Finally, in some positive news on the otherwise beleaguered motorsport front here in New Zealand at the moment, Ultimate Rally Group boss Peter Martin announced this week that he was setting up an all-new Tarmac Rally Championship series to help focus both prospective entrant and fan interest on the three separate Targa events he intends to run in 2022.
Martin also confirmed this week that the other major event on his books, the biennial international NZ Silver Fern gravel rally, will also go ahead later next year.
The 2022 AASA Tarmac Rally Championship will consist of nine single day rounds, two each at the two-day Targa Bambina (Hamilton, North Island, March 12-13), and all-new Targa South Island (Nelson, South Island, October 22/23) events, and all five at the re-scheduled 2021Targa New Zealand (New Plymouth-to Havelock North, North Island) event now set to run over a slightly modified course between the 25th and 29th of May 2022.
Title sponsor for the new 9-round tarmac rally championship series is the Australasian Auto Sport Alliance, the 100% New Zealand-owned and operated agency of independent Australian motorsport permitting and licence issuing authority the Australian Auto-Sport Alliance.
With fellow Auckland-based independent motorsport event promotor, Dr Jacob Simonsen – of the 24 Hours of NaZCAR (nee LeMons 24 Hour race) fame – Martin was instrumental in getting an alternative permitting and licensing body to long-time incumbent MotorSport NZ up and running here, and has successfully used the AASA as his exclusive event permitting and competitor and vehicle licensing partner on what Targa events he has been able to run since the first COVID-19 Lockdown threw a spanner in the works back in March 2020.
“Yes,’ said Martin,” this (a bona fide ‘National Championship Tarmac series) is something I’ve been wanting to do for some time, but something has always got in the way. Ironically this latest Lockdown has freed up the sort of time necessary to put into planning just this sort of thing, and the AASA Tarmac Rally Championship is the first ‘fruit’, if you like, of those labours.”
Martin has also spent much of his new-found ‘spare’ time since being forced – by the Government’s current COVID-19 Lockdown policy – to postpone this year’s five-day Targa NZ event from its traditional last-weekend-of-October time slot to a new ‘mid-year’ one at the end of May next year, fine-tuning the 2022 calendar, to give everyone their best shot; both at finishing each event they start, as well as scoring maximum AASA Tarmac Rally Championship points.
To that end he has deliberately kept the km count relatively low on the first of the new 2022 season events, the two-day Hamilton-based Targa Bambina.
With a total of just 260kms of special stages and only 345km of transport stages linking them together, competitors and event officials alike can ease themselves back into the unique demands of a typical Kiwi tarmac rally event.
As Martin says; ‘this means that we can start a little later and finish a little earlier than we would normally each day, so that our entrants can work your way back into tarmac rallying given that it will have been nearly a year since many of them have been behind the wheel.”
Targa Bambina is scheduled for the 12-13th March. It is a two-day event based from Hamilton that has a mixture of well-known roads from previous Targa Rotorua events as well as a number of new roads that have not been used in this configuration before.
This year’s planned Targa New Zealand 2021 will now run for five-days between the 25th and the 29th May 2022. It will start (and remain based in) New Plymouth for the first three days then move to Whanganui (where the allied two-day regional event will start), then finish in Havelock North.
Due to less daylight hours to work with Martin says that there will be one stage less per day on Day 1 (Tarata), Day 3 (Bushy Park) and Day 5 (Motere), otherwise the event is as plotted, with a total stage distance of 750kms linked by1,250kms of touring for a total of 2.000kms.
The big news for many in 2022 is the return to the South Island for the third Tarmac Rally event. This time it is just for two-days (Oct 22-23) but it is to a new host city, Nelson, and what Martin describes as ‘an all-new mix of fantastic roads with their own unique charm and challenges!’
Finally, after being forced – by the NZ Government’s initial COVID-19 border closure this time – to cancel the 2020 Silver Fern (International 2WD Marathon gravel) Rally in the North Island, Peter Martiin also confirmed this week that he was forging ahead with plans to hold the next – South Island – event in November next year (2022).
“That’s right,” he said, “it’s with great pleasure that I can also confirm that we have also started planning for the NZ Silver Fern Rally 2022 with the event starting and finishing in Christchurch.
“Documentation day will be Saturday 19 November with the seven-day event itself starting on Sunday 20 November and finishing on Saturday 26 November.
Targa New Zealand events and the Silver Fern Rally are owned and organised by the Ultimate Rally Group.
Targa NZ events are run with the support of sponsors AndrewSimms.co.nz, Chicane Racewear, Global Security, NZ Classic Car magazine, Race Brakes, Race4Life Trust, Racetech, TrackIt, Vital and Writeraze.
For more information go to www.targa.co.nz or check out the Targa NZ page on Facebook.
For more information on the NZ biennial Silver Fern Rally go to www.silverfernrally.co.nz or check out the Silver Fern Rally page on Facebook.
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