Ugo Ugochukwu was the man with the speed around Hampton Downs and came away from the first round of the 2026 Castrol Toyota Formula Regional Oceania Trophy with the series lead – but can it last?
American Ugochukwu is unquestionably a highly talented driver. He drove FIA F3 in 2025, achieving two podiums and finishing 16th in the standings with PREMA Racing.
He is set to return for a second season in the Championship with Campos Racing in 2026 – but it’s a big call to say he’ll maintain his advantage at Round 2 at the Taupo Motorsport Park this weekend.
Taupo is very different from Hampton Downs. It’s more technical, less physical than Hampton Downs, and extremely hard on tyres. It has an interesting blend of corners, including a tight hairpin, several slow and medium speed corners, a tricky but fast chicane, and the awesome flat-out right-hander, Turn 11.
It’s hard to pass – but not impossible – and the new push to pass system on the CTFROT cars will come into its own down the straight.
M2 Competition’s Ugochukwu’s principal opposition this weekend could come from the new team Hitech’s two very impressive Japanese drivers – Jin Nakamura and Kanato Le. Both looked mighty fast very quickly at Hampton Downs, and the world-class Hitech team will inevitably improve.
Brit Freddie Slater is clearly an excellent single-seater prospect too. He’s fast, races hard, and can expect to be near the front again this coming weekend. Watch out for his M2 Competition Toyota FT60 car at or near the front.
Kiwi racers Louis Sharp and Zack Scoular both took wins at Hampton Downs – with Scoular showing fine form in the reverse grid after running mid-pack in Thursday’s collective testing and Friday practice.
Sharp was on song all weekend, but just couldn’t quite match the improvements in pace Ugochukwu and the Hitech drivers made over the weekend in his mtec Motorsport entry.
It’s a highly significant venue for another Kiwi – and one of the stars of Hampton Downs – Ryan Wood. He achieved his first Supercars podium as recently as 2025 and has always gone well there.
Wood is an extremely popular addition to this year’s Trophy field, and his campaign is attracting huge interest not only from New Zealand but also from Australia. Easily a top-five runner at Hampton on his single seater racing debut, he’ll be looking to step onto the Taupo podium once again this weekend.
Seb Manson – a winner last season as a Rookie in the Trophy – had a weekend he will want to put behind him, and heads to Taupo with a five-place grid penalty for the accident in Hampton Downs’ final race, which put him out, Kalle Rovanperä, Sri Lankan Yevan David, and Wood.
That was a real shame for the two-time World Rally Champion, who genuinely improved relative to the fastest time almost every time he took to the track.
He held the sixth fastest time in final qualifying until the dying moments and ultimately qualified ninth. Talent, of course, is talent, and there will be potentially millions of eyes on the Finn once again when he takes to the track this weekend. He’ll continue to improve; that’s a guarantee. And a good result is definitely a possibility.
Nolan Allaer turned a few heads at Hampton Downs as well, the IndyNXT driver getting his head around car and circuit very quickly indeed and running in the top ten by the final race. Another who should continue on an upward trajectory.
Red Bull Juniors Ernesto Rivera for M2 Competition and Hitech’s Fionn McLaughlin both showed promise, and both will be determined to do better at Taupo. McLaughlin has plenty of speed, but put himself on the back foot at Hampton with a sizeable accident in practice. Mexican Rivera improved throughout the weekend, too.
Aussie James Wharton ran well for new team TJ Speed with HMD Motorsports, and is only a tenth or two from making the jump from top ten to podium – it’s really that close this year – and the same can be said for China’s Yuanpu Cui in the fourth mtec Motorsport entry.
F4 USA champion Cooper Shipman, Brazil’s Ricard Baptista, and TJ Speed’s Trevor LaTourette are all in New Zealand to learn and did a great job in their first Trophy weekend. Top ten finishes for any of the three are entirely possible.
Racing at Hampton Downs was exceptionally close, so getting it right in every session will be imperative. Getting behind and finding that extra tenth required could be a tall order.
Collective testing takes place on Thursday, practice on Friday, qualifying and two races on Saturday and Sunday, with Sunday’s feature race for the Denny Hulme Memorial Trophy, which is the very trophy the 1967 World Champion won for winning the Argentine Grand Prix in 1974.
This year’s Trophy is already proving a big hit with the fans. More than 120,000 watched the qualifying and races live on the TOYOTA GAZOO Racing YouTube livestream, and that figure rose to 200,000 views by Thursday.
They’ll all be in for a treat again this weekend when New Zealand’s premier motorsport championship takes to the tracks.
All the weekend’s remaining action will be livestreamed on TGRNZ’s YouTube channel, and all races will be live on Sky Sport NZ. Tickets to come along to the race weekend are still available at https://nextgennz.flicket.co.nz
Header Image: Joel Hanks
