Practice 3 at the Huntly International Speedway concluded last Saturday night with all eyes now looking forward to this weekend’s Opening Meeting on Saturday 22nd October.
The Opening Meeting will usher in what will be a massive season ahead at Huntly with some major drawcard events such as the Pollock Cranes NZ Superstock Champs and Superstock Teams Invitation. The Outback 4×4 NZ Stockcar Teams Champs, Tank Guy Saloon GP, and the Garage 16 NZ Modified Champs.
Practices 1, 2, and 3 all went off without a hitch over the last two weekends with some respectable car numbers across all registered classes.
Ministocks will sport close to 40 drivers in the Youth grade this season which would make it a record number of entries for Huntly in quite some time.
Production Saloons quantities remain strong with a handful of new drivers to the grade and will push their number of entries to around the 20-car mark. The usual suspects to look out for in this grade are 25H Mark Levin and 48H Dave Pilkington.
Stockcars have always held the record for the most numbers on the books and this season will see no difference. Like the Ministocks and Prod-Saloons, the Stockcar brigade also received an influx of new drivers to the group with most of them being imports from the Ministock grade. Although you’ll be hard-pressed to go past the likes of 27H Brett Aikin, 88H Justin Hutchby, 16H James Marshall, and 361H Clinton Cheetham who have all staked a claim in the share of the black n white checkers over recent seasons. Notably of interest is the return of 33H Callum McLeod who makes a return to racing after a 10+ year hiatus.
Modifieds have a busy season ahead with the Garage 16 NZ Modified Champs set to take place on March 10th & 11th. Drivers will be looking at every opportunity to gain valuable track time ahead of that event which Huntly has only hosted twice, the last being in 2005 with a local hero of the time Tony Galbraith taking the win. Looking to emulate that feat is the always hard-charging 119H Brad Lane whose younger sister 199H Sam Lane is joining the Modified ranks this season. Ex-Superstock driver 96H Scott Redfern has been a welcome addition to the ranks last season and will get quicker with more track time.
Superstocks to have a busy season ahead with the Pollock Cranes NZ Superstock Champs taking place on January 5th-7th. The class has had a massive turnaround of driver numbers with only 2 registered competitors at the beginning of last season. Now with close to 10 drivers on the books, the class has been given a much-needed boost with the return of the Wootton brothers 71H Tony Wootton and 717H Tyson Wootton with the latter having had a season over at Waikaraka Park. 218H Aaron Alderton is back while the reigns of the 86H Kris Allen car have been placed in the hands of Tommy Van Amsterdam with Kris himself signing off a 30-year strong career after last season. NZ Championship Sponsors 7H Wayne Slater and 77H Thomas Slater will each have their own cars having shared one together at the business end of last season while newcomers 17H Dave Kirton and 27H Dave Merrett have looked impresses in pre-season testing despite the limited track time they have had.
Red and all his helpers have been busy over the off-season getting our facility and track looking spick and span. They have laid the new My laps loop in the track (which has been tested and is running smoothly), leveled out the pits and added a new steward’s room, extended the spectator’s car park, built fences, painted corporate boxes, and decks, weed eating, spraying, lawn mowing and much much more. Working bees have also been going on with drivers, reps, and crew water blasting, painting, and doing a general tidy-up.
We would also like to thank all our loyal volunteers, staff, and sponsors for resigning with the club and welcoming aboard our new volunteers, sponsors, and caterer. Check out all our sponsor’s signs around the track and give them a call if you are in need of any of their services. Don’t forget to mention you saw their signs at Huntly International Speedway and you may get a discount.
Without our amazing sponsors, our drivers, crew, volunteers, and the club in general we would not be able to deliver the amazing racing and family events that we do over the speedway season.
All that is left to do is for the gates to be opened to let in all your smiling faces, then the drivers will start their engines and we will be ready to drop the flag and let the dirt fly on our action-packed full-on race season at Huntly International Speedway the place to be.
Hope to see you all trackside.
