The Winton Super Sprints returned at Winton Motor Raceway on Saturday (April 5), over 100 cars entered, the largest field since 2019.
The rules have been simplified this year, quite simply, points are now awarded based on fastest recorded lap that day.
Twenty-five points are handed to the fastest driver down to two points for 11th and below. Three bonus points are awarded for each sprint event participated in, and a further 10 for participating in all throughout the season.
Entrants are split into eight classes based on their vehicle specification.
Racing Cars Over 2 Litre
Peter Hill took the honours in the Racing Cars Over 2 Litre class driving his Ford Mustang, his 1m 33.652s time proved to be the best time of the day in any category.
It was another Mustang in second, Dane Nye ended up 1.071s behind. Nigel Armstrong in an old school Holden VX SS rounded out the top three, he was 2.6s off the time set by Hill.
Racing Cars Up to 2 Litre
This category includes one make race cars Toyota 86s, Hyundai Excels and a variety of improved production and production cars.
Dan Fewster set his benchmark early and it was just enough to win the Racing Cars Up to 2 Litre category.
Like Fewster, Adam Schuurman was lapping in a Toyota 86, despite his best efforts even setting his best lap on the final lap, he ended up 0.505s behind. Stuart Haverkort driving a Honda Civic was 1.1s further back.
Road Registered Up To 2 Litre
Road Registered Up To 2 Litre was dominated by John Tyack in his Mazda MX-5 winning the class by nearly five seconds.
The official margin in the end was 4.816s, his 1m 43.794 around halfway through the day was never challenged. Peter Garrett driving a BMW Z3 was his closest challenger,
Garrett’s best lap was a further 1.4s better than that of Ford Focus driver Thomas Plover. In total 12 cars entered into the class.
Road Registered Over 2 Litre
This category was stacked with 17 entries, ranging from Ford Mustangs to Porsches, Commodores and performance BMWs.
In the end, two Porsches that entered finished 1-2 with Robin Knaggs taking the class victory.
His 1m 34.04 lap time was set on his penultimate lap and resulted the Porsche GT3 RS driver taking a 3.3s win over 911 steerer McPherson. The best non-Porsche was Larry Walsh in a Ford Mustang who set a 1m 39.76.
High Performance Up to 2 Litre
This was the closest class of the day, just 0.38s separated the top two, however it was even closer in the fight for a top three finish. All of these drivers saved there best until late in the day.
Ray Manson in his Holden Gemini took the class honours, edging out Nissan Pulsar driver Chris Rebeiro.
Both Felice Di Terro and Gavin Nolan set their fastest times on the penultimate lap of the day. Di Terro lapping in an MX-5 took the podium place by just 0.043s.
High Performance Over 2 Litre
Andrew Thompson won the most popular category of the Winton Super Sprint, no less than 18 cars competed.
Thompson and his Subaru WRX Sti won by over 3s, however the next three were separated by just 0.6s.
Audi RS3 driver Philip Owers prevailed in the fight for second, he beat Thanh Tran in a BMW M3 Touring and Georffrey Stean in a Mitsubishi GSR300.
Open Wheel/Clubman
Clubman driver Robert Pern set his quickest lap on lap 12 of 34, however it comfortably stood until the end of the day, winning the class by 2.6s.
Russell Gray in a Formula Ford ended up second after setting his best time of the event on his final lap. Charles Haynes pipped Kyle Murphy to third by 0.2s.
Juniors
The category for the youngsters was hotly contested, in the end the win went to Lily Hendrick in her Excel, saving her very best for the final lap.
Locky Walsh ended up just 0.525s back, with Suzuki Swift driver Jake Riddiford rounding out the top three.
Also at Winton on that day was ‘Cruise for the dream,’ 280 vehicles descended on Winton as part of the car display. All were there to raise money for John Giggins’ dream, to transform his own XD Falcon into a tribute to the iconic Dick Johnson TRU-BLU Touring Car.
John is based in Wangaratta, and has recently been diagnosed with terminal Stage 4 Brain Cancer.
A big thanks also to the Motorsport Training Australia crew for their assistance over the course of the day in helping to organise the event.
The next Winton Super Sprint event is on July 5.
