Scoles rolls them all in Sunday morning thriller at Taupo

A late safety car and the loss of three laps notwithstanding, rookie Nieko Scoles won an absolute thriller in the second race of the Bridgestone GR86 Championship’s first round at Taupo this morning.

Fantastic defence and an almost perfect race were enough to get the young Invercargill racer across the line for his first win, ahead of a hard-charging Cameron Hill and Mac Templeton – who took his first-ever podium in the championship.

Nieko – a star of the grassroots Toyota 86 Trophy Series over the winter and a beneficiary of the Tony Quinn Foundation – was delighted with the win.

“I’m honestly speechless; from where we were yesterday, to be in victory lane is great in the first round of the championship,” he said on the podium afterwards.

“I built a gap before the Safety Car came out, but that all went. The restart was good, and I did get a bit of my advantage back, and thankfully it was enough.

“I was a bit down yesterday with where we were, but I’m happy after that for sure.”

With the usual reverse top eight of the Saturday race results forming the first four rows of the grid, rookie Scoles took pole position for Mackenzie Motorsport alongside Neale Motorsport’s young charge Templeton. The top three from Saturday, Ajay Giddy, Lucas McGill and Harry Townshend, would start eighth, seventh and sixth respectively.

Scoles was best away, and despite an early nudge in the rear from Templeton on the run down to the first corner, Nieko took turn one first. There was plenty of action behind the leader, however, as the usual turn one traffic jam began.

Cam Hill made the most of it all and got past Templeton, who was forced almost immediately to defend third from the rest.

A great start from Giddy saw him vault from eighth to fourth, and as they emerged from the first corner, he gave Templeton the hurry-up as they sped off onto the rest of the first lap.

Harry Townshend lost a place or two at the start, as did Miles Baker and Lucas McGill, and it would get worse for the second-place finisher from Saturday as the race progressed. On lap two, he was caught up in more rough and tumble in the midfield, was pushed wide, and went even further down the order.

Once things settled down, the race evolved into a fascinating contest with three groups of two cars battling at the front. Scoles was focused on trying to build a gap from Hill, while Templeton was in full defensive mode trying to keep Giddy at bay and behind them, Baker had his mirrors full of Romeo Nasr.

After that, there was a small gap to Townshend, who was in full recovery mode – and clocking some of the race’s fastest laps – after losing out at the start.

By lap six, Scoles had worked hard to build a lead of about a second, but it was all wiped out when the Safety Car came out after McGill broke his left front suspension in a collision with Riley Boswell as he tried to fight his way back through the field. That was the race done for car number 25.

It took a couple of laps for the recovery crew to remove the stricken iMac Racing GR86 before Callum Crawley in the GR Supra Safety car let the field go for a one-lap dash to the finish.

Scoles stayed calm and executed both a perfect restart and final lap, keeping Hill at bay. Templeton, too, was exceptional in defending his third place from Giddy, while that man, Harry Townshend, was again front and centre on the last lap with a great move on Baker to grab sixth.

At the flag, it was Scoles from Hill, then Templeton, Giddy, Nasr, Townshend, Baker, Tayler Mitchell, the Toyota 86 Trophy Series winner, after a solid performance in the tightly fought midfield, then Nathan Grammer and Blake Dowdall, who both had impressive races to secure their first top ten finishes in the championship.

Bridgestone GR86 Championship – Round 1 Taupo – R2 Race result

Header Photo: Tayler Burke