New Zealand Endurance 3-Hour Champions Jonny Reid and Sam Fillmore have started their title defence off in perfect fashion, taking victory in today’s Golden Homes North Island Endurance Series 3-Hour at Hampton Downs.
The victory didn’t come easily for the pair; Reid locked in a thrilling battle with Ant Pedersen before finally getting past Pedersen into turn one and easing away from the Mercedes-AMG GT3 until a dryline appeared, with Pederson closing in on Reid with just 20 minutes to run.
An untimely puncture for Pedersen saw him forced to return to pit lane and switch to slicks; Reid pitted two laps later, also switched to slicks and returned to the lead over the Mercedes by some 23 seconds, which he held until the chequered flag. The Pedersen duo of Ant and Paul still retained second.
The podium was completed by Glenn Smith, Gene Rollinson and John De Veth. Rollinson managed to un-lap the Mclaren twice from Heremana Malmezac Porsche and claim 3rd position in the final 15 minutes on the drying track, the team’s podium was even more impressive as they ran with no windscreen wiper. Unlike the two leaders, they didn’t make the change to slicks late in the race, running the entire three hours on the tyres they started on.
A commanding second half of the race for the Hamilton Asphalts Nissan GTR of Chris van der Drift and Lance Hughes saw them shoot up to fourth right in the final minutes with a pass on Malmezac.
They were the first in the field to switch to slicks, a wise decision that saw them quickly putting four to five seconds per lap on the field. Setting the fastest lap in the race immediately after making the change justified the decision, which ultimately rewarded them with a strong result.
The Porsche 991.2 Cup pairing of Malmezac and Jono Lester held on for fifth.
Lester’s first stint behind the wheel was one which you could only expect of an Elite driver, dominating from second to pull well clear of the AM field, even lapping 2nd and 3rd place at one point.
Malmezac was hurt by the race’s only Safety Car, which came when Wolfbrook Motorsport’s new Audi R8 GT3 came to a halt with a broken axle.
The car had also been in the wars during the driver switch for Steve Brooks to Bill Riding, with a brief fire breaking out at the rear of the car and needing to be extinguished.
Malmezac led the restart, only to run off at the sweeping right-hander to sacrifice the lead.
His loss was Reid and Ant Pedersen’s gain, the duo sneaking by to take the top two positions.
In the final hour, as the sun finally began to shine, the battle was close up front, with the Mercedes bridging the gap to the Audi R8 LMS Evo 2 and looking like a real possibility for a pass until a puncture halted their charge.
Christina Orr-West and Bree Morris (Mercedes GT4) were sixth home, putting in an impressive 137 laps to finish 10 off the lead. Their result, and the DNF for Brooks and Riding, meant they took out Am/Am honours for the race and also won Class 3 as its sole competitor.
They, too, made a late stop for a tyre change, which proved effective, with Orr-West able to set some incredible lap times.
The eighth and final 3-hour car that of Tom Alexander and Francois Beziac, was unable to make the start following damage sustained in the morning’s 1-Hour.
