A big field of Super TT with a diverse range of cars

The ever-growing Super TT category was again the headline act for Round 2 of the MRA Series at Wakefield Park on the weekend, with over 50 entries necessitating a split into two separate divisions based on qualifying times.

In Division 1, it was Anthony Soole who prevailed in the first two races in his Lotus Exige. However, Soole, who was also competing in the Sports Sedans, elected not to contest the third and final race, allowing Franck Donniaux to take victory in his Subaru WRX ahead of Matilda Mravicic (Mazda MX5) and Darren Pearce (Mitsubishi Evo).

Division 2 was taken out by Steve James, who won Races 2 and 3 in his Holden Torana after finishing second behind Dennis Walker (EH Holden) in Race 1. Walker slipped back to fifth position in Race 3, allowing Leon Black (Subaru WRX) and Kerry Millar (VZ HSV) to round out the podium.

The first Division 2 race was red-flagged when Jayson Darke’s Peugeot blew up spectacularly, engulfing the Wakefield Park circuit in a huge cloud of white smoke.

Matilda Mravicic took a clean sweep of Mazda MX5 race wins in the only turbocharged car in the field. Lou Iezzi finished second in Race 1, with Steve Shelly narrowly holding out his son Jake Shelley in an exciting drag-race to the line. Race 2 was a reverse-grid race, but while Mravicic easily worked her way into the lead, it was Shane Otten and David Stone who were the best of the naturally aspirated cars.

Otten beat Mravicic off the line in Race 3, but Mravicic recaptured the top spot after a couple of laps. Otten finished second ahead of Jake Shelley.

Four BMW E30 races were held throughout the weekend, with Alan Saint winning the first three. However, Saint spun off the circuit at Turn 8 in the final, allowing Stan Armstrong to win ahead of Glen Potter and Graeme Bell, who crossed the finish line first but was penalised 10 seconds after the race.

Aussie Race Cars took on the Future Racers for the first time at Wakefield

Jade Barnes won all five Miniature Race Car Series races, but it was a battle royale for the minor positions, with Nathan Jess, Robert Free, Craig Davies and Matt Dwyer all having a turn in either second or third position. In the end, it was Free who came home second in the final ahead of Dwyer.

Charlie Borg won the first two Mini races before spearing into the sand at Turn 2 in the final. Linda Devlin capitalised to take her first race win.

Peter Lucas in the Lotus holds out the Oz Truck contingent

Next weekend May 5/6, will see the second round of the 2012 MRA series conducted at Wakefield Park, with ten categories, a far cry from the early days of the MRA, which was then known as Mini Racing Australia, and they ran the Mini’s on other promoters race programs.

The original MRA was formed in 2004 by Brian Walden, a former Mini racer who has also raced V8 Supercars and been a team-owner. In 2007 the name was changed to Motor Racing Australia, and they commenced promoting their own race meetings at Wakefield Park, then the following year Terry Denovan joined Walden as a partner in the company.

Next weekend’s round will see some categories run on just Saturday, others Saturday and Sunday and also some just Sunday.

Those running just Saturday are Racing and Sports combined and regularity, while those on both days are both days BMW E30′s, Miniature Race Cars,  MG’s and Oztrucks.

Sunday only categories are for Super TT, Sports Sedans, Mini’s and Sports Sedans.

Entries close soon, and already there are more than 100 entries, and Wakefield Park Venue Manager Matthew Ronke said he expected around 150, and he urged intending entrants to enter as quickly as possible.

As usual, the Super TT is the best supported by entrants, and with thirty entered already it may well be split into two divisions as it was in the first round.

Among the cars that would slot straight into division 1 are the two BPG entries, a Nissan Skyline GTR for Adam Burgess, and a Mazda RX7 for his son Craig Burgess.

Michael Auld will drive the Holden Commodore production car he shared in the Bathurst 12 Hour race with Brian and Garth Walden, while John Street will be driving his Mitsubishi Evo and Victorian Ross wood will debut his rebuilt Nissan Skyline GTR.

One of the one-make racing categories the MG’s are also very well supported with 19 entries from Victoria, Queensland and NSW.

