conducted on Friday and Saturday in fine conditions, and cars and drivers seemingly sorted and ready for more of the same for Sunday, it was unsettling for many to rethink the slicks and some didn’t have a backup plan.

First to face the slippery conditions were the Superkarts. With their amazing power to weight ratio on some parts of the track it became like a “ballet on ice”. Fortunately apart from some spins, no-one saw gravel time. Results were dominated by Anton Stevens (ART-PVP) with two race wins and a second, followed by Mark Robin ( Stockman MR125) with one race win and three thirds.

Improved Production O2L saw Graeme Watts continue his dominance of this category with three straight race wins. Looking extremely confident on track, Graeme clocked the fastest lap time in the class with a 1:41.71. Steve Devjak (Commodore) was consistently less than a second behind and scooped three second placings. Joe Lenthall (Mazda RX7) had a good campaign gaining valuable points with two third place finishes. Joes new red and white graphic designed livery goes really well with the spectacular metre and a half of flame he had shooting out of his exhaust late on Saturday afternoon. Unfortunately this weekend John McKenzies’ regular podium finishes in this class came to a temporary end with a smokey exit from race two. John said: ”The smoke looked like it was being caused by oil leaking into a valve stem. “ He commented that it was time for an engine overhaul anyway.

Formula Vee featured a big field of 35 racers who were also racing for positional points in the Clemenger International Freight Australian Series. This categories results was on a knifes edge, as the lead was swapped regularly and the final race placings were evenly distributed across Michael Kinsella ( Jacer F2K10) with a first and second, Dylan Thomas with a first and a third, and Tim Brook (Jacer F2K4) with a first, second and a third.

While David Crighton enjoyed two race victories in Improved Production U2L , Graeme Cox settled for second and third placings. Bob Jowett was only a half second behind Crighton in race one, however Bob’s luck ran out in race two as he over cooked it into turn one and impacted heavily into a tire wall. That same tyre wall was responsible for the front end damage to Danny Castro’s Silvia S13, and it was last seen sitting sadly crumpled next to Bob Jowetts Honda Civic in the recovery yard.

With one and a half seconds out front of the field in race one and two Birol Cetins’ Yellow Camaro purred along consistently. However today, only two race wins for Birol, as he was forced to exit early in race three after what appeared to be an unfortunate accident with Steve Lacey. Steve has been having the worst luck lately with his (also) Yellow Camaro, as he has suffered steering failure in his last three outings. I spoke to Steve prior to race three and he was upbeat in his belief that he had solved the steering issue.

Unfortunately in race three Steve got only as far as turn two before his left front tyre, listing at an awkward angle under the wheel arch, uncooperatively dragged his big machine into the grassy verge on driver’s left in a pall of scraping tyre smoke.

– Words and pictures by Rob Annesley
look@shotbyrob.com.au.

