Round four of the Precision National Sports Sedan series sees an enormous 38 entries set for the September 2-4 event at Eastern Creek’s SMP.
The National field will also be splitting the track with the Kumho Tire NSW Sports Sedans for the all out SMP stoush.
As announced yesterday on AUTO ACTION’s website, joining the field will be Supercars ace Andre Heimgartner, with the BJR driver set for his second National round of the season in the Mark Duggan owned, Duggan Family Hotels, Aston Martin DRS9.
Last time out at Phillip Island, Heimgartner secured a podium third, but was then hampered with some mechanical issues that hindered his round 1 performance.
The round will have a celebratory flavour, with the 70th birthday of the Australian Racing Drivers Club, seeing earlier era racing cars take to the track with the Group N Historic Touring Cars, Group S Historic Sports Cars, Heritage Group C & A Cars, and the HQ Holdens.
Heimgartner in the Duggan Family’s Aston Martin DRS9 racing against Jordan Curuso and Steve Tamasi at Phillip Island in March 2022
The two Sports Sedans series will also be joined by the Production Touring Cars and the Superkarts.
It’s a huge round four for the National series, with the neck and neck contest at the top of the field between Jordan Caruso in the Audi A4, and Steve Tamasi in his Holden Calibra nearing its conclusion, with Shane Woodman holding third over Michael Robinson.
The NSW championship is also hanging in the balance, with Birol Cetin returning in his Camaro hoping to take back the series lead, which was snatched up by Steven Lacey and his Camaro in Cetin’s absence, with third place runner Theo Cambouris continuing to amass consistent points .
The coveted Des Wall Trophy is also up for grabs in Sunday’s race 3 of the combined Sports Sedan grid, with the Wall family on hand to present the trophy to the victor, honoring the life of the 2009 Australian National Champion who lost his life to cancer 10 years ago, and is remembered for his significant contributions that he gave to Sports Sedan racing and racing in general.
Caruso leads Tamasi and the rest of the pack at The Bend
AUTO ACTION spoke with series leader Jordan Caruso ahead of this weekend’s racing, who with the John Gourlay owned Audi A4, has shown irresistible pace throughout the season.
“It’s been a lot of mental preparation this week and going over go-pro footage, John’s (Gourlay) has had the car in the garage keeping it maintained and making sure it’s ready to go,” Caruso explained.
“The car was just flawless at The Bend last round, and it felt good to drive, so we’re gonna go to the SMP with a similar approach, as the two tracks share some characteristics.
“And with the bigger field also, qualifying will be really important to get some good laps in and try to be out front. With the pace difference, we might have to be fighting through some congestion with lapped cars.
“But also, Sydney’s SMP is a killer for tyres, so we’re gonna have to do a good job of managing the sets that we have whilst trying to do the least amount of work on the tires as we can, to get the same variety of results.
Caruso also talked about being kept on toes by Tamasi, whose consistency means that any slip up with the way the points are awarded, could be the difference in taking out the title.
“Stevie (Tamasi) has just been so elevated in his performance this year, and I’m really enjoying the in-race competition with him cause he’s pretty on to it. His car is really strong off the line, so a few times he’s been able to get in-front and I’ve just had to be patient and wait for the right move.
“Any slip up or one bad race could sort of cost you the championship at the moment. And obviously this week we’ve got Andre (Heimgartner) in the field again, so I’m really excited to go up against him, and hopefully he doesn’t have the mechanical issues he did last time out and he can have a really good crack at it.
Regarding the Des Wall Trophy, Caruso is looking forward to competing for the tributary trophy, which sees the starting grid complete an additional formation lap as a mark of respect.
“It’s obviously great that they’re paying tribute to Des Wall once again; it’s a really fitting way of paying homage and it’ll be my first time competing for it, so it would be an honor to take it out over some really stiff competition.”
In addition to the bumper field, Mason Kelly, son of former Bathurst 1000 winner Todd Kelly, will also be belting up again, along with a number of MARC cars from Queensland, including Geoff Taunton, who competed well at The Bend in his first 2022 national outing.
Competitors will be joining the field from Queensland, NSW, Victoria and Tasmania, with Liam Hooper from the Apple Isle competing in the Nationals for his first time.
The penultimate September 2-4 SMP round sets up a tantalizing championship finale for the Precision National Sports Sedans series, which will be heading to Sandown on November 4-6.
For more of the latest motorsport news pick up the latest issue of Auto Action.