Teams Update IX

The Palmerston North Pumas continue to keep their unbeaten record and stretch their lead with Auckland faultering at the Peter Barry Memorial teams meeting at Meeanee. Weather stopped the final rounds being completed but the Meeanee Maulers, Palmy Pumas, North Island Select and Waikato Raiders made the semi finals and have a chance to add to their points for the season.



Oct 30:
Auckland Alleycats def Gisborne Gladiators

Nov 6:
Eastern States Titans 135 def KB Cowboys 34
KB Cowboys 130 def Canterbury Crushers 39
Eastern States Titans 124 def Canterbury Crushers 45

Nov 12:
Wanganui Vulcans def Canterbury Crushers
Canterbury Crushers def KB Cowboys
Wanganui Vulcans def Eastern States Titans
KB Cowboys def Eastern States Titans

Nov 19
Huntly Teams Meeting Night 1
Manawatu Steelers 140 def Meeanee Maulers 55
Gisborne Gladiators 180 def Waikato Raiders 0
Huntly Hawks 160 def Stratford Stormers 30
Auckland Alleycats 105 def Wanganui Vulcans 90
Meeanee Maulers 160 def Stratford Stormers 30
Manawatu Steelers 165 def Huntly Hawks 30
Wanganui Vulcans 150 def Gisborne Gladiators 40
Auckland Alleycats 100 def Waikato Raiders 95
Night 2
Auckland Alleycats def Stratford Stormers
Waikato Raiders def Huntly Hawks
Meeanee Maulers def Wanganui Vulcans
Manawatu Steelers def Gisborne Gladiators
Stratford Stormers def Huntly Hawks
Waikator Raiders def Auckland Alleycats
Gisborne Gladiators def Wanganui Vulcans
Manawatu Steelers def Meeanee Maulers

Nov 27
Palmy Teams Invasion
Palmerston North Pumas 135 def Wellington Young Guns 60
Manawatu Steelers 185 def Stratford Stormers 10
Palmerston North Pumas 140 def Stratford Stormers 55
Wellington Young Guns 150 def Manawatu Steelers 45
Manawatu Steelers 3rd def Stratford Stormers 4th
Palmerston North Pumas 1st def Wellington Young Guns 2nd


Dec 10
NZ Stockcar Teams Night 1, Wellington
Palmerston Pumas def Wanganui Vulcans
Meeanee Maulers def Canterbury Crushers
Eastern States Titans def Stratford Stormers
Wellington Young Guns def Waikato Raiders
Auckland Alleycats def Gisborne Gladiators
Waganui Vulcans def Canterbury Crushers
Palmerston Pumas def Eastern States Titans
Meeanee Maulers def Waikato Raiders
Gisborne Gladiators def Stratford Stormers
Wellington Young Guns def Auckland Alleycats

Night 2
Wanganui Vulcans def Stratford Stormers
Auckland Alleycats def Eastern States Titans
Auckland Alleycats def Wanganui Vulcans
Palmerston North Pumas def Gisborne Gladiators
Wellington Young Guns def Meeanee Maulers
Gisborne Gladiators def Meeanee Maulers
Palmerston North Pumas def Wellington Young Guns

World 240's Meeting, Rotorua
Rotorua Rascals def Gisborne Gladiators

At Gisborne Speedway
Foreign Legion def Gisborne Gladiators

South Island Teams, Woodford Glen
Canterbury Crushers def Reece's Rebels
Southern Sharks def Eastern States Titans
Eastern States Titans def Reece's Rebels
Canterbury Crushers def Southern Sharks

At Stratford, 12-02-11
Manawatu Steelers def Stratford Stormers

At Wanganui, 13-02-11
Palmerston North Pumas def Wanganui Vulcans

Peter Barry Teams, Meeanee Speedway
Meeanee Maulers 165 def Stratford Stormers 20
Waikato Raiders 155 def Gisborne Gladiators 35
Te Marua Terminators 155 def Auckland Alleycats 30
Palmerston North Pumas def Kihikihi Crusaders
North Island Select 140 vs Orange Roughies 20
Meeanee Maulers 170 def Kihikihi Crusaders 15
Palmerston North Pumas def Gisborne Gladiators
Waikato Raiders def Orange Roughies
North Island Select def Te Marua Terminators
Stratford Stormers def Auckland Alleycats

At Riverside Speedway, Invercargill
Canterbury Crushers def Southern Sharks

Waikato Stocks and Saloons

Waikato Stockcar Champs
Huntly Speedway





One thing you can be assured of when traveling to Huntly Speedway is good stockcar action. Following on two weeks after a decent turnout of Waikato cars for Auckland's local title won in extraordinary circumstances by 88h Justin Hutchby, it was good to see a decent field including quite a few Auckland cars in attendance. Unfortunately the entire Alleycats team was a no show but with the Peter Barry Teams meeting this week leading into a heavy few weeks for this class, it was understandable. Two groups had two races for qualifying spots in a 20 lap winner takes all final. A repecharge featuring about six cars provided some great action but by the time the final arrived I think it had been decided that if your car was still mobile you were in, meaning a field of around 33 cars. Just quietly I had hoped that my dream team of trouble makers (4h, 83h and 84b) would get through qualifying but things were looking grim until the change of plans to include everyone.