Event Wrap: CAMS Supersprint Championship Round 3

Round 3 of the CAMS Supersprint Championship was held at SMSP North last weekend, and while rain threatened, apart from some fine misting, it didn’t really eventuate. Another plentiful roster of 117 eager competitors lined up in the eleven groups. No sooner had competition started when a lengthy delay occurred due to a full circuit oil spill from Paul Martens Clubman ( #63), had track maintenance staff dusting and blowing the track from the entrance to turn one all the way around to the entrance to the pits on the main straight – practically the entire track.
A long 40-minute wait had competitors on the dummy grid quite antsy. A funny side to it was when race control called to scrutineering to have a chat about the oil spill. The scrutineer apparently misheard the call and asked for a repeat of the car number involved. Race control replied”…go find car #63… it’ll be the clubman with no oil in it.”This is a good time to doff our caps to the maintenance and safety staff who do such a good job in preparing and maintaining the track, making it safe for us all to enjoy the sport. They worked tirelessly to get the track back in driveable order, and to clean up an oil spill stretching 2.8 km. I noticed that we have a new industrial broom, a forklift with a massive broom attached to the front. Very cool…and sweeps very fast.The delay resulted in the session being shortened by two runs, however the day was successful; records were broken in two Types and seven Classes as well.Again Andrie Tan was the fastest on the day in his Radical with the only sub one minute time of the day of 59.302. Steve Lacey brought his Chev Camaro to the Championship for the first
time. Steve has been a Championship competitor for many years. First in his white Torana, followed by his blue VK Commodore, but this Camaro is something else. Steve was the fastest tin top on the day with a time of 1.03.415, which broke the Type 4 and Class 4D
records. He previously held both those records in his VK Commodore Sports Sedan. Unfortunately, Steve suffered steering problems on his third pass, and was forced to retire. Paige Butchers had a scare when her bonnet flew up on turn one and scratched her windscreen pretty badly.
Warwick Morris was the other Type record breaker in his Porsche GT3. He recorded a time of 1.08.593, which broke the Type 2 and Class 2C records. Warwick has broken the Class 2C record at every track he has run this year and it is the second time he has broken the Type 2 record.
Other Class records broken were:
Class 1C – Preston Peiris took a second and a half off the Class 1C record with a time of 1.17.587 in his Mazda MPS3. Preston has broken the Class 1C record at every Round this year.
Class 4A – Chris Muir set a new Class 4A record in his new Honda CRX with a time of 1.16.401. Chris only unveiled his newly finished CRX today, was extremely happy with its performance.
Class 4B – Ed Cory broke the Class 4B record in his Mazda MX5 with a time of 1.16.250 Class 4C – Richard Perini broke the Class 4C record in his Porsche RSR with a time of 1.04.564. While they didn’t make the record books, it is worth noting that Bruce Hibbard (Porsche GT3), Adam Laura (BMW M3) and Matt Cole (Mazda RX7) also broke the Class 4C record yesterday.
Class 5B – Chris Kostakis broke the Class 5B records by about 3 seconds in his MNR Vortex with a time of 1.056.973. It should be noted that Chris has broken the Class 5B record at every Round this year.
The Mazda MX5 Club is leading the Club Championship by the barest of margins on 1226 points just ahead of ARDC who are just four points behind on 1222 points. Manly Warringah are in third place on 597 points.
-Words and pictures by Rob Annesley
Special thanks to Bob Welsh for specific race details

Event Wrap: PCRA Round Three May 31

Round Three of the Post Classic Racing Association (PCRA) Championships were run under dark threatening skies on May 19th at Sydney Motorsport Park. Despite some lengthy medical delays and fading light, the full programme was completed. Late in the day Clerk of Course Terry Whalan deemed the light good enough to race, and the twilight enhanced the excitement as the flames shooting from the exhaust pipes on the down changes looked spectacular. Rider John Mckenzie commented that “…it looked great, maybe we should do more twilight racing.”
Group 4 including the P4/P5 Unlimited class bikes qualifying round caused the first lengthy medical delay as Martin Kraaymaat highsided his Katana on turn ten and was airlifted to hospital. As the qualifying resumed McKenzie took pole and completed a full front row of Suzuki GSX-R750’s with Steve Anderson, Simon Hills and Stuart Lomax. Race one was scheduled as six laps but declared as four Laps. Instead of the chequered flag the race was red flagged as Peter Macmillan came off his TZ750 at turn two, and despite getting a helicopter ride Peter was later given the OK and released. Steve Anderson on his GSX-R750RK dominated at the front with several P6 bikes giving chase. The race was declared with the positions at lap four giving Steve Anderson the win (1:12.10), with John Mckenzie in second and Stuart Lomax in third. Race two, four laps, Steve Anderson again took control (1:12.3) with some dicing for the minor places giving John Mckenzie second and Dean Scott third. Race three was also four laps and with the sun low on the horizon the race got underway, Steve Anderson again made a break at the front and made a clear getaway (1:12.3) leaving Dean Scott in second place with John Mckenzie in third edging out Troy Galvin on the ZXR750 by 0.009 seconds. It was a bumper day for Steve Anderson with a clean sweep of all three races, keeping his chances alive in the championship.
Group 7, Pre Modern F1/F2 and P6 Unlimited. had twenty-nine bikes entered including six P6 Unlimited, 14 Post-Modern F1 machines and 9 Post-Modern F2 bikes. Pole position was claimed by Drew Sheepway on a F2 Honda 400 (1:10.9, making up the front row was Ryan Young F1 Honda, Wade Lewis F2 Honda and Stuart Lomax F1 Yamaha.
Race one duration was six laps. John McKenzie commented”… on an otherwise dry day light drizzle started on the warm up lap but other than playing with the (riders) mind it was not enough to affect grip.” Drew Sheepway took the race win (1:11.4), second to Ryan Young and third to Bob Marriner. In race two Wade Lewis (1:10.8) edged out Ryan Young and Drew Sheepway for second and third respectively. It wasn’t certain that we were going to run this race, the final event on the program but after some consultation with a few of the riders the Clerk of Course Terry Wahlan made a good call and despite the fading light it was deemed good enough to race with the start taking place 5 minutes after sunset in the dusky light. The results in race three were a mirror of race two, with Wade Lewis taking the win (1:11.0) and Ryan Young and Drew Sheepway claiming the minor placings.
Another great day of racing thanks to the PCRA, race officials, the timing team, the medics and the army of volunteers. Despite some lengthy medical delays we still made it through the full program albeit with shortened races. Looking forward to the next round at Eastern Creek GP Circuit on the 19th of July.
Rob Annesley
look@shotbyrob.com.au
Thanks to John McKenzie for his contribution to this article

