Southland’s Damon and Brendon Leitch were both competing in the 2014 Toyota Racing Series with the opening round at their home circuit at Teretonga Park, Invercargill. Damon had been in the series before while Brendon was making his TRS debut. Here’s Lindsay Beer’s round review for the brothers……
Leitch brothers do well in TRS
Invercargill brothers Damon (pictured) and Brendon Leitch both shone in the feature event for the Toyota Racing Series cars at the Motorsport New Zealand Race Championship Series at Teretonga Park this weekend. The 20 lap Spirit Of A Nation feature saw Damon exerting massive pressure on eventual winner Egor Orudzhev of Russia before finishing second while Brendon scored his best result of the round with a tenth place on debut.
DAMON LEITCH
Damon, the more experienced of the brothers was in top form during Saturday’s two qualifying sessions ending both second on the timesheets in his Post Haste Couriers car.
In the first session he was just .415 of a second behind Steijn Schothorst of the Netherlands while he was just pipped in the second session with a time just .014 of a second behind Orudzhev. That gave Leitch a front row spot on the grid for the first race on Saturday afternoon and he was in second place chasing Schothorst when his rear wing delaminated sending him off the track at high speed.
He regained the circuit, eventually pitting for repairs but he lost too much time and was not classified as a finisher. In Sunday morning’s race Damon was at the rear of the grid due to his non finish on Saturday. The track was treacherous after rain and despite moving his way up the field frequent safety car interruptions blunted his progress.
In the feature race Damon was again on the front row, this time alongside Orudzhev. He chased the Russian hard throughout the race making several challenges and it looked as though the Southland Spirit Of A Nation Trophy might actually stay in Southland. Once again the safety car made a couple of appearances and at the end Damon had to be content with second.
“The car went really well,” said Damon. “:I qualified a lot better than I had gone in testing with new tyres on the car and that normally means a good weekend. However the wing delaminated and I went off and that mucked it up! In the second race we didn’t quite have the car right in the wet and I was caught up around some rookie drivers. Without the safety car in the third race I might have got closer but it was good to get some points.”
BRENDON LEITCH
Meanwhile younger brother Brendon Leitch can be well pleased with his first weekend in the highly competitive class highlighted by tenth in the feature. Brendon had a good car in the dry but it needed work in the wet.
“We had real good dry speed. In the third race the car came on around lap 4 or 5 and got better and better. I was working my way through and the car had more tyre left. It was absolutely magnificent. Without the safety car I might have got a few more. It was good seat time though and the tenth place in the feature race was the highlight.
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