Taupo Preview

Round 3 of the North Island Endurance Series will take place at Bruce McLaren Motorsport Park at Taupo on Friday 12^th June and Saturday 13^th June.

The 2Hour Clubmans Endurance Race has grown to 27 entries at time of writing with three Mazda RX-8 coming up from the South Island which include Cameron Davies and Flynn Mitchell , newly crowned SS Cup Champion Jarrod Parmenter and his co-driver Andrew Brunton in another as well experienced South Island Endurance Series competitor Mike Driver in his RX-8.

Photo courtesy of Matt Smith

In the pointy end of the field Brendan Murphy and Brock Cooley have returned for Round 3 while the two BMW 235i’s of Wayne Leach and Paul Burborough as well as Todd and Rhys Bawden should have a decent chance at Taupo.

While David Grigor hasn’t entered at time of writing Class 3 and overall leader Shane Parsons and Lindsay Lyons will be looking to fight back for Taupo with Allan Sargeant showed great pace at Hampton Downs driving his Seat Leon Supercopa.

Brock Timperley and John McIntyre will return to the 1Hour race after missing Round 1 in their highly modified Ford Falcon V8 NZV8 while Lochlainn Fitzgerald-Symes will be looking for a top 5 result after a 4^th place disappeared underneath him in the dying stages at Hampton Downs.

While the big question still, remains can either John Midgley or Anthony Leighs snatch victory of Glenn Smith and John de Veth.

Garry and Ben Derrick who were Runner Up in the South Island Endurance Series 1Hour Race last year in their Porsche 991 while Charles Rollo will make his first appearance in the series driving his Toyota Levin AE86 Turbo while Geoff Short has swapped his Porsche 997 for his Audi R8 LMS GT3.

In the 3Hour Neil Foster and Jonny Reid proved they can take it the Heart of Racing Aston Martin of Alex Riberas and Darren Kelly. Glenn Smith and John de Veth showed great pace in Qualifying in Hampton Downs while Andrew Fawcett and Sam Fillmore gave everyone a warning that they are there to snatch a podium if the cards fall their way.

Lance Hughes and Chris van der Drift will want a better day out after a braking issues took them out of the race at Hampton and Marco Giltrap and Simon Evans have entered a McLaren 570 S GT4.