Motorsport: Kiwis up with pace abroad

Matt Halliday. Photo / Supplied

While most eyes from the weekend were on the Kiwis racing in the Australian V8 Supercars where Shane van Gisbergen was again the best of the New Zealanders, there were a number of Kiwi racers plying their trade abroad.

Matt Halliday was racing in the support class for the Monaco Grand Prix in the Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup; Brendon Hartley was also in action on the streets of the Principality in the 3.5 World Series Renault.

Another New Zealander, Chris van der Drift, is doing well in the Superleague Formula at the Assen TT circuit, Holland.

As everyone was in action over the weekend, Superwheels has compiled a round up of how they did.

Shane van Gisbergen

Stone Brothers Racing's young gun Shane van Gisbergen made the most of his weekend despite not qualifying as he would have wished at the seventh round of the V8 Supercar championship meeting at Winton Motor Raceway over the weekend.

After his 15th-to-fifth drive in the first race on Saturday the fact he could only manage the 19th-quickest time in qualifying for Sunday's longer second race was not part of the plan. Van Gisbergen stayed out of trouble and hauled himself up to 12th by race end to finish the round in sixth place behind James Courtney, Craig Lowndes, Lee Holdsworth, Michael Caruso and Steve Johnson. Van Gisbergen will take some heart as he only dropped one place in the overall championship standings to be in fourth behind new series points' leader Courtney, defending series champion Jamie Whincup and his teammate Lowndes.

Whincup had a horror weekend, finishing third in the first race but only 24th in the second after being sent spinning off the track with just 20 laps to go and needing repairs in the pits before he could continue.

That left him 11th for the weekend, just ahead of Top Ten Shootout winner Garth Tander (12th) and Greg Murphy (15th) - results which help put van Gisbergen's never-say-die sixth overall into perspective.

"It was frustrating today, in the race we made up a few spots at the end of the first stint.

"After I had stopped for tyres and started my second stint there was a Safety Car and it was a bit out for us tyre-wise so none of us took it.

"At the restart we had all the cars with fresh tyres behind us and I got passed by the cars coming through, when we pitted for tyres at the end under the second Safety Car I made good ground but really we didn't have the ultimate pace.

"It all started in qualifying - we seem to struggle at the colder tracks, like here and Hamilton, so that is something we need to work on at our test day coming up."

Matt Halliday

New Zealand racing driver Matt Halliday has put up another creditable performance in the latest round of the Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup as the support race to the Monaco Formula One Grand Prix. The Kiwi driver brought his Giltrap Racing Porsche 911 GT3 home in eighth place in a race that was filled with drama from the start.

Qualifying was an indication as to how ruthless racing would be after the top 14 cars were covered by a single second. Some of the more experienced campaigners had difficulty finding a clear lap on the notoriously tight street circuit, including Halliday who qualified in 12th grid position just 0.8 secs behind the pole sitter.

As the 23 cars raced away from the start Halliday immediately had to avoid spinning cars after which he began moving up the field despite few overtaking opportunities.

He eventually settled in eighth place, which he defended to the finish having accepted the high risk of further overtaking attempts during a short 16-lap race distance.

"It was a good start and it is always nice to make up four places at Monaco," said Halliday. "We proved we have good pace and are going forward with the development so we look to keep building on that for the next round at Valencia."

The next round of the Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup will be held on June 27th at the European Formula 1 Grand Prix in Valencia, Spain.

Brendon Hartley

Brendon Hartley finished fourth in the 3.5 World Series Renault race on the streets of Monaco over the weekend. The 20-year-old New Zealander charged through from eighth on the grid with a stunning series of fastest lap times.

While his Red Bull teammate Daniel Ricciardo took a well controlled win, Hartley showed he was clearly the fastest driver as he caught and passed a string of cars on a circuit where it is notoriously hard to overtake.

Hartley was frustrated during the opening laps trapped behind Filip Salaquarda and light contact was made on the approach to the chicane. Hartley had to wait until lap 12 before squeezing through in an unorthodox move at Mirabeau. After a series of fastest laps, Hartley closed in on Sten Pentus in sixth, and made a repeat move at Mirabeau on lap 21.

"I touched the wall early on in qualifying, which in all honestly was my mistake," said Hartley. "I was very disappointed in qualifying, as I knew that I had the pace and didn't really show everyone. I guess I showed everyone now ...

"Salaquarda was hard to pass, moving about in the braking and making it very hard. I said, 'Alright, this is the place where I am going to make my passes'. I had a couple of goes at other corners, but Salaquarda kept closing the door and would have crashed."

Alexander Rossi was the next target, and the rear of the American's car was tapped several times by Hartley exiting the Rascasse hairpin. Just three laps from home, and under severe pressure, Rossi lost control and hit the barriers at Massanet. Monegasque Stefano Coletti was then relieved of fourth place by Hartley's battle-scarred car at Mirabeau on the penultimate lap.

Ricciardo made a perfect start and was first out of Sainte-Devote, ahead of Aleshin, Costa, Coletti and Rossi. In a single lap, the Australian pulled a two-second lead over Aleshin.

For the rest of the 31 laps Ricciardo managed his lead so for the third successive year, a WSR rookie took the win at Monaco.

Chris van der Drift

Superleague Formula is where motorsport and soccer have combined to produce a racing series. The field is made up of V12-powered 750hp single-seater racecars in the colours of some of the world's leading soccer teams.

Kiwi Chris van der Drift, driving for the Greek soccer club team Olympiacos, redeemed his weekend after a disappointing retirement in race one with a win in race two. It was Van der Drift's first-ever Superleague Formula win in only his second ever event, and now lies sixth overall in the championship.

Starting from the second row, Van der Drift followed pole sitter Borja Garcia to start with but pitted a lap earlier than the Spaniard.

A fast in and out lap by van der Drift saw him take the lead and go on to win comfortably.

Tottenham's Craig Dolby looked like the man most likely to threaten van der Drift after the pit stops having charged up the field from 10th. He made it into fifth in the first stint and then jumped Ucha Martinez and Franck Montagny during the pit window, but, after dispatching Garcia for second after rejoining, he couldn't get close enough to van der Drift to deny Olympiacos the win.

Round three of the championship takes place at Magny-Cours in France.