Mercer tank update

After I mentioned the Space Tank of John Mercer in an earlier posting, I received a few pics from Gavin Evitt who is a member of the Historic Stockcar Club and edited the 'Siderail' magazine.

Also efforts to track the car down have been successful with a posting by Cuzz12h on Macgors, but no new pics so far, see message below:

"...Went around to hillbillys house last night to look at this car, it was ex Dane Condor and the motor is now poked (heads). Rather than spend time to repair the old 221 ford V8, it will be replaced with an EA Falcon 6 and will be back racing before the end of this season. Hillbilly was surprised to see the photo of what this car use to look like in 1986 as the car has had some major changes over the years (front nose change, side rails and bumpers). Chassis still looks mostly original.

Thanks to Gavin for these new shots.

76a

Richie Wright of Auckland has been racing stockcars since the dawn of time it seems and always turns up with an immaculately presented car. This little beastie has been around for a while but only seems to make a few cameo appearances each season. According to the 'drivers missing in action' section on Macgors site someone posted "Last time I saw Richie Wright he was a police constable based in Pukekohe and living in Waiuku, I think he still has his last car."

Wright, a former member of the AVD-Centra stockcar team can never be accused of following the pack when it comes to the look of his cars. The jury is still out on the fluoro pink chassis (looks orange in these photos but trust me it was so bright it almost hurt) and having a white car is sure to make you even more visible on the track, but this car seems to be able to take the hits.

A google search revealed a page of images of the AVD Centra stockcar team and an earlier Wright car 25a, can be seen on the far left of the first pic. The site belonged to Nigel Bree and was one of the first dedicated stockcar websites. Come back Nigel!

92g

First in a new series of postings will be of stockcars I like for no particular reason other than looks! In a sport that is fairly generic in the looks department, it's always great to see someone go that extra mile and present something a bit different.

First up is the 92g of Brett Lloyd from a few seasons ago. It has just recently sold from Hawkes Bay to Blenheim (Steve Biddulph has the ex 12b now racing as 96e) where stockcars are having a revival of sorts. I managed to get the rebuild pics from Rex and Del Nield. The low profile and fine presentation of the car made her a real looker.

Brett Lloyd is now registered at Palmerston North and qualified for the NZ Stockcar Finals at Meeanee in the 92p machine (bottom picture).






Photos 1-2 courtesy of Rex and Del Nield
Photos 3 courtesy of Graham Hughes www.proshotz.com
Photo 4 gregobro!

Half a meeting is better than most!

There is something about me, Palmerston North and Stockcars that when added together means rain! We flew down on Friday full of hope and expectation after what I can only describe as a very average season so far, landing in cloudy but promising weather conditions, only to see rain drops starting to fall on the windscreen as we approached our motel... sinking feeling.

We still went to the track but by 6pm the plug had been pulled and it was Hell Pizza and Super 14 rugby on Sky, Blues v Hurricanes (more disappointment!) as our nights entertainment. I did manage to score the Teams programme and Palmy 75th Anniversary Book while I was at the track and had a look around the pits so it wasn't a total washout.

Saturday Night

With the programme now moved on a day, Friday nights racing became Saturday nights, and Saturdays moved onto Sunday for the finals. Now even though 5 of the last 10 years meetings have meant one night has been cancelled we only booked flights that returned us to Auckland on Sunday morning so once again we knew we would be missing the finals. Why are we always so optimistic when booking our flights? Seems we weren't the only ones as quite a few well known drivers were also on our flight home too.

Once we dealt with that aspect it was off to the track and straight to the pits for a look around. One of the reasons we love this meeting more than any other is the fact we can pre-buy our seats and not do the mad 4pm queue at the gate thing we used to do years ago. In fact the entire operation at Palmy is head and shoulders above any other track in my opinion.




Once seated there seemed to be a real party atmosphere that's been missing these last few seasons. Expectation was high and I have to say we were well rewarded with possibly the best "Friday night" racing in years. There didn't seem to be a single dud race and even the traditionally weak teams performed so well that the result could have gone either way.

I have to mention the "spectacular" wall of fire death car display which got probably the biggest reaction of the night (booing) it was so lame but gave us such a good laugh, I dont know if that was the intent. It was right in front of us and so much effort went into getting it set up that the resulting stunt was so incredibly crap! Then a streaker completely stole their thunder and then it was back into the racing.



