GARRY’S THE BEND SUPPORT WRAP – SUNDAY

There were two big winners out of the support categories on the final day of the Repco Supercar SuperSprint at The Bend Motorsport Park. Tom Randle and Adam Poole dominated the Aussie Tin Tops and SA Combined Sedans with two wins each respectively.

AUSSIE TIN TOPS

Drama struck Saturday’s race winner Yasser Shahin even before they took to the track for race two. He was penalised 30s for a pit lane speeding indiscretion at the end of race one. Then he crashed his Porsche GT3-R on the out-lap for race two.

Driving Rusty French’s Bentley GT3, Randle was left to drive away to a huge 40.6s victory in race two over Geoff Taunton (MARC II V8). Again the Porsche drivers Ryan Suhle and Harri Jones battled for third until the latter overstepped at Turn 6 and slide wide.

That enabled Andrew Taplin (Lamborghini Gallardo) to snare fourth ahead of Jones. Behind them Super 3 Ford Falcon FG drivers Jason Gomersall and Nash Morris duked it out for most of the half-hour race, swapping positions on a couple of occasions before they were split by Kyle Gurton (Porsche) on the last lap.

Ninth spot went to Matt Sims (Porsche) ahead of the MARC Focus V8 steerers Bayley Hall and John Goodacre.

Randle was well ahead in the last race when the safety car was deployed after Brenton Griguol (Ferrari F430) and Henry Beasley (Porsche) came together at Turn 17, and the race finished under the caution a couple of laps later.

Suhle made an excellent start to get ahead of Taunton at the start but had a moment Turn 12. He dropped a spot and resumed his duel with Jones, just holding on to the end. Tom Taplin (Porsche) fell as low as 13th on the first lap before he fought back to fifth.

Next was Gomersall, again he came out on top in his dice with Morris who ceded spots to Gurton and Sims later. Lachlan Gardner was the best of the MARC Focus V8s as he finished 10th in front of Hall.

COMBINED SEDANS

A five-second penalty had no effect on Poole (Improved Production Holden Monaro) race two winning margin as he still greeted the chequered flag 24.1s ahead of Matt Wright (IP Datsun 120Y Turbo).

Wright was fifth early before he was able to work his way through and finish ahead of race one winner Hagen Zerk (IP Ford Falcon XZ Coupe) and Anthony Beare (Saloon Car Holden Commodore VT).

Scott Abo (IP Toyota 86 GTS), Andrew Bailey (IP Nissan Silvia) and Shawn Jamieson (SC Commodore VY) were next. Eighth was Phil Mere (IP Commodore V8) from Charlie Kovacs (Commodore VE Ute) and Saloon Car Commodore drivers Wayne King, Peter Holmes and Scott Dornan.

HQ Holden laurels went to Joel Heinrich over Bruce Heinrich by 0.15s with Dave Smith not far behind them.

Behind the clear-cut Poole in race three, Wright was second again, ahead of Bailey, Zerk, Mere and Aho as the IP cars filled the top sixth places.

Seventh went to Beare as Jamieson was an early casualty while Scott Dornan (Commodore), Dylan Richter (Ford Falcon EA) and the battling Nick Hancock and Hayden Clark in their respective Toyota 86 and Subaru BRZ. This time the HQ win went to Bruce Heinrich over his son Joel.

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