More questions than answers in Friday NZ Grand Prix practice at Highlands

There were more questions than answers after Friday’s final three practice sessions before the final round of the 2025 Castrol Toyota Formula Regional Oceania Championship at Highlands Motorsport Park and the 69^th New Zealand Grand Prix.

The most obvious question was who was in best shape for the Grand Prix itself. Two sessions were interrupted by minor crashes, and teams opted for different strategies on set-up and on tyre use. It left the picture of who was quickest overall somewhat murky.

Could it be championship leader Arvid Lindblad, content to sand bag and let others have the limelight? Or perhaps Supercars’ top performers Will Brown and Broc Feeney, who settled in very quickly indeed and was quickest in the final session.

Another question on everyone’s lips was whether M2 Competition were struggling to find pace, or were perfecting their speed and holding off from showing their full hand of cards with strategic throttle ‘lifts’ around the track.

Patrick Heuzenroeder – fast all day – topped the morning’s first session for mtec, making the most of a brand new set of tyres -to clock a 1 minute 29.510. That was significantly slower than 2024 times but with plenty of time for the drivers to go faster and for the track to rubber up a little more.

Zack Scoular and Giles Motorsport’s Will Brown also benefitted from new tyres to go second and third. Perhaps the most impressive run in the first session came from Kiwi Motorsport’s Nicolas Stati – who went fourth fastest on old tyres and finished ahead of Enzo Yeh and Alex Crosbie, who both had the benefit of new rubber. Seventh fastest Jett Bowling looked very committed – another on older tyres. Shawn Rashid, Sebastian Manson and Nicholas Monteiro completed the top ten.

Championship leader Arvid Lindblad and M2 Competition team mate Matias Zagazeta were near the bottom of the time sheets, but neither did any running on new tyres, preferring to concentrate on longer runs during the session.

In the early stages of the second session Lindblad got as high as fourth on new tyres but Brown and Yeh were both ahead on older rubber.  And he fell further back as the session progressed.

It could be the case that M2 are having to work on finding the optimum pace around the long Highlands track, for Lindblad at least. The team did make  set up changes to his front wing, camber and it appeared, to the car’s overall ‘rake’ or incline from rear to front during the first two sessions. These changes would normally be designed to generate more front end grip and reduce understeer and combined with new tyres, should have cured any potential ‘issue’.

On the face of it, given he used two new sets of tyres in the session, it was not unreasonable to think Lindblad might be in a bit of trouble with only the fifth fastest time but eagle-eyed fans watching the testing felt there was more to come from M2 Competition’s top drivers, observing on occasion some very early lifting of the throttle down the straights.  Michael Shin’s pace, third fastest in the session and only two tenths down on Will Brown’s best, tended to suggest the team does have some additional pace to unleash.

Lindblad may also be focussing on set-up for Saturday morning’s unique NZ GP qualifying format, a one-of-a-kind in the Castrol Toyota Formula Regional Oceania Championship.

It is divided up into three sessions with the first defining the Race 1 grid and which 13 drivers go forward to session two. That second session defines who will run for the top eight and who will start 9-13 on the Grand Prix grid. The final segment, of course, defines the top four rows for the GP.

In that scenario Lindblad’s potential ability to deliver fast laps quickly in each of the three segments would be valuable, particularly since the best laps in sessions have been coming later and later and the GP qually sessions might not long enough on what is the longest track on the calendar.

Brown was another to bolt on a new set of Pirellis for the later part of the session and the choice served him well as he delivered a series of fast laps for Giles Motorsport – the best of which ended up as quickest of the session. Heuzenroeder looked as fast in the second session as he had in the first, going second quickest after another strong run. Shin was third, Shawn Rashid an eye-catching fourth ahead of Lindblad, Stati, Scoular, Manson, Bowling and Monteiro.

The first half of the final session was another interesting one, and like the sessions beforehand on Friday and Thursday, gave little away. One thing it did prove was that Broc Feeney had adapted to single seaters very quickly indeed.

At the half way point he sat on top of the times just under three tenths quicker than Brown. Shawn Rashid was enjoying his most competitive session in the championship too, going fastest at one stage and easily in the top five.

A red flag came out when Stati went off and brought the session to a close and there was no further improvement on the very hot track when the drivers went out to complete the session. The delayed end to the session was good news for Yeh, as he managed to get out on fresh tyres and in a repaired car after his earlier crash.

With the session done, it simply left more questions than answers as to how form for the 69^th New Zealand Grand Prix weekend looks. Feeney was quickest, followed by Brown, Shin, Scoular and Nikita Johnson – hitting the top five for the first time over two days of testing. For the teams it was mtec, Giles, M2, mtec and M2. It was just as mixed further down with Rashid sixth, Heuzenroeder seventh, Monteiro eighth, Sebastian Manson ninth and Lindblad just tenth.

Strategies, set-ups and absolute speeds will, of course, be revealed in Saturday morning’s qualifying session. It could be the most open  qualifying session so far in the championship as it enters its final two days.

2025 Castrol Toyota Formula Regional Oceania Championship – Friday Practice 1

2025 Castrol Toyota Formula Regional Oceania Championship – Friday Practice 2

2025 Castrol Toyota Formula Regional Oceania Championship – Friday Practice 3

Header Image: Bruce Jenkins