As always, we bravely cheered for Auckland (or Dorkland depending on where you come from) and after the first race suddenly there was silence around us! Not only had they won, but a clean sweep over the Glen Eagles. Joy! Of course it was soon dealt with swiftly by the naysayers around us with screams of injustice about the way in which Darryl Hammond had dispatched 75c. Suddenly the angry crowd who bleat that stockcars don't hit anymore wanted to know how 43a could do that, what a maniac, mass booing and thumbs down. What a sweet moment for us long suffering Allstars fans...

Although the dream didn't quite come true with a narrow loss to the Scrappers in the final race in the group, what a great performance by a team that was well and truly written off before the meeting. In fact these last few seasons the Aucks have done pretty well and made our time in the stands a bit more pleasureable! The re-emergence of the Stratford team was well received and they surprised quite a few by qualifying for the second night.

The debut of the Kihikihi Kings and the massively improved performance of the Otago Cougars are really positive signs for a class that is heading in an uncertain direction. Superstock teams racing is the jewel in the crown of speedway but it comes at a price. These cars are such high performance beasts now that some of the hits are just unbelievable. Scotty Miers hit on Kerry Remnant was the highlight of the night. You have to be brave to get out there and Scotty Miers is the epitome of a teams racer.

The rest of the meeting was similarly spectacular and although we knew we weren't going to see the finals we felt we had seen a return to form for one of the best meetings every year. What a great 'half a meeting!'

There is a comprehensive review on the Palmerston North website including the finals won by the Palmerston North Panthers.






Meeting Rating: 9/10

Underwhelming

During the 1980's I was one of the many defectors from Waikaraka Park who started going to Western Springs Speedway after having been a stockie regular since about 1971. But in 1993 I went to see the NZ Stockcar Title held at WP and with a record number of entries and a fairytale run-off between Kevin Free and Craig Pierce in which the former won his third NZ title I was once again hooked on stockcars and have been a firm follower since.

Fast forward to the present day and once again WP is holding the NZ Superstock title and lo and behold on the list of entries is one Kevin Free, or is he...

Qualifying Night



Even in the weeks leading up to this meeting rumblings could be heard on the discussion boards and at the big meetings prior to this one that all was not well. Saturday night we finally knew who was going to be participating and I believe there were 77 cars all up. A couple of former champs missing due to 'logistical problems' including Kevin Free who's only involvement in the weekend would be to hand out prizes for a banner competition and a few hot laps with the historic stockcars in his brand new car built for $6,000. Fairytale over.




The qualifying in my opinion was better than the finals night. This isn't a compliment, it doesn't mean that the qualifying night was out of this world, it sadly means the finals night was rather underwhelming for such a major showcase. Whether it was intentional or not there seemed to be alot of hits going in all of the heats and if the damage to the walls was any indication they were hard hits. Lets be fair, usually qualifying is just a whole pile of desperate flag racing with some chaos in the third heat from disgruntled drivers and std stocks who turned up to cause trouble. As seems the norm these days the entries from Palmy and Rotorua would end up topping the list of qualifiers and the home track managed only one qualifier in 8a Graham Goldsmith which must have been massively disappointing for the club. I know I was gutted!

It was great to see the five South Island cars rewarded for their efforts in just getting up here and also to see 54w Mike Pye qualify. He seems to have taken on the role that Richard Watkins once played for Wanganui when he was the sole entry in every championship steadfastly representing the "V".




The nights proceedings moved in a halting fashion but the points were at least being given out so we had some idea of what was happening. I think the overriding memory of the Saturday nights racing will be the Graeme Peters rollover, Rodney Woods empty engine bay, the Miers tank sadly grinding to a halt and chances of qualifying going with it and the ease in which Shane Penn qualified.




My best presented car winners are 86n Jared Gray and 16c Mark Osborne.

Finals Night

We arrived a bit later on the Sunday night and paid the price, with the upper grandstand almost full the three of us grabbed some rare space pretty close to our usual position and then we waited... I still can't believe that some sort of extra seating wasn't put up for this meeting but I'm never surprised. Now the band that played on the Saturday, OpShop, I dont mind, but this was never their kind of audience. As Frankie Stevens would say "it's all about song choice" wisely some classic hits were belting out of the ill performing speakers and so we didn't have to listen to people shouting abuse at the band!

