Andre Simon claimed victory at Highlands Motorsport Park on Saturday in the New Zealand Endurance Championship Class 4 & 5 1-Hour. Driving a Toyota 86 Turbo, Simon was never far from the front to take victory by just over 11 seconds.
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Finishing in second place, behind Simon, was the VW Golf driven by Tim Mackersy. It was a solid result for Mackersy, who had been running in third with just 10 minutes remaining, behind Marco Shlep.
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Unfortunately for Shelp, mechanical difficulties saw his BMW E46 WTC GTR slow before eventually having to retire, missing out on a podium that looked so sure.
Mackersy, however, benefitted from this and move up into second, whilst the Audi RS3 TCR of Warren Black was elevated into a podium position.
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In a race that was the battle of the home-builds and TCRs in the race, which ultimately turned into a battle of reliability early on.
The first casualty came not long after the start, an engine failure in the Lotus Exige of Mark Meadows bringing the field back together.
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Following this, the VW Golf GTI TCR of Grant and Cole Askew began misfiring, the team forced to withdraw the car to focus on the later 3-Hour race. They did return to the pack later in the race, albeit in a testing capacity.
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Another Safety Car was then required when Marcus Barnett stopped on track in a Seat Supercopa. That incident came about through contact with the Audi TCR of Denzil Travers, the latter awarded a drive-through penalty as a result.
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Once the rhythm returned, it was Simon who was leading the way again, which he held on to claim victory over Mackersy and Black.
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Brad Rule, in a Honda Civic, was crowned Class 5 champion after finishing seventh overall.
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