Lawson leads after TRS opener in Cromwell

New Zealand’s Liam Lawson got the defence of his Castrol Toyota Racing Series title off to the best possible start with a dominant victory in the feature race at Highlands Motorsport Park, his second win of the weekend enough to give him the championship lead.

He leaves Cromwell heading M2 competition team mates Igor Fraga and Yuki Tsunoda by 15 and 16 points respectively.

His second Dorothy Smith Memorial Trophy race in a row became a lot easier when fellow front row sitter Caio Collet, who had all but matched him all weekend for pace, pulled into the pit lane at the end of the warm up lap.

Undiscovered damage from the Brazilian driver’s morning trip into one of Highlands’ unforgiving concrete walls was the culprit and it completed a miserable weekend for the mtec Motorsport driver. Losing a win on Saturday after an illegal practice start on the warm up lap, then hitting the barriers in the second race compromised his weekend massively and the driver with perhaps the best chance of challenging Lawson is already on the back foot in this year’s championship.

Lawson won the race with ease and survived a Safety Car restart after Jackson Walls stopped his car out on the track to romp home over two seconds ahead of second placed Franco Colapinto, the Argentinian driver improving dramatically from the start of the weekend to the finish for Kiwi Motorsport and marking himself out as a definite contender for race wins, if not the title. It was, said the Kiwi, a little bit tougher than it looked.

"It was actually a very challenging weekend, this car is a lot more physical to drive than last year’s," he said. "The longer races at the end of the weekend are very tough. I wanted to maximise points today and I’m very happy to have achieved that."

Lawson’s M2 Competition team mate Fraga also put in a solid performance in the 20-lap race and was third for the final place on the podium.