Winton Super Series Day 1 Wrap
At times, the opening day of the Hi-Tec Oils Super Series was a wet and wild affair at Winton Motor Raceway.
Words: Dan McCarthy. Photos: John Morris
L to R: Robbie Farr, Brad Gartner
All six categories had three practice sessions today, including the Australian Superkarts Championship, a welcome addition to the Super Series program.
The categories were the TA2 Muscle Car Series, Legend Cars Australia, Formula RX8, Australian Super TT Championship, Australian Excels, and three Superkart groups.
TA2 Muscle Car Series
The top three in the TA2 Muscle Car Series standings ended the day in the top three positions. Series leader Josh Haynes edged out Brad Gartner by the slender margin of just 0.12s.
Gartner is looking to bounce back after a difficult weekend at the Shell V-Power Motorsport Park last time out. The tight margin between the rivals,’ bods well for a great battle over the course of the weekend.
Mr Consistent, Graham Cheney sits third on the points table, and ended the day in that spot also, he was 1.4s of the pace of the young hot shots, with his fastest time being set in practice 2.
On debut this weekend, Speedway legend Robbie Farr ended up 14th, he was 3.8s off the fastest time.
Mark Bailey ended up in fourth, 0.005s ahead of Cam Sendall, and just 0.07s clear of John Hollinger.
Joshua Thomas, TA2 veteran Mark Crutcher, Hayden Jackson and Brett Niall rounded out the top 10.
While session 2 and 3 were dry, practice 1 took place in insanely wet conditions, Haynes was fastest by nearly 1s. Notably Gartner did not set a time.
Legend Cars Australia
Ben Goodridge was fastest on Day 1 in the pocket-rocket Legend Cars Australia, the top three were separated by 0.35s. Ryan Pring was second fastest, and Aiden Williams third.
Chris Spicer ended the day in fourth, 1.4s slower than the time set by Goodridge.
Mark Duckworth rounded out the top five ahead of several of the usual front-runners, Scott Morgan, Robert Hogan, and Billy Finnegan. Askr Sendall was ninth, with Robert Coulthard 10th.
Many familiar names were outside the top 10 including Bruce Duckworth in 12th, Lincoln Pope in 13th, Brendon Hourigan in 15th and Scott Melville in 19th.
However, don’t read to much into these times, qualifying is tomorrow, but in Legends Cars Australia you can win from anywhere on the grid.
Formula RX8
Steve Devjak was fastest at the end of the opening day at Winton in Formula RX8, but not by much, the official margin was 0.054s.
He pipped championship leader Brock Paine, who has taken clean sweeps in both of the last two Formula RX8 rounds.
His championship rival Rob Boaden ended the day all the way down in 14th position on the combined times, notably he completed only three laps in the third and final practice.
Further up the field Thomas Derwent was third fastest on the combined times, 0.7s off the fastest time, but 0.5s clear of Geoff Connell in fourth.
Diesel Thomas was fifth, he and Liam Hall in 13th were separated by less than a second, highlighting the competitiveness of the field.
Thomas ended up ahead of South Australian Ivan Vantagianto, Stacy Vickers, Brett Thompson, Jamie Canellis and Joshua Thomas, who rounded out the top 10.
There is a record number of entries in the category this weekend, with 23.
Australian Super TT
Youngster Blake Tracey was the fastest driver in Australian Super TT today at the wheel of his BMW E36, he was 1.3s clear of the field. The top three were over 2L slick tyre runners.
Corey Gillett was second in his sleek Nissan S13, with Brett Edwards in his Ford Falcon in third.
The fastest Over 2L treaded runner was Ryan Bell in fourth behind the wheel of a Nissan 370z, 0.9s clear of Trev Drummond.
Michael Ricketts was the best performing Under 2L car, the Young Car Wash sponsored Nissan Pulsar ended up sixth, from Daniel Natoli, Stuart Gamble, Damien Hunter and youngster Kiara Zabetakis.
A total of 16 Australian Super TT cars are entered this weekend, the biggest of the season.
Australian Excel Championship
At the end of proceedings, the local Victorians ended the day with the best times. Toby Waghorn was fastest with a 1m 52.2s lap, 0.13s faster than Brad Vereker who’s time stood from practice 2.
There was a bit of a margin back to the first of the interstaters, New South Wales driver Blake Tracey 0.7s off the pace in third.
Queenslander Tyler Collins was fourth fastest, ahead of Caleb Paterson, Matthew Boylett and Caleb Hefren.
Sam McLaren, Joshua Richards and Edward Mitchell rounded out the top 10.
Superkarts
Due to the incredibly large field of Superkarts this weekend, the field has been split into three separate groups.
Natsoft has combined the times from every single session, enabling me to tell you who was fastest and when.
The fastest category, 250cc International was topped by Nicholas Schembri, he set a 1m 22.29s time, an impressive 1.5s clear of his fellow Victorian Tim Clarke.
It was a tough day for the rest of the karts within that class, Paul Clark and Raff Pironti were next, while Ilya Harpas did not record a single lap time.
125cc gearbox was topped by Bradley Tremain, he beat Lee Vella by just 0.19s.
Sanuja Perera was fastest in 125cc Rotax Light, the heavy class was topped by Colin McIntyre and Super Heavy Rick Setterfield.
Stock Honda saw Cameron Austen go fastest, 0.3s ahead of Jock Dos Santos.
Notably Victorian’s were fastest in every single category.
On-track action starts tomorrow at 8.30am, with the livestream commencing at 10am, this can be viewed here - www.youtube.com/@superseries.official
Coverage on SBS, Fox Sports, Kayo and Sky Sports NZ starts at 1pm AEST.