Aucklander driver Hugh Gardiner has continued his dominance of the Carter’s Tyres South Island One Hour Endurance Series, winning the third and final round at Timaru International Raceway on Saturday. With three wins from three races Gardiner has won the 2016 One Hour title. Second home was the Steve Parker/Matt Jackson Porsche followed by Grant Williams/Brent Buist in third.
“It’s great to have won all three races,” commented Gardiner. “These are the only races that we compete in each year so thrilled to have won the series.
“The team has worked hard for this and it has paid dividends. Fortunately for us but unfortunately for our closest competition, Chris Henderson blew an engine on Friday so didn’t make the grid for the race. Still we had to get through all the traffic and was able to lap everyone except for the Steve Parker and Matt Jackson entry that came second.”
In fine warm conditions it was a race without any safety car intervention.
“The driving standard across the whole field was unbelievably good,” said Gardener. “It is a series that continues to grow from strength to strength with great cars and top racing.”
In seventh place overall and first in Class 1 (>3501cc) was Bruce Davidson (Chev Corvette C6R) while Lee Rhodes took the Series win for the class.
Andrew Wright (BMW E36 M3) was the first Class 2 (2001-3500cc) home. Having taken three Class wins in three races the driver from Rakaia took the Series Class 2 title.
Daniel Cropp was the first Class 3 (0-200cc) car across the finish line but it was Mark Meadows (Lotus Exige) who took out the overall Series class win.
Drivers and teams now look forward to the New Zealand Endurance title round which will be held 18 March 2017 at the Mike Pero Motorsport Park, Christchurch. Qualifying teams from both the South Island and the Mahindra North Island Endurance Series will fight it out for the national title.
Race Results – Driver(s) + laps completed
1 Hugh Gardiner 55
2 Steve Parker / Matt Jackson 55
3 Grant Williams/ Brent Buist 54
4 Allan Dippie / Scott O’Donnell 54
5 Jarrod Owens 54
6 Danny Whiting 53
7 Bruce Davidson 52
8 Chris Small/ Johnny Small 52
9 Lee Rhodes 52
10 Johnny Wilson 52
11 Daniel Cropp 51
12 Andrew Wright 51
13 Ben Coffin 50
14 Mark Meadows 50
15 Jeremy Dawson 50
16 Bradley Dawson 49
17 Warren Good 49
18 Graham McDermid/ Lee McDermid 48
19 Jason Hewitson 48
20 Sam Bushell 47
21 Dan Yeoman 47
22 Matthew O’Donnell / Keiran Grace 46
23 Ian Wooster 45
24 Jim Kelly 45
25 James Dicey / Steve Heffernan 45
26 Vaughan Moloney 43
27 Reon Hotton 43
28 Vicki Curzon / Derek Curzon 41
29 Stephen Grant 38
dnf Adam Glass 30
dnf Nick Archibald/ Wayne Leach 24
dnf Stuart Black/ Arron Black 49
dns Michael Parkes / Rodney Parkes
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