By BOB PEARCE
Pukekohe's February date with the Australian V8 Supercars is off.
But the promoters still insist the meeting will take place later in the year.
A formal announcement is expected from promoters IMG this week, though Australian sources have been talking of a new November date for some time.
The problems for the February fixture started when the Australian Formula One Grand Prix was carded a week earlier in March.
The V8s are one of the main support classes for that weekend so Pukekohe also had to move forward a week, throwing shipping arrangements into confusion.
In the event, it proved impossible to guarantee shipping for the 30 cars and their huge service vans back across the Tasman in time for the Melbourne Grand Prix.
The grand finale of major national classes which would have supported the V8s will go ahead at Pukekohe but there will be some soul-searching about the new date among those who must tailor their events to fit in with the Aussies.
This weekend the V8s are back in sprint-racing mode for the penultimate round of the championship at Sandown.
Paul Radisich, still chasing his first championship round victory, will have a brand-new AU Falcon.
Another Ford driver, Glenn Seton, who is lying third in the championship, hopes to be racing at Sandown despite a massive testing accident at the Phillip Island circuit.
Seton crashed into the barriers at 200 km/h and was taken to hospital with damaged ribs and severe bruising.
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Possum Bourne will be looking to win his second championship in seven days when he competes in the Rally of Malaysia this weekend.
The three-day Kuala Lumpur event is the penultimate round of the Asia Pacific championship, which Bourne leads by 21 points in his Subaru Impreza WRX.
Last Sunday he won the Australian title for a fifth consecutive time.
But Bourne is not underestimating his opposition in Malaysia, where he has been seeded second behind Katsuhiko Taguchi.
"He'll be hard to beat, "says Bourne.
"He lives there and he knows the roads like the back of his hand."
Bourne himself has contested the rally five times, winning in 1994.
The final round of the championship is in Thailand.
The Kiwi will be keen not to repeat the rushed preparation which preceded his Australian win.
One of his crew, James Laird, flew to Tokyo on the preceding Tuesday to pick up some engine parts which he brought back to Hobart on Thursday ready for the weekend.
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Aucklander Marty Roestenburg, with wife Ali as co-driver, won the Bay Rally at the weekend to clinch the regional Falken Tyres Top Half championship.
Driving his Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 3, he finished 1m 54s ahead of last year's Top Half winner, Greg Kirkham, with Glenn Smith in Bruce Herbert's national championship-winning Mitsubishi third.
Roestenburg, who had four wins, won the title by 31 points from Dave Strong.
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Michael Schumacher intends to try to seal the world Formula One drivers' championship by winning at Suzuka, Japan, this Sunday even though second placings at Suzuka and in the last round at Sepang, Malaysia, would be enough to clinch the title.
The German Ferrari ace leads defending champion Mika Hakkinen by eight points and a win would put him out of reach of the Finn.
Schumacher has won twice at Suzuka, but Hakkinen has had the edge in the last two races there.
It is 21 years since Jody Scheckter won Ferrari's last Formula One driver's championship.
One luxury Schumacher will be unable to enjoy amid the Formula One frenzy of Japan is a quiet dinner in a Tokyo restaurant.
In New York before the Indianapolis Grand Prix the German took his wife out to dinner and enjoyed an anonymity denied him in Europe or the East.
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The New Zealand Tranzams felt the heat when they made their debut at Houston, Texas, at the weekend.
Craig Baird, in the car he drove to victory in the New Zealand championship, ran as high as eighth in the big field when he had to pull out because the cockpit temperatures reached dangerous levels.
Christchurch driver Grant Silvester finished 17th.
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Twenty two 22 cars have been entered for the first round of the Formula First national championship at Pukekohe this Sunday.
Last season's champion, David Payne, and 13-year-old whizzkid Chris Pither have moved on, but there are a crop of new youngsters in this very competitive launching pad for motorsport careers.
Also on the 15-race programme are pre-65s, Super Minis, Muscle Cars and SS 2000s.
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Kawerau rider Tony Rees could record back-to-back victories 12 years apart when motorcycle endurance racing returns to Manfeild on October 15.
Back in 1988, when the last Castrol six-hour was run at the track, Rees was in the winning team with Dave Hicks, on a Yamaha.
He is back this month for the Quality Hotel four-hour event, sharing the latest Yamaha R1 with Aucklander Paul Gee and they will be among the favourites.
Motorsport: Clash forces cancellation of Supercars
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