Race Report Round 3 Taupo Car Club/IRC Meeting

Toorace Trofeo Report Round 3: 24/25 November 2018

The music band title Wet, Wet, Wet came to mind to describe the event held in Taupo for Round 3 or our calendar. That triggered a long ago memory of a past report, similarly titled and a flooded Taupo track (see the 2006 Wet, Wet, Wet report if you want to see a photo of a really wet Taupo track).

So, Taupo was wet. Not so on Friday afternoon when the weather was fine and hot; but definitely different shades of wet by the time the meeting started the following morning. Qualifying and all 3 races were varying types of wet from a damp qualifying to an extremely wet final handicap race which Maurice Thomson correctly described as 8-9 on the scale of too wet to continue.

14 of our 15 Entries took their places on the Dummy Grid, with the welcome return to the Series of Andy Drummond in his blue AlfaSud. Qualifying was an exercise in patience with trouble for the green machines of Ray Shanks and Max van Maanen. The former finding the tyre wall on the exit of the sweeper and the latter retiring with leads/spark plug issues. Fortunately, both were back for Race 1, Max from the rear of the grid due to not setting a lap time. Track transponder loop issues meant that timing was manually recorded, a tough weekend for the Taupo Car Club timing crew.

Race 1 was underway just before 4pm the GTs proving to be best suited to the conditions and setting the fastest times. Good ‘wets’ were a definite advantage. Class wins went to Darron Curphy, Simon Mills, Chris Browne & the current wet weather wizard Chris Hunkin in the Trofeo class specification ‘Hornet’. Pick of Race 1 for the loyal spectators was Aaron Woolley who had a great race from 12th on the grid to overall 4th, and second in GT Junior class.

After a group photograph in a nice dry garage (showing that you can’t dampen Trofeo spirit) we lined up on dummy grid for Sunday morning’s Class Handicap race. We got underway between weather fronts, with a dryish line for most of the race, before the conditions got damper. Again. 

A Lap 4 front straight move on Rob Herbert in Turn 1 by Max van Maanen who was just ahead of Wendy Metcalfe resulted in a decent rotation by Max. Staying wide and scrubbing speed meant that Wendy was able to cut inside Max’s spinning Alfasprint, but finding a damp line into Turn 2 assisted by a mistimed application of power initiated a Stage right exit before she re-joined again with a dirty trail of evidence behind Maurice, Tina Glennie and Aaron Woolley. With Max’s Alfasprint stationary in Turn 1, the Safety Car was rolled to allow a safe recovery. The field bunched up and the restart achieved in Lap 5. This provided an entertaining and good battle for the remaining laps with most of the field heading into the sweeper together on the final 2 laps. The last lap proved a bit too busy with Maurice’s Punto leaving its Alfa friends for a trip through the volcanic fines. Places were lost, although Wendy was pleased to pick up her ‘lost’ 3 places.

The weather continued to roll through with brief hope that we might strike a lucky break in the rain. This was not to be and a smaller grid finally took the track in wet conditions, which improved slightly before becoming dismal! This race belonged to Bryan Lambert and was apt reward for his tenacity over the entire meeting. Such was his progress that he led from pole and lapped Wendy Metcalfe whose ‘all-weather’ tyres, sideways movements through the sheet water and self-preservation instinct meant that completion was the goal. Most of the grid completed the race, and no one fell off! Congratulations to Bryan who finished the day with the sort of smile you can’t wash off. No matter how hard it rains.

#Toorace

Series Positions after Round 3

GTA: Darron Curphey

GT Junior: Aaron Woolley

Veloce: Chris Browne

Trofeo: Chris Hunkin

Handicap:Darron Curphey

Toorace Trofeo Grid for Race 1: Saturday 24th November, Taupo