NZ's best midget car racers to front at Meeanee
Aucklanders Brad Mosen and Ryan Baker and Palmerston North's Shane Dewar.
These are just three of the crowd pleasers in the 21-strong field who will contest the second round of the Bryce Townsend Memorial Midget Car Series at Saturday night's Motorworks Christmas Special Meeting at Meeanee Speedway.
It will be the first time in many years the midgets have raced at Meeanee. Townsend died in March this year and was aptly acknowledged with his winning of the Contribution to Speedway award at the Speedway New Zealand awards in July.
He was a two-time winner of the New Zealand TQ title in the late 1990s and moved to the midget class in the 2000s. A two-time North Island midget class champion, Townsend, won the 2003-'04 season World Midget 50 Lapper. That year's International Midget Series saw Townsend on the podium three times in five races against a highcalibre international contingent which included Tony Elliott, Dave Darland, Tracy Hines and Cory Kruseman.
When his racing career ended he took on a mentoring role for Aucklander Max Guilford who will be racing on Saturday night. The evening's format will consist of standard qualifying heats including re-starts from the rear of heats.
For the feature race the top qualifier will draw a marble to determine a straight up start or a top 10 invert.
Saturday night's other feature event will see the Hawke's Bay Hawkeyes superstock team take on their Wellington Wildcats counterparts in two teams races. The Hawkeyes, who won the prestigious Palmerston North Teams Champs title as well as the Auckland-hosted Nationals last summer were scheduled to take on the Wildcats in the capital last weekend but wet weather forced the cancellation of that meeting.
New Zealand champion Randal Tarrant and the bloke regularly labelled as the country's best blocker Mike McLachlan will be the kingpins in the Hawkeyes team. They will be joined by Clayton Hagen (pictured racing below), Matt Demanser, Kairyn O'Brien and Hayden Hart.
The Levien brothers, Ethan and Keegan, who finished first and third respectively in the Hawke's Bay championship last month will spearhead the Wildcats team. They will be joined by experienced campaigners Paul Fairbrother, Dale Robertson and Hilton Parker.
Support classes will be streetstocks, TQs and sidecars. Father Christmas will make his annual visit during the meeting.
