It’s been a busy week with a whole host of announcements for New Zealand motorsport. If you missed them then here’s a catch-up.
At the top, Motorsport New Zealand have announced the completion of a comprehensive review of its strategy for top level circuit racing. This is timely and gives certainty for all those involved of how everything is going to fit and its direction for the immediate and medium future.
A key to the medium future is that Motorsport NZ has reached an agreement with WSC Ltd, the global rights holders of Touring Car Racing (TCR). This exciting category will be introduced as a national series in New Zealand in 2020. We already have a number of these cars competing in series such as both the North and South Island Endurance rounds.
From MSNZ’s media release, it is apparent that they see two different directions for young drivers. Either saloons or single seaters. Thus, if a young kartsport driver sees his future in Supercars, then from Kartsport they will be encouraged into TR86, BNT V8s or TCR. If their future is in single seaters then the path is Formula First and/or Formula 1600 then the Toyota Racing Series.
Already this has raised concerns about the importance of single seater racing for all drivers whether they are heading towards Supercars or Formula One. Particularly the learning of race-craft that these categories give. Let’s not forget that five of the six TR86 Champions competed in F1600. One cannot underestimate the importance of single seater racing, particularly in the lower Formula. There are plenty of top saloon car champions who cut-their-teeth in Formula First, F1600 and even TRS . Few have by-passed this experience.
With the demise of the Formula European Masters (FEM) Championship (previously FIA F3 European Championship), Liam Lawson will now contest the Euroformula Open Series as part of his Red Bull Junior Team program, alongside the FIA F3 championship. This is a great decision as it will give Lawson more track time on Formula One circuits. This will also see him continue to compete against a number of drivers from the 2019 Toyota Racing Series – Australian Calan Williams and Americans Cameron Das and Dev Gore. David Schumacher, who Lawson raced last year in German F4 is also on the entry list.
Brendon Leitch is at Sepang International Circuit this weekend competing in two race categories. Having competed in six consecutive TRS, he will compete in both the Asian Formula 3 and the Lamborghini Super Trofeo Asia Championships. This is a fantastic break for Leitch who still has a lot to offer. His Achilles heal seems to be qualifying. A key to success in TRS has been to qualify well and Leitch has had mixed results over the years so we will have to see how he tackles racing in Asia.
Taupo’s Conrad Clark will compete in the Chinese Formula 4 Championship with the opening round next weekend in Shanghai. Clark won the 2017 Speedsport Scholarship and competed in the 2017/18 NZ Formula First Championship, winning the Rookie of the Year award. Rather than carrying on competing at home, he then jumped into the US scene and competed in the 2018 US Formula 4 Championship, finishing outside the top ten in 11th overall. This begs the question, why is this 16-year-old by-passing competing at home? We had an extremely competitive national Formula 1600 season over the summer which arguably he should have been in, but those managing him have decided on another direction. I always thought that to win overseas first you had to learn to win at home. Is that not easier?
This afternoon sees the official opening of Paddon Rallysport at the Highlands Motorsport Park in Cromwell. This is an important step for the WRC driver in his career. Talkmotorsport will have more on this tomorrow.
So plenty happening this week. Over the next few weeks Talkmotorsport will present more in-depth opinion on a number of these topics.
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