The V8 Supercars round in Darwin has again proved fruitful for Kiwi V8 driver Shane Kiwi Shane van Gisbergen. It was at Hidden Valley Raceway that ‘the Giz’ enjoyed two podium finishes at the SkyCity Triple Crown meeting and this year he went even better claiming his first V8 Supercar win on Australian soil at the Darwin circuit.

This landmark victory comes almost two months to the day after the 22-year-old claimed his first series win at his home round in Hamilton and with two wins to his name now van Gisbergen is a genuine 2011 title contender.

He claimed his second win in style too, following up from the disappointment of a clash and subsequent scrabble to finish seventh in Saturday’s race with an epic drive through the pack from his sixth row starting position to eventually catch and pass Craig Lowndes for the lead of Sunday’s race with just three laps to go.

In doing so van Gisbergen proved the wisdom of Stone Brothers Racing’s tyre strategy, the team choosing to start its drivers on the harder ‘control’ tyre and save the softer ‘option’ tyre until later on, when – as happened – a Safety Car period might play into their hands. (more…)

He’s been class champion, dominated the Super 1300 class and now Papakura offroad racer Nick Hall has leapt into the outright championship lead in the Mickey Thompson Champs with a perfect weekend at the latest round, held near Himatangi near Palmerston North in the Horowhenua.

Hall, driving an American-built single-seater race car with a race-tuned 1.3-litre engine, dominated the in-class heats on Saturday of Easter weekend then worked his way up from a start position of sixth to take the lead in Sunday’s 150 km endurance race.  He now holds a narrow six point lead in the 2011 Mickey Thompson New Zealand Offroad Racing Championship.

Racing against the biggest and most competitive turnout of Super 1300 cars in the 2011 championship to date, Hall was able to dominate from any start position in the three in-class heats despite landing in the fence off the start in the third heat.  When another racer moved to the outside off the start line, Hall was unable to avoid the rear of the other car, and both tangled with farm fencing alongside the track.  Fortunately, organisers ruled the race should be restarted and Hall carved through the field to once more win. (more…)

After staying the night in New Plymouth, the Targa field were once again greeted with a glorious, sunny day as they started the second day of competition.

Although there were only four special stages on Day 2, a challenging day lay ahead of the drivers — the first being the 31km Tarata stage, followed by the infamous 25km Inglewood Jumps stage.

In the Modern Category, the GT-R battle continued — although Clark Proctor had finished Day 1 just ahead of Tony Quinn, the Aussie soon showed that he wasn’t about to give up and he took a full second out of Proctor on the Inglewood stage. Steve Millen in the Stillen GT-R dropped further behind the two leading GT-Rs, giving away over 30 seconds to Quinn over the Inglewood jumps.

After SS9 in the Modern Category the battle between the GT-R35’s of Tony Quinn.

In the Classic Category, the overnight lead had gone to Neil Tolich in the Perana, but Team KB were snapping at his heels in their BMWs, with Mark Kirk-Burnnand taking a full second out of Tolich’s lead over the Inglewood stage.

Known locally as the Lincoln Road Jumps — the Inglewood stage has become an increasingly popular spot for spectators and this year was no exception with a large crowd watching the action.  No less than three Groundsky photographers were strategically positioned on the stage and TV3’s Shaun Summerfield, plus a cameraman, were also on hand to record the flying cars.

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With day one of competition finished, the cars arrived in New Plymouth after a grueling day which included two of the longest special stages on this year’s event.

After his engine blow-up at Hampton Downs during the Prologue, Leigh Hopper started the day in his other WRX.

Out on the stages, a few minor incidents added a spot of excitement — Geoff Bawden went ‘gardening’ in his immaculate 1977 Holden Torana SS, while Peter Dudson (Fiat 131 Abarth) found a piece of hard agricultural machinery on the other side of the fence he shot through and punched a hole in the side of his car. Other fence-hoppers included Ross Johnson’s Porsche GT2 and Chris Lane’s Audi RS2 Quattro.

Up at the pointy end of the field, as everyone had predicted, the first places were dominated by Nissan GT-Rs — and as the field arrived in Otorohanga, GT-R driver, Clark Proctor, held a one second advantage over Tony Quinn’s GT-R, with Steve Millen’s Stillen GT-R only 68 seconds behind. Alas, the fourth GT-R, driven by Harry Dodson had struck mechanical problems and had been reduced to only two-wheel drive, so Harry was off the leading pace.

The early Classic Category leader was Neil Tolich in his Capri Perana (pictured), just 59 seconds ahead of second-placed Mark Kirk-Burnnand’s BMW. Mark’s uncle, Barry, only 39 seconds behind in his M3. Other Classic contenders included Garth McGregor’s Torana XU-1 and Allan Lewis’ supercharged Datsun 260Z.

The afternoon consisted of a short 16km stage followed by 41 and 36km stages — making up 182kms of special stages for the day.

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