The Miniature Race Cars caters for cars like the Aussie Racing Cars and Future Racers, and Jase Collins has entered his Ford Falcon Aussie Racing Car, and heading the Future Racers is defending champion Nathan Jess from Canberra.

After dominating the opening round when he won all Mini races, John Walker will be in action again, while Chris Adlam will be trying to go one better than January when he finished second.

The Victorian BMW E30 series will make a welcome return to Wakefield Park, after they turned it on ran at the Wakefield 300 in March and saw the Victorian driver Alan Saint win two races, while a NSW driver Stan Armstrong won the opener. Both have entered again with several extra entries this time round.

current entrant list here

Sports Sedans Return to Wakefield Park this weekened

The New South Wales State Championships head to Wakefield Park on April 28/29 for their second round of 2012, after an action-packed opening round at Eastern Creek at the beginning of the month.

With so many highly competitive categories on the program, spectators will be treated to some entertaining racing. Here is what can be expected from each category:

Formula Ford
David Whitmore was the dominant force in the Duratec class last year, and looks to again have an edge over his rivals after winning at Eastern Creek. However, the horsepower advantage of the Duratec-powered cars will not be as significant around the tight and twisty confines of Wakefield Park, so look at some of the Kent class cars to nip at their heels.

At Eastern Creek, Andrew Gillespie was the winner of the Kent class, but expect him to be strongly challenged by Matt Campbell, Ryan Campbell and the ever-improving Emma Brown. Wakefield 300 competitor Matthew Chahda has also entered the meeting as he continues his learning curve.

Formula Cars
This category features an assortment of “wings ‘n’ slicks” style cars, with older Formula 3 cars proving particularly popular.

Regular Australian Formula 3 Championship competitor Graeme Holmes took a clean sweep of race victories at Eastern Creek, ahead of Glenn Lynch. The father-and-son combination of David and Darren Choon were also among the front runners.

One car to keep an eye on will be the AGI Sport entry of Nathan Gotch. Gotch’s Renault-powered Dallara 304 previously ran at the front of the national F3 championship in the hands of Tom Tweedie, and Gotch is competing in both national and state categories as he looks to speed up his adaption to openwheelers after a background in production car racing.

Formula Vee
A massive field of Formula Vees contested Round 1 at Eastern Creek, and a similarly large number of cars is expected at Wakefield Park. Ben Porter and Daniel Reynolds shared the spoils at the Creek, and should again do battle at Wakefield Park, while other contenders are Matt Stubbs, Michael Kinsella, Heath Collinson (who finished second overall in the recent VMRC round at Winton) and Dylan Thomas (who returns to Wakefield Park after driving his Mitsubishi Evo to second place in the Wakefield 300).

HQ Holdens
This is the first round of the NSW HQ Holden Championship for 2012, but if the Hopwood 100 held last month is any guide, look for Anthony Camilleri, Josh Jackson, Duanne Cambridge, Peter Green Jnr, Clinton Green, Chris Buckley and Jeff Proud to be engaged in close and entertaining contests.

Improved Production Over 2 Litre
Dave Loftus was unstoppable at Eastern Creek in his Toyota Starlet. His closest opposition came from the V8 Commodores of Anthony Loscialpo and Ahmed Baghdadi, but the bigger cars will not be as well suited to Wakefield Park, so look for the Mazda RX7 of Joseph Lenthall and BMW E46 3 Series of Brian Anderson to be podium contenders.

Improved Production Under 2 Litre
David Crighton was very fast at Eastern Creek in his Nissan Silvia, but an engine problem ended his weekend and is also expected to keep him out of the Wakefield Park round. Therefore, Hondas are expected to dominate, especially the Civics of Bob Jowett, Andrew Tendli and Brett Morse.

Production Sports
As with the HQ Holdens, this is the first round of the Production Sports Car Championship, but a non-championship event at the Bathurst 12 Hour provided a reasonable form guide, demonstrating that the Porsche 911 of Neale Muston will again be difficult to beat.