The other feature for the night was the Waikato Saloon title raced over the three heats for points. It came down to how many cars 48a Phil Towgood could pass in the final race to beat 46m Terry Corin who started on pole. Corin could do nothing more than hold on to first place and hope Towgood had trouble moving up through the field, but as we witnessed he picked off each car and claimed the overall points win with a masterclass in driving. 18m Chris Taylor took out third place. The race was excellent and really set the bar high for the highlight of the night. Would the Stockcars be able to top it? Fear not! The 20 lap feature had action from the very first corner as 54h Larissa Van Houtte was sent spectacularly up the wall and hooked up on top of 28k Ivan Lammas bringing on the reds. The early stages of the race had every Rotorua car take a turn at leading as one by one they were removed by the locals. When 141h Rhody Game mis-timed a hit and fired into the wall on turn 1 the leader was 218h Aaron Alderton but he pulled off on to the grass gifting the lead to 72r Rumney. Next big incident was a red light for 32h Nigel Beer who had had a fairly tough night of it up to this point already carrying an injury from heat one, but was unlucky enough to hit the stranded 71h Wootten car in turn two ending with big damage to both cars. At this point 55h Neville Hazelton who had looked strong in the qualifying heats inherited the lead and looked good for the win until a puncture two laps from the end slowed him enough for 88h Justin Hutchby to grab the lead and win, repeating the feat of 81h Rod Smythe from last year taking both Auckland and Waikato titles in the same season. Rinso managed to come home in second and Hazelton limped home in third place in a hugely depleted field by races end.

Also I just want to mention the Golden Oldies racing that I thought would be a bit of WWE tappy tappy slow stuff... well these guys aint mucking round! Awesome racing and the more cars they get out there the better. They are great to look at in the pits, sound even better heading out to the track and are becoming a class well worth watching. There must be heaps of these cars lying round, in fact there is a perfect one just up the road from where I live. Get them back out there and relive the past! Anyway enough from me, sorry for the fairly basic updates lately, work has been like... well, work actually. Hard work, and so stockcars have taken a back seat. I almost didn't go to Huntly on Saturday night because I was a bit knackered but Im glad I did, it was good speedway with no weak racing. The programme ran smoothly, with the usual good commentary from Malcolm and Mintie and bloody good value for $15, just how speedway should be.

City of Sails Stockcars / Streetstock 290's

Auckland City of Sails Stockcars and Streetstock 290's
Waikaraka Park

Just a few photos from the meeting at WP last weekend. 59a Grant Littlewood took out the Auckland City of Sails Stockcar title from 95a Gary Lonergan and 242a Bernie Fox rounding out the top three. The stirrers trophy won by 137a Jamie Fergusson. The Streetstocks contested their delayed World 290's title, won by 11r Stephen DeMalmanche, 7g Travis Gooch second and 12k Daniel Curran taking third to keep the locals off the podium.

Auckland Stocks and SuperSaloons

Auckland Stockcar & Supersaloon Titles
Waikaraka Park





My last few visits to Waikaraka Park have involved rainouts and lighting malfunctions, but through it all good racing was always a given. Saturday night was more of the same, except this time a nasty accident in the Stockcar feature that involved 15a Carl Campbell being cut from his car on the track would be the reason for yet another meeting failing to go the distance. This meant that the Supersaloon feature was also canned and the results for both classes had to be obtained from previous laps or previous heats. It was unfortunate because the actual racing on the night for the two featured classes had been superb.