I'll try to go easy with my recollections of the evening but as the title of this posting implies, it just never seemed to get off the ground. I'm as excitable about stockcars as Mintie is about cowbells but something just didn't quite gel. The pre race interviews before the first heat just took soooo long and my feelings on interviewing drivers are well documented, needless to say, to kill the boredom next time get everyone around you to scull everytime a driver says "yeah, nah" and you'll be plastered before the race even starts. As is the norm these days, when ever I tell someone "there's gonna be carnage in this race" it never happens. What proceeded was three fairly straight forward heats with minimal contact although the third heat did play out well knowing the full points situation and the whole Hunter v Penn battle at the front which Darcy Hunter played with the coolness and guile of a man who deserved to be the 1nz (even though I'll admit I was cheering for Penn). The gasps around us when Penn passed Hunter without either despatching him or making sure he wasn't a threat were palpable. It really was the defining moment in the championship in my opinion. As for the final outcome I was actually quite pleased, 337r a well deserving winner and as I mentioned, creating the win without team tatics, 591p always a major threat and 16c who really was the dark horse of the field. I wonder how different the outcome would have been had one Scotty Miers been in the finals.

The support programme for this meeting was appalling. When you have a field of super saloons with this much quality you don't play around with pointless 4 car or 2 car or any other odd mini version of a race! Finally they relented and let them all race together and it was the best 'filler' race of the weekend with 3nz Lance Jennings winning an action packed race with a great rollover to finish by 6a Doug Torrey.

The idea for the stockcar teams race was good but only made the rest of the bikes, minisprints, sidecars etc seem even more dire. Auckland beat Waikato in a fairly slow moving encounter but at least something with an 'a' on it won something.




My companions laughed when they saw the "bullring" and that just about sums up the bike action. Anyway, as soon as heat three of the title had finished we joined the mass exodus to the carpark to see if we could find an exit to actually get the car out of that hadn't been parked over by some late comer. The space issues at WP are a whole other posting but for now I'll leave it.

The programme cover is worthy of mention, I take it Neil Sampson did the drawing similar to the one he did for the 1993 programme but as with alot of this meeting, there were reminders of the glorious past but how things have changed...

I was recently at the NZ Stockcar title in Napier and as far as entertainment, value for money, action, excitement and crowd reaction, it far surpassed the display at WP this weekend. When I think of a NZ title for Superstocks I think of the meeting in Gisborne a few years ago, and that's what I expect or at least hope for. I'm taking nothing away from the drivers, I really feel the promotion and actual co-ordination of the meeting fell short.

There is a full report of the meeting on Percy's site.

Meeting rating : 6/10

NZ Stockcar Title Meeanee 06

Just getting to this meeting was reward enough for me after a few weeks of injury stopping me from doing anything but with the help of prescribed drugs (including Morphine yee har!) nothing was going to stop me going!

It's at this point I'd just like to say to anyone I ran into including Wal86 (StockCarScene) and Yaz (NZ Stockcar Crazy) that I was heavily medicated so if I rambled or didn't make sense that's my excuse! It was great to catch up with you guys at last and put faces to names.

Anyway on to the meeting, 140+ cars were entered and the thought of an entire weekend of stockcars with a few superstock races thrown in on the finals night was just what the doctor ordered. We arrived fairly early on Friday night after a slow drive down to Napier (staying at the Shoreline Motel on Marine Parade - excellent!) only to find my 'pet hate'... the "Blanket People" had struck! Now I try to always write pretty positive stuff but these people really pee me off, HUGE blankets with one person or sometimes no one at all sitting on them reserving seats for 20+ people who wont arrive until after 6pm really sucks. If we can take a day off work, drive from Auckland to Napier and reach the gates at 4.15pm and then have trouble finding a decent seat of course I'm gonna be mad. Anyway I think something has to be done about this before too long because if you have a favourite seat or a group of you are going to meet up then get off your butts and get down there early like the rest of us do.



Qualifying Night

With only 4 cars going through from each heat I thought it would be all out carnage after the first round of heats but surprisingly some of the heats were a bit tame including green group's third heat which was like a flag race with barely any contact and one of the very few low points of the weekend. Hits did come though and the stars of the night for me were 68b Tony Darroch who destroyed his car, 37b Paul Demanser and 9g Steve O'Dwyer who turned mongrel after his chances of qualifying had been ended. In fact there was a few races where there was so much action going on including multiple red lights (that bloody siren sound) and roll overs that you'd have to be a hard nut not to have enjoyed the spectacle. The programme ran smoothly although the points updates where non existant and this is a major low point for me.




Instead of constantly hearing "Crank it up Sonny" and some old porn slapper thanking "Brent Boddy cars for the hot new pace ute with 17" mags and lowering kit oh yeah baby eat some Gala Catering hot dogs mmmm" WE WANTED POINTS UPDATES!!! I don't care if they are official or not, I want to know who the top six are going into the final heat at least and also during a break when both 1NZ and 97p where being removed from the track we got jokes instead of the importance of what had just happened, two of the major players removed from the championship. As the pits was closed to the public we left on the first night only having our own feeble attempts at who might be in the finals? Isnt it typical that at a track that had an excellent sound system, the commentary team had nothing to say!