Production Touring
Mitsubishi EVO Xs were the vehicles of choice at Eastern Creek, with Bob Pearson’s three-car Pro Duct outfit proving to be the class of the weekend. This should again be the case at Wakefield Park, although Wakefield 300 winner Jake Shelley will be looking to add to his tally of race victories at the circuit in his Mitsubishi Evo VIII.

Sports Sedans
Geoff Whittaker claimed the round win at Eastern Creek, winning two out of the three races. Anthony Macready, Steven Shiels and Birol Cetin were among the other contenders, while former champion Chris Jackson will be looking to bounce back at Wakefield Park after a shocker of a weekend in which he failed to finish two of the three races.

Supersports
Wakefield 300 winner Michael Shaw has switched from Radical to Stohr for 2012, but he will have his work cut out trying to beat his team mate Adam Proctor. A number of Radical competitors will also be included in the field.

Sydney has a lot of Streets, but there is one in particular that seems to have been made for motor racing enthusiasts, as there are no less than seven residents in the street that race and house their competition cars in their respective garages.

King of the unnamed street is John Street, a man who has only been racing for some six years, but he has been most successful in that period, and well known to Wakefield Park race goers.

While they don’t live in the same street, there are several other Streets that compete in motor racing, with John’s two sons Ross, who lives in Queensland with wife and family, and Glen who is in Sydney, and John’s brother Peter Street.

There’s a story on its own on John’s first six years in the sport, for the competitive tennis player of 40 years, and experienced at state level is now 67, and that’s right, he was 61 when he started.

His sons were both keen to get into motor racing, and they had an LA Lancer turbocharged, but a house fire destroyed the car completely, and being uninsured put the family behind the 8 ball.

Eventually a Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 3 was purchased, and as Ross had moved to Queensland Dad took charge of the car, which he shares with brother Peter.

While Peter is a regular competitor in NSW Championship rounds competing in Improved Production Over 2 litre events where he generally runs at the pointy end of the field, John has been running in the AASA sanctioned Super TT (Tin Top) at MRA rounds.

“I’d never missed an MRA meeting in five years,” Street said. “That was until last weeks (January 29) 2012 series opener at Wakefield Park which I missed because the car wasn’t ready.”

During that time he has been extremely successful, having won his class each of the five years he has competed.

For this year the Streets will have two Evo’s at their disposal, for they have purchased an Evo 8 that was originally built for the Bathurst 12 Hour race but did not race after the GT cars were introduced in 2011, and it is within weeks of being finally ready to compete.

The other racers in Streets street are his next door neighbour David Noble who drives a 2.6 litre Mitsubishi Galant, Denis Walker who runs a very fast EH Holden in Super TT, and his son John who has a Mini, and cleaned up the Mini races at the recent MRA opener. They also have a HQ Holden purchased from the Street family, that John competed in NSW HQ championship round.

Also in the street is Rod Thorpe, a front-runner in Production Touring Cars behind the wheel of a Holden Commodore SS, and there is another person further down the street who raced a Formula Vee.

As for John Street, his next outing will be at the May 6th MRA Round, competing in the Super TT events, he hopes in the Evo 8.

The 2012 Kumho Tyres Wakefield 300 will go down in history as not just the best Wakefield 300 to date, but possibly one of the best races to ever be held at the Goulburn circuit.

When you have drivers of two completely different types of cars banging doors at 200 kilometres an hour, in appalling weather conditions, all while negotiating much slower traffic, you know that you are watching something special. Indeed, it is the skill of high-speed traffic management that has become a hallmark of some of the world’s most prestigious endurance races, like the Nurburgring and Le Mans 24 Hour.

There were stories everywhere you looked in the Wakefield 300. At the beginning of the race, it looked like the Craig and Adam Burgess Nissan GTR was going to take some beating, until it developed a left-rear control arm failure after 22 laps. Amazingly, the problem occurred in exactly the same place as the gearbox problem that eliminated the car from last year’s event, and Craig Burgess parked the car in the same position, just beyond the pit exit. It was a cruel reminder that speed alone is not enough to win the Wakefield 300.

