By: Colin Windell
Port Shepstone - A few new names popped up on the leader board at the mid-season round of the KZN Road Racing Club meeting at Dezzi Raceway, Oslo Beach, at the weekend with Cecil Manson-Bishop finally getting a win for his immaculate historic Ford Anglia.
A highlight was the first public appearance of the new 5.7-litre V8 Chevy-engined Backdraft Slingshot Roadster built for Mike McLoughlin and Trevor Graham. Going out for some shakedown testing it was driven by Brian Martin who notched up second overall in the Super GT category, despite teething problems.
Trevor Graham tried the car but switched to a conventional Lexus-powered version when he could not comfortably fit in the new car, finishing up third for the day with Peter Blofied having a fine run to win the category overall.
As usual the Historics was a tightly fought battle but two faultless runs by Manson-Bishop ensured him of overall victory in Class E, ahead of Darryl Mann and Stuart Armstrong. In Class F, Rory Nossiter hung onto the win (and third overall for the day) despite having the wrong diff in the Mini.
The car was being prepared for a long-distance all-Mini event and it was an impulse decision to go to Dezzi – one also compounded by having only semi-slick tyres for the event.
No such problems in the 150 Super Production motorcycles where Jesse Conci ruled the roost, winning both heats to take overall honours for the day ahead of Tai Robinson and Kyle Robertson.
In the 150 Class A section overall honours went to Cayden Potgieter ahead of Felix Kroeber and Sven Christensen with Riley Day winning Class B from Hannah Pure and Jaydon Weston.
The 300 Class motorcycles overall result looked like an easy win for Drew Gates on paper but the youngster had to work hard for the honours after crashing at the start of Heat 1 and being forced to come from well behind. He made no mistakes with the second heat and blasted away into the lead he held to the flag. Felix Kroeber finished second overall for the day with Kyle van Rooyen third.
There was much excitement in the opening heat of the Modified Production Cars when Nicole Lombard put her VW Scirocco ahead of the VW Golf of Elton Fuchs, holding the reigning champion in the Super Modified class at bay for a few laps.
Fuchs managed to pass Lombard who was then a passenger after being nudged by Ronald Janse van Rensburg’s Golf.
She returned for the second heat in Henk Lombard’s more potent VW Scirocco but could not manage a podium place.
Having moved up from being a Class C car, Tim Kinsey finally achieved overall honours for the day in Class A, beating out Gary Commins and Kyle Purchase for the top step. Class B went to Richard Loynes from Rosh Sooful with Gary Brown winning Class C from Mark Futcher and Barry Glanz.
The Formula Extreme motorcycle honours were taken by Liaan Smit from Stephen Puren and Clinton-Massey Hicks while Hayden Louw topped the charts in the Super Motards from Shaun Joffe and Cameron van der Nest.