1nz Dale Robertson's reign was over pretty quickly actually and it was disappointing to see him struggling all night, it was as though all his bad luck for the season hit on night one. Other favourites to suffer and not qualify were 8m Scott Fredrickson who must be one of the most targeted drivers you'll ever see and 97p Graeme Ward who was off the pace all night with various problems. 14r Steve Axtens and 19r Lance Aldridge the TAB favourite both taken out early on aswell. It was good to see a few unexpected drivers qualify like 49b Mark Jones who had some major support in the crowd and the five Straford drivers who really did their club proud.





We left the track well satisfied with what we had seen and thirsty for more carnage on night two.

Finals Night

A much better performance all round with the points updates and a few insides as to what was happening including tell us who was coming where in the points during red light stoppages - this was a much better option than music or husky voice overs but overall Im going to say that the commentary was below par for a meeting of this stature.

The Blanket People were out in force but we managed to get seats in the top row along from turn two so I was able to lean against the back board of the stand only slightly medicated and quite comfortable. I'd hate to think how many people squashed into the stadium but it was definitely a full house!

The actual three heats for the NZ title were great and once we saw who the finalists were (parked on the infield) it was obvious to me that a Palmy car or a Rotorua car would take the title. The Rotorua challenge faltered and it was the Stratford drivers who became a real chance by heat three, but I still didn't think Peter Rees would get the title as I was sure he would be a marked man. Ivan King 48r almost took him out in heat three but you have to hand it to the 11p that he can take the hits and was deserving of the title. We thought 19p Kerry Humphrey had won it and I probably think alot of the drivers did too as 11p seem almost oblivious to the fact he had just won.



19p Humphrey gets my driver of the weekend award. What an amazing achievement to be 3nz after moving up from the ministocks only a few seasons ago and had a tyre not chosen the worst time to give up he would easily have won the run off with 22w Richard Gaskin for the 2nz position. He was humble and gracious and his well presented car was a credit to the man and his club. He is a future 1nz for sure.

The consolation races were great although the attrition rate was high and perhaps a few of the groups could have been combined later on but a special mention to 44c Peter Ross in an immaculately presented car that came so close to qualifying on night one and showed his class taking out two of his three consolation races on night two. It's a great sign for the class that both of the entries from the South Island were competitive, well presented and worthy of being there. 1nz and 86b also took to each other in every race they were in and 37g Ricky Kuru had the best rollover of the weekend in my opinion and there were plenty of those. Generally the entire night was a credit to the drivers and the Hawkes Bay club.

...and finally some good stuff

A few things I'd like to mention that I thought were excellent, the opportunity to go on the infield and take photos of the cars and have a good close up look at them before the meeting. This was the first time I've ever gone on the infield at any track and once the cars fired up to head back to the pits the atmosphere was amazing, a perfect start to the weekend.

The signing session for the kids on Saturday was also a great idea and well done to the club for encouraging the drivers to be more proactive with the crowd.

The food choices at Meeanee are far and away the best of any meeting I've been to (outside Palmy of course) and even included Subway!

The programme was well put together and as a point of interest had an article on the woman drivers competing, Lisa Black, Rose Halfpenny, Kelly Layton and Donna Carter. 93a Kelly Layton and 117a Rose Halfpenny qualified for the Clay Classic.

The seating was great and the general feel of the Meeanee track is always excellent. The last meeting I attended there was Murray Hobbs winning the NZ Superstock title a few years ago and once again that was a fantastic meeting to attend.

If Billy Neill ever decides to leave stockcars he could show the clowns a thing or two, his quad bike performance was spectacular to say the least! Go Billy!



My best presented car award goes to 11r Kayton Beazley.

All in all then a great visit to Napier and a special occasion witnessing Pete Rees taking the 1nz title for the second time, and the first person to do it in Stockcars since the class was officially recognised. The quality and depth of stockcars in Palmerston North is frightening and it's hard to see any one else winning a title when you have the majority of drivers in a final carrying a 'p' on their cars.

Meeting Rating : 8/10

Top 5ive January

Richard Ashcroft : Break The Night With Colour
Coldplay : Talk
Supergrass : Low C
Sugababes : Ugly
David Gray : The One I Love

Super Saloons and super painful!

I'll keep this update fairly short and brief due to injury!

