Motorised mayhem is almost assured when the 2012 Mickey Thompson New Zealand Offroad racing Championship fires up in Hawke's Bay on Saturday.
Over two days, the region hosts the final round of the championship, which has attracted entries from almost 100 race teams across ten classes of race cars and trucks throughout the year.
After six rounds of race action on farms and in forest tracks from Mangawhai in the north to Twizel in the south, the overall winner and class champions will be decided on a fast and spectacular farm course accessed from Matapiro Road at Crownthorpe, 35km southeast of Taradale.
Heading for Hawke's Bay to compete are the offroad racing elite: entrants in the anything-goes Whakatane Commercial Spares unlimited class. This includes Lotto millionaire and longtime offroad racing supporter, Trevor Cooper in the most advanced Cougar race car in existence. The unlimited-class cars can run any engine and their design is subject to minimal restrictions, meaning most cars are capable of 200 km/h plus across the roughest terrain.
Also racing in the unlimited class are Clive Thornton of Whakatane with his powerful Desert Dynamics Chev two-seater; former Hawke's Bay racer Vince Harvey in his Ryan Nissan V6 turbo, and Manukau's Tony McCall in his new BSL Terra Chev single-seater. The northern and unlimited-class winner, Malcolm Langley (Whakatane) has entered and will grid up carrying a maximum 92 points. Close behind in terms of outright speed are the "Super 1600" cars of Leader Products Class 3, where outright southern points leader Wayne Moriarty will pit his Euroblast Cougar Toyota against the biggest field in the event with more than ten of the fast, agile class three cars expected to race this weekend. Christchurch-based Moriarty has the Cougar - a multiple class title winner at national level - up for sale, but says he won't be taking it easy on the car with a class and possible outright title at stake. He lines up against northern region class winner and 2012 Woodhill 100 champion James Buchanan in his Cougar Evo Suzuki.