After that, we were treated to a fascinating battle as David Raddatz and Shane Otten repeatedly swapped positions. Raddatz’s Mazda MX5 was better under brakes and through the corners, but Otten’s V8 RX7 was faster in a straight line. On a couple of occasions, Raddatz briefly took the lead at Turn 10, only for Otten to overtake him on the main straight.

Not far behind the leading duo, Dylan Thomas (Mitsubishi Evo VIII) maintained a sensible and consistent pace, while Nathan Jess (Future Racer) and Michael Shaw (Mitsubishi Evo VIII) also stayed well within the top-five, lapping quickly enough to keep the leaders in sight, but not overdriving and risking silly mistakes.

Back in the pack, there were thrills, spills and safety-cars as drivers found (and in many cases exceeded) the limits of adhesion. Turn 2 proved to be a particularly popular spot to go off the track, with a number of cars becoming beached in the gravel and necessitating safety-car interventions while they were retrieved.

The biggest crash happened just before the half-way mark, when the Geoff Bowles / Jim West and Simon Mitchell / Kim Boyd BMW E30s simultaneously speared into the Armco at Turn 1, prompting a lengthy safety-car intervention.

Strategy proved to be critical in the outcome of the race. Nathan Jess was the first of the front-runners to pit, coming in under Safety Car on Lap 48 to hand the car over to Matthew Thompson. Michael Shaw was in under the next Safety Car period on Lap 58, with Jake Shelley slotting into the driver’s seat.

Conversely, Shane Otten, David Raddatz and Dylan Thomas all stayed out until Lap 87, leaving it until the last minute to hand their respective cars over to Stephen Anslow, Nick Cancian and Dave Thomas. Amazingly, with 40 laps to run and all pit stops complete, all five contenders were still on the lead lap, setting up an amazing grandstand finish.

At the restart, Shelly took the early lead from Thompson. Cancian restarted the race in fifth position but quickly disposed of both Anslow and Thomas, and overtook Thompson a short while later.

With 30 laps to go, it looked like a battle between Cancian and Shelley for the race win and the two youngsters were not leaving anything behind in their quest for a Wakefield 300 victory. Several times, Cancian looked down the inside of Shelley at Turn 10 and each time, Shelley aggressively shut the door.

After a few laps, Cancian became impatient and gave Shelley a few taps. Cancian’s intimidation forced Shelley into a mistake at Turn 2 and Cancian was through to the lead, as Matthew Thompson beached the Future Racer.

It was an unfortunate incident for Thompson and Jess, who had been up the pointy end all weekend after clutch problems in practice, but the recovery process put them two laps down and out of podium contention.

No sooner than Cancian took the lead than the news came through that he and David Raddatz were going to be penalised 90 seconds for overtaking under yellow flag conditions. All of a sudden, Shelley and Shaw were back in the box seat and they cruised home to take an epic Kumho Tyres Wakefield 300 victory.

For Shelley, it was a meteoric rise to prominence after he made his circuit racing debut at last year’s Wakefield 300, while Shaw demonstrated that as well as being super quick in West and Radical sports cars, he can drive a tin-top as well.

The Thomas father-and-son combination came home a well-deserved second, while Raddatz and Cancian still scored a podium finish despite their penalty.

Stephen Anslow and Shane Otten were fourth. The team made the decision for the faster of the two drivers, Otten, to start the race, but his advantage was neutralised by the numerous safety car periods and Anslow simply did not have the pace to contend for victory in the final stint.

Michael Hall and Chris Gough finished an outstanding fifth outright (and first in Division 4), in a Mazda MX5 powered by a stock standard engine. The wet weather worked to their advantage, but their driving prowess elevated the car to a position that exceeded even their expectations.

Jess and Thompson were back in sixth, ahead of Henry Draper and Linda Devlin who solved their Mini’s mechanical woes and picked up the Division 3 win.

Steven Head and Nick Martinenko were eighth in their MX5, ahead of the Torana A9X of Alan Moses and Gareth Stokes. Daniel Kapetanovic and David Krusza made a fine circuit racing debut to round out the top-10.