I decided to venture off to the NZ Super Saloon GP last Saturday following on from the Modified version the week before only this time I knew the field would be full of stars and the action aplenty.

I wasn't going to be disappointed, two groups from every corner of NZ racing over two heats to qualify for a one race final for the coveted NZ Grand Prix title. I actually liked the format for this championship with the 'all or nothing' one race final.

There was a big crowd in attendance and the meeting was well run and pretty slick although the stand-in Flag Marshall had some moments during the evening including waving a yellow flag instead of the white flag for a last lap and some confusion with some of the starts but as I say I think the usual guy was missing. Also it was great to have Jamie McCarthy back behind the mic, this guy really knows how to hold a meeting together and although the regular guy does a good job, Jamie has just got that 'X-factor' that makes the difference. Hopefully he will be employed during the NZ Superstock champs as he's usually up with the play and has alot of background info which the crowd appreciates, specially at the big meets.

I have to say Super saloons have never been one of my favourites, I think it's just a throw back to your upbringing when Dad used to take us to WP in the 70's, there was only saloons and stockcars and you either like one or the other and I've always been a stockie supporter but in recent seasons the big saloon meetings have never disappointed and this meeting lived up to it's title.



A full review of the meeting can be found on Percy's website including the controversial final lap in an excellent report. At this stage 67s Bunter Pierce is the winner, but I believe protests have been lodged with the other two podium finishes being 34t Ray Stewart and 38a Peter Hemi. Whatever the result the meeting was a winner and the drivers involved certainly did their class proud.

Anyway the meeting was a goodie although I left with a slightly sore back which worsened over the next 24 hours until I ended up having to visit the Auckland Hospital emergency department on Sunday. End result 3-6 weeks off work, a neck brace and barely able to move, my trip to the World 240's at Rotorua now off and planned visits to Meeanee and Palmy on shakey ground... harden up young man, who would of thought watching Super Saloons could hurt so bad! Timing couldn't be worse and I'm gutted but anyway I guess I will be logging onto the Macgor Discussion Board like all the other unlucky non-travellers this Friday and Saturday for reports of all the action...

Anyway I hope it's a great meeting (I know it will be) but not like 'too great' okay!

Meeting rating: 6/10

NYE Modified GP

NYE is a strange time to hold a meeting in my opinion but as the meeting was supposed to be a quickfire one with a fireworks display which I intended on missing so I could go out after the meeting I thought I'd check it out.

The 'Grand Prix' in most classes seems to have lost some of it's lustre over the last few seasons and the Modified version proved this with a mere 14 cars entered. The programme ambitiously had 32 drivers listed but I think that may have been wishful thinking. In fact the field was almost the same as the previous meeting on Dec 27 which gave it a bit of an 'Auckland club night' feel to it, which was a bit disappointing. I'm taking nothing away from the drivers who were there and as it turned out the racing was top notch and quite dramatic if you included the 1NZ rollover, but with 10 Auckland cars, 1 Huntly and 3 Rotorua drivers it was never going to be a true Grand Prix meeting.

I really think the time has come for SNZ to address the problems with Clubs scheduling these meetings to suit themselves. The NZ, North, South and GP titles, the 'Big Four' should all be run on static dates every season so that there is no overlapping or poor scheduling and so competitors know that the NZ title is the first Fri/Sat in February every season for instance. I dont know how workable this is but it's got to be better than holding a GP on NYE? I don't want to take away anything from Allan Haigh's win but had he beaten the field of drivers listed in the programme that would have been something special to remember I'm sure. Two drivers I noticed who seemed to step up a level for this meeting were 66a Chris Picknell and 22r Glen Lloyd who both were super competitive at various stages.



Looking at the programme and the previous winners in this title Jamie Fox must be wondering what he has to do to win with yet another 2nd this time round missing the title by three points and previous finishes in 2004 3rd, 2003 2nd, 2001 3rd, 1999 2nd and 1996 3rd! Still that's an awesome record of podium finishes any driver would be proud of.

As for the rest of the meeting, the saloons were contesting their TelstraClear DHL Series and managed to put in some hits the stockie boys would be proud off. 48m Phil Towgood won this particular round.

The stockcars were entertaining although understandably down in numbers with 441a Andrew Weir providing most of the entertainment as he had no intention of racing for any flags. 99a Grant Littlewood picked up most of the wins.

As I mentioned I didn't hang around for the fireworks and the meeting was running later than I had expected but I still managed to make it to my next destination at 11.40pm with a whole 20 mins to get ready for the big countdown.

Meeting rating: 4/10