New wheels for defending rally champ
Top seed and defending champ David Holder will have a new drive for the penultimate round of the New Zealand Rally Championship starting in Hamilton on Friday.
Holder and co-driver Jason Farmer will take over Greg Murphy’s Holden Barina AP4 for the Handy Rentals Hamilton Rally of Waitomo, with Murphy unavailable for the last two rounds of the championship.
Current championship points leader Andrew Hawkeswood and co-driver Jeff Cress of Auckland have been front runners in all rounds of the championship as the Mazda 2 AP4+ driver chases his maiden national rally title. He has a seven-point lead over closest rival Matt Summerfield, the number three seed. The Rangiora Subaru driver has wins at the Whangarei and Canterbury rounds.
A capacity 81-car field marks the return of the championship
rallying to the Waikato, covering 207 kilometres over six special stages in the King Country and Waitomo districts. Seven newbreed AP4 cars, the NZRC debut of an R5 along with the spectacular array of 2WD class cars will be features of the event.
Nelson’s Ben Hunt is third in the championship race and the Subaru driver has been bagging consistent points finishes and finding the form that took him to the 2015 national title. Completing the top five seeds is the spectacular Audi S1 Quattro AP4 rallycar of Auckland’s Dylan Turner and Malcolm Read.
Hawke’s Bay’s Max Bayley, a former national 2WD champ, will debut an M Sport-built Ford Fiesta R5, run and prepared by Neil Allport Motorsport. The R5 spec car, which is a feature of the WRC2 World Championship support category, is the first of its type to contest an NZRC round and many are picking Bayley to be a serious championship contender with some time in the car.
The top 10 are completed by recent Ashley Forest Rallysprint winner Sloan Cox (Mitsubishi Evo), Te Aroha speedster Graham Featherstone (Mitsubishi Evo), New Zealand’s fastest female Emma Gilmour (Suzuki Swift) and Rhys Gardner in the first generation Mazda 2 AP4.
Along with a number of prime spectator viewing areas through the event, the public will get a chance to get up close with all 81 cars and drivers at the ceremonials, running from 4pm on Friday from outside The Eatery and The Keg Room at Hamilton’s Rototuna Shopping Centre.
The competition starts on Saturday from Piopio at 8am.