KEY POINTS:
When Taupo was awarded a round of the A1GP this year, officials of the new World Cup of motor racing spoke of New Zealand punching above its weight in the sport.
The facts speak for themselves. Combine a Kiwi with an engine and they become a force to
be reckoned with. We have had world champions on four wheels and two, and competitors at the top of the sport in a host of categories.
With Taupo establishing a new first, it's time to recall some of the significant moments in our four-wheeled heritage.
The list is only a taste of a very rich menu.
1933: Prosperity Grand Prix on the streets of Orakei, won by Arthur Dexter in a Brooklands Riley. Only half a dozen cars completed the course.
1950: First New Zealand Grand Prix at Ohakea, won by John McMillan in a Jackson Ford.
1954: First New Zealand International Grand Prix at Ardmore, won by Aussie Stan Jones in a Maybach. Subsequent Ardmore GP winners included Stirling Moss, Jack Brabham and Reg Parnell. The airfield circuit used to draw crowds of up to 80,000 people. Moss won the last Grand Prix at Ardmore by more than a lap in a deluge.
1959: Bruce McLaren wins the United States Grand Prix, the first of his