 

 

Event Wrap: FoSC Queen’s Birthday Weekend

The Amaroo Circuit (South) hosted the second Festival of Sporting Cars ( FoSC) event for 2014 on the June Queens Birthday weekend. Known as the Queens Birthday Invitational the event was held under grey overcast conditions however the threatened storms held off until the final chequered flag fell. The event ran over the 1.9km circuit, utilising the new challenging 800m winding track layout.

David Nichols, President of FoSC, said:” We are thrilled to have a bumper field attend this event at Sydney Motorsport Park, we weren’t sure how many would come, but this roll up is terrific. We are also excited to welcome our feature events for the day, rounds of the Excel Championship and the Historic Touring Cars Association Championship, both events being run inside our FoSC programme.”

Also on the programme were races for Historic and Invited Racing Cars plus Historic and Invited Sports and Touring Cars. The Regularity category was underlined by two good-sized fields – with a diverse mix of vehicles, including some beautifully restored classics.

There were also two non-racing but still very successful events. The first was a Come and Try event which is a soft introduction to would-be hopeful racers giving them a chance to drive on the black top circuit with the assistance of an in-car mentor. The entrants here were given two opportunities to practice their skills over the course of the day. The “newbies” gained valuable experience with the expert advice of the likes of Master Drivers’ Mal Brewster and Ray Gulson. These gutsy first-timers rolled up in a Jag, Volvo, Renault, Austin Healey and even a Datsun Sunny. “Its not about the car, its about the fun,” said one entrant. Another happy newcomer commented …” FoSC must be the best-kept secret in motor sport.”

The second non-racing event was the “Partners Parade” in which a spouse, friend, child or significant other gets a chance to come out in the car on track with you, either as a passenger (in the case of the 10 y.o I saw) or if they have a licence they can have a drive themselves. This was a particularly enjoyable part of the day for those family “pit crews” who do all the backup work race after race. It was a great inclusive event to make it a fun day for all.

As you can imagine, with nearly 130 entrants across six racing categories plus Regularity and the non-racing events, the pits, paddock and grid were abuzz with frenetic activity. One thing to appreciate with the FoSC is the amazingly wide variety of sporting cars that grace this event. Several entrants that caught this reporters eye were Dave Lawrences’ beautifully restored Red 1955 Austin Healey 100, which is still his daily driver, and Alan Morrins’ Ford 1984 GT40.

Excel Series racing was a hotly contested affair, with close bumper to bumper action between all three of the Team AGI cars of Nathan Gotch (#66), Nick Filipetto ( #77) and Glenn Smith ( #44) . Nathan took the major honours of the day with two wins and a second place, whilst Nick got one of each, a first, second and a third. In the Historic Touring Championships Wayne Rogerson (Mazda RX2) was too hard to beat, laying down three straight wins, followed by John Wright ( LJ Torana XU1) with two second places.

The FoSC has enjoyed nearly ten years of offering affordable racing events, with its mantra of “helping racing enthusiasts to get into and enjoy motorsport with a minimum of money and red tape.” FoSC pride themselves on being able to offer a fuss-free way to go racing. President Dave Nichols wished to thank all the regulars and new comers alike for making this event at Sydney Motorsport Park a huge success.

– Words and pictures by Rob Annesley
look@shotbyrob.com.au