The winners of Division 5 (11^th outright) were Declan and Phil Kirkham in their Ford Fiesta XR4, while Division 6 honours went the way of Mark Morsillo and Elliot Wright, who brought their Triumph TR7 home in 16^th place outright.

Notable non-finishers included the Martin / Lachlan Higgins and David Atkin / Tom Browell BMWs and Adam Ronke and Warren Sheehan. The Higgins team made the mistake of qualifying on slick tyres and started the race from the back of the grid. An off-track excursion while trying to make up positions was a further setback, and the car retired on Lap 69.

David Atkin and Tom Browell struggled with setup in the wet weather qualifying session but were making steady progress in the race before the throttle cable broke.

Meanwhile, Ronke and Sheehan’s Nissan Skyline R33 didn’t make the start due to electrical problems, so they slotted into Amin and Matthew Chahda’s AU Falcon which lasted just two laps before it was parked with a clutch failure. It was not a good day for the Chahdas, with their BA Falcon future tourer also retiring with a broken gearbox.

Overall, the 2012 Kumho Tyres Wakefield 300 was an epic race and the telecast on SBS Speedweek and Fox Sports Inside Speed will be compulsory viewing for anyone even slightly interested in motorsport.

Terry Nightingale : Well where do I start,
The Kumho Tyres Wakefield 300 for me was definitly the best race I have ever witnessed live. To have 5 cars battling it out for the outright lead for the majority of the race was fantastic, then having to negotiate through other cars who are also battling for division honours made for a highlight.

Sitting up in the commentary box was no doubt the best seat in the house for what was going to be an action packed 300km’s, altough saying that the fans and spectators down at turn 2 would have got their moneys worth within the first 5 laps. The battle between shane otten in Steve Anslows v8 rx7 and David Raddatz in the turbo’d MX5 Mania Mazda MX5 was quite enthralling as both drivers had previously driven together and infact won 2 seperate 300kms endurance races at Wakefield Park and Winton Motor Raceway so they both knew eachothers driving style.

One of the most scary moments came when Raddatz looked to make a dive up the inside of Otten to claim the lead coming into the trecherous turn 1 and Otten closed the door, the two cars touched and they both got out of shape, my hands went into the air and I gasped for a breath. Phew they made it through the corner, Lachlan and I turned and looked at eachother and shook our heads in disbelief.

Another battle for the lead was great between two youngsters Jake Shelley and Nicholas Cancian. I couldn’t believe how long this went on for, you could see that Cancian had the pace on Shelley but could not find a way past as the deputy.com Evo would have had to been the widest Evo in the country at that stage, Shelley ducking and weaving to take the most defensive line, Cancian couldn’t find a way past, even sometimes finding the back bumper of the evo and making contact couldn’t unsettle the youngster who at this time was doing everything right to keep the mx5 behind him.  Inevitably though Cancian found a way past.

The highlight for me though was the Hydrawash MX5 of Chris Cough and Michael Hall aswell as the Mini Cooper of Linda Devlin and Henry Draper who never seem to set foot off the racing surface to come home in a respectful 5th and 7th outright and both winning thier division.

Overall from someone who has competed in 3 300km enduro’s and commentated 2 of them 2012′s edition was by far the best. For anyone who missed out on this race make sure you don’t again as i strongly recommend it to anyone looking for an action packed weekend of motorsport.

The Race:

Many hardened long time motor racing fans have described Sundays 2012 edition of the Kumho Tyres Wakefield 300 at Wakefield Park, as the best race they had ever seen.

The race had a bit of everything, made more exciting by the bad weather that saw countless numbers of cars running off the track at the high speed turn 1 and turn 2, but it was the battle for the outright win that lasted the entire race with side by side racing that enthralled those watching.

There were 38 cars that started the race with 29 finishers, and there were six divisions. The speed differential was so great the tail enders were lapped for the first time on lap 5, thus causing an enormous number of high speed traffic jams as the leaders fought their was through the field.