I never did a count of the Stockcars in the pits but they had been split into two groups. The pre-race estimate was around 50 cars which was fantastic. From my notes group one had 22 cars and group two had 21. Some of the cars in the pits didn't make it out onto the track so not sure what the reason behind that was. Two qualifying heats and the top 15 from each group would go through to a 30 car final, that raced two heats for points. After the first heat for both groups the obvious problem I saw was that the real entertainers (those going for the stirrers money) were not going to qualify for the finals. 67a Nick Krisnic took a fairly easy win for Group 1 heat 1, and with at least 4 or 5 cars dnf-ing our top 15 from this group was taking shape early on. 67a, 34a, 116h, 91a, 59a, 81h, 15a, 89r, 72r. For heat two only 20 cars fronted with 34a Mark Wearing and 9a Cameron Kenworthy on the front row. 9a had failed to finish heat one and would need a whole heap of points to get through. 67a Krizo was off the rear of the field. 59a Grant Littlewood took the victory from Wearing, Rinso and Mulholland. 59a, 34a 81h, 89r, 43a, 158a, 137a, 67a, 116h, 15a, 91a, 72r, 28h, 9a, 45a. Group 2 seemed to have a lot more action than group 1. 88h Justin Hutchby and 95a Gary Lonergan tussled for the lead and the Huntly cars banded together to hold up 95a giving Hutch the heat 1 win. 7a Ken Tyson spun 71h Tyson Wootton but was given some instant payback and put up the wall. 65a Mills gave a massive hit to stirrer 4h Matt Nilsson. 88h, 95a, 81r, 36h, 242a, 741a, 168a, 29a, 49h. Heat 2 had even more action with 85a Shannon Savage putting 4h up the wall but the biggest hit of the race was 71h Wootton on 95a Lonergan, it failed to stop the Aucklander qualifying. 81r Damian Orr taking the win. 81r, 242a, 95a, 29a, 7h, 5h, 741a, 34h, 168a, 88h, 13a.

The 30 qualifiers were: 168a, 81h, 34a, 158a, 43a, 71h, 49h, 36h, 29a, 5h, 45a, 13a, 89r, 91a, 59a, 15a, 34h, 48h, 81r, 28h, 95a, 72r, 741a, 116h, 7h, 88h, 67a, 242a, 137a, 85a.

Now this is where everything started to go pear shaped. By this stage the heats for the Auckland SuperSaloon title had been run and I hadn't taken too much notice of it as I was only going to write notes on the actual final race. Basically 8h Craig Cardwell had won the first heat, but it was heat two that had two rollovers, 12m and 99a (while running in 2nd place), and action aplenty. In their 3rd heat Cardwell had been sublime. Some nights he cant get a break but it was all going right for the 8h tonight. He managed to grab a 3rd place behind 24h and 1nz from a rear grid start, that would prove decisive. The Stockcars had the first of their two heats and it was spectacular to say the least. 137a Fergusson was rolled on the first lap but able to continue. 13a Hey and 158a Martin were early retirements. 29a Scott Tennant was leading from Billy Neill, Damian Orr and Lonergan. 137a went into stirring mode and slowed 81r Orr, he was then set upon by 71h Wootton and 48h Scott Gallop slowed Tennant. Krizo went into bat for the Aucklanders and removed 36h and put 28h up the wall by the start finish line but reversed out into the line of 81h Smythe resulting in a huge hit that brought on the red lights. Upon the restart 36h Mark Caldwell attacked 29a Tennant and 95a Lonergan took the victory. 95a, 34a, 88h, 15a, 29a, 168a, 89r, 34h, 81h, 72r, 741a, 81r, 45a.

After this we had protests apparently in both classes which resulted in a lot of filler as the meeting dragged on. Finally we had the Stockcars back out for the final heat. Hutchby was on grid 1 alongside 242a Fox while Lonergan was way back on grid 15 and Wearing would start from 7. From the green flag 137a tried to stop Hutchby while 95a and 34a were both spun sending them to the rear. Great blocking from 48h Gallop was making it very hard for the Aucklanders. 45a Taylor managed to put in a great shot on 34h Anton Leek but 95a was being held up by 71h. At about the 7 laps stage 34a Wearing was sent flying into the front straight wall head on and the red lights came on. 15a Carl Campbell had been injured in an incident I missed and the worst was feared. The meeting was halted and the race declared. There was no other option but to declare the Supersaloon result too. It was an unfortunate end to the meeting that had been action packed with both classes putting on a great show. Two more Auckland titles heading back to Waikato was almost as bad as the thousand of crickets that invaded the 'cemetery bend' end of the track (I'm not joking!) So we've now had floods, blackouts and PESTILENCE! I think WP has earned a break from Mother Nature!

Auckland Stockcar Champs
88h Justin Hutchby 58pts
15a Carl Campbell 53pts
29a Scott Tennant 51pts
89r Dean Mulholland 51pts
72r David Rumney 50pts
95a Gary Lonergan 47pts
81r Damian Orr 47pts
168a Billy Neill 47pts
34h Anton Leek 44pts
741a Craig Chatfield 43pts

Auckland SuperSaloon Champs
8h Craig Cardwell
1nz Shane MacIntyre
96a Lance Jennings
6m Gary Edwards
24h Ben Harding
8m Geoff Fletcher
7m Brent Emerson
63h Nigel Mouet
4a Shane Hick
58a Max Anderson