Round 3 Recap
Round 3 rewind
Round 3 of the WASSSCA Championship is done for another year, and what a weekend it was, with a larger field entered than previous meeting it looked to be an absolute cracker of a Sunday. With our race weekends back to early morning starts it was great to see everyone smiling, happy and raring to go.
We would just like to welcome our new member Adam Michaelides in his very well presented Holden VF Commodore, prepared by Brett Stewart at Formula Tech Performance. Great to finally see the car out on track and doing well. It was also great to see Ken Coppin out on track for the first time this year in his beautiful Ferrari 360. He has been really busy behind the scenes planning something really special along with some other members for the end of the year, so stay tuned!
Things kicked off with qualifying at 9:30am, with Grant Hill taking pole for race 1 with a 59.6 and Walter Epple in his Porsche 911 a very close second with a 59.9, another person we are happy to see back out on track. Brett Niall in his Ford Focus Marc Car was quick all weekend with a 1:01.1. With more seat time in this car at the track, expect big things to come. Neville Stewart back again in his widebody Porsche rounding out the second row of the grid with a 1:01.5. Greg Barr also in his first appearance for the year went 5th fastest with a 1:02.6. Ken Coppin 6th with a 1:03.2. Adam Michaelides in his VF Commodore went 7th with a 1:03.9. Lindsay Murray in his Dick Ward RX7 went 8th fastest with a 1:05.6 while rounding out the rear was Glenn Petersen with a 1:06.0, with the car and driver always improving and also with some more upgrades along the way, expect those times to fall.
Race 1 we saw a close battle between Grant Hill and Walter Epple, after 8 laps they were only separated by 3 seconds, with Walter pushing Grant on old tyres it was exciting to watch. Brett Niall in his Marc car was 3rd pushing hard until the end. Fourth belonged to Neville Stewart in the 997 widebody Carerra cup car, running largely unchallenged being 13 seconds from Brett. Fifth place was Ken Coppins for the taking running with the street cars and 9 seconds behind Neville and 31 seconds behind winner Grant Hill. Last of the runners on the 6th place was Glenn Petersen in his yellow VL commodore, our only DNF was Adam Michaelides in the VF Commodore. Our 2 non starters for the race and in fact the weekend were Greg Barr In his Perkins Engineering VZ Commodore with a driveshaft failure while lining up for race 1 and Lindsay Murray in the Dick Ward Mazda RX7.
Race 2 saw a very good battle and an even closer finish, With Grant Hill on old tyres and Brett Niall on some green rubber. Grant held off a late charge from Brett to hold onto 1st place, with the two finishing only 0.2 seconds apart after the 8 laps, Walter Epple in the 911 a close 3rd only 2 seconds behind. Neville Stewart holding down the fort in 4th place again. And Ken again having a great battle with the Street cars down in 5th in the Ferrari. 6th belonged to Glenn Petersen, who was struggling for grip in the VL commodore.
The final race for the weekend saw Alan and Grant Hill decide to throw some green rubber on the supercar to hold off Brett in the Marc car. With his fastest time in this race quicker than his qualifying time at the start of the day! Brett and Neville go the better of Grant at the jump but by the end of the first lap he had charged ahead and held on for a simple run to the flag ahead of Brett Niall and Neville Stewart rounding out the top 3, with Ken Coppin in 4th having another great battle with Craig Maloney in the Subaru Wrx from street cars. And Glenn again rounding up the rear in 5th place, Walter Epple had picked up a vibration and retired from the race.
With Alternator problems all day, having to charge the battery in between runs the crew down at ADH racing did an excellent job to take 3 from 3 for the weekend bringing the total up to 9 in a row for the season! But with some more names coming out next meeting could mean for some interesting racing and even a new winner for 2018.
We would just like to thank our club sponsors for 2018 to making this season possible. These are, Earth plus, ADH Golf and Utility vehicles, Diamond Capital, Rockhard Stone Construction, Racing Dynamics, Advanced Motorsport Solutions and Okey Dokey Produce. They all have been great supporters of the club and continue to show support in motor racing in WA.
We would also like to thank all the officials for taking the time to let us go racing and making sure we are able to stay safe and return home to loved ones. We hope to see you all out there on June 17 for Round 4 of the WASSSCA championship.