The race was cut short by ten laps, and made a time event, due to the record number of safety car periods caused by cars firing off in the extremely wet conditions. There were still four cars on the lead lap when the chequered flag came out on lap 123, and victory went to Sydney youngsters Jake Shelley and Michael Shaw in a Mitsubishi Evo 9.

In second place just nine seconds in arrears were fellow Sydney drivers  Dylan Thomas and his father Dave Thomas in another Evo 9, while third was 2010 race winner David Raddatz in his MX5 Mania Mazda MX5 with new co-driver Nic Cancian.

Cancian had taken the flag first, after he and Raddatz drove a magnificent race, but they received a 90 seconds time penalty for overtaking under a yellow caution flag, and were subsequently relegated to the lower end of the podium.

Another driver to receive a penalty was the defending champion Steve Anslow in his 6-litre Chev V8 powered Mazda RX7, with Raddatz former co-driver Shane Otten.

Anslow/Otten had also looked winners at times, and had like five others had led the race, but they finally finished fourth, after they had received a 45 second penalty, which dropped them behind Raddatz when his 90 second penalty was applied.

Canberra driver Nathan Jess, a two-time winner of the race, and his Melbourne co-driver Matthew Thompson were also front runners in the tiny 1000cc motor cycle powered Future Racer, and were on the lead lap and battling for the win with the leading pack until lap 115 when Thompson spun into the turn 2 gravel trap.

Luck plays a big part in motor racing, for Shelley went off in the same incident, but the difference was the Evo driver got out of the gravel and mud while the Future Racer became stuck and required a tow by the tractor which triggered the ninth and final safety car of the day.

The safety cat then gave Shelley the opportunity to stay in touch with the leading pack.

There had been another entry in with a chance of winning, with Sydney father and son Craig and Adam Burgess in their highly modified Nissan Skyline GTR. They had led the 2011 300 until a gearbox broke, but this year had a new stronger unit and seemed the car to beat with great pace when running at the front, but on lap 22 while leading they retired with a broken rear axle.

Of the six divisions, there were no finishers in Division 1, but Division 2 was won by Shelley and Shaw, Division 3 by the mighty Mini Cooper JCW driven by Victorians Henry Draper and Linda Devlin.

Division 4 went to Michael Hall/Chris Gough (Mazda MX5), while another Victorian father and son team, Phil and Declan Kirkham, won Division 5 driving a Ford Fiesta XR4.

Mark Morsillo and Elliot Wright in their Triumph TR7 V8 won the sixth and final division.

Shelley & Shaw take out an epic Wakefield 300

Jake Shelley and Michael  Shaw have won an enthralling Kumho Tyres Wakefield 300 for 2012. Whilst David Raddazt and Nick Cancian took the chequered flag a post applied 45 second penalty dropped them to third place with Shelley sitting only 9 second on the road behind and second place finisher Dylan and David Thomas  another seven seconds behind.

Dylan Thomas captured pole in a wet qualifying

Dylan Thomas has put his Mitsubishi Evo on pole position for the 2012 Wakefield 300.  In a rain soaked qualifying session the EVO of father and son Dylan & Dave Thomas qualified more than a second faster than second place Steve Anslow last years winner.

The Wet conditions caused the top 10 shoot out to be cancelled  leaving Thomas on Pole for the 39 car grid Wakefield 300.  The surprise of Qualifying was Chris Gough in his Mazda MX5  who came from the bottom 50% session to land in 6th position.  Last year’s fourth place finisher Jake Shelley was fifth whilst 2010 Champion David Raddatz was fourth.

Debutant David Krusza qualified 9th in his and co-drivers Daniel Kapetanovic  first race event.

2012 Kumho Tyres Wakefield 300 Qualifying.

Queenslander Geoff Phillips and New South Wales driver Steven Godfrey team up in one of the Tampered Motorsport entries.

Phillips comes from a background of sports sedans and has more recently been racing in hillclimbs and sprint events in Townsville, while Godfrey has raced his Toyota MR2 in Super TT events.

This car is not as powerful as some of the other Mazda MX5s in the race, but the drivers should be up to the job, so expect this car to finish in the top-15.

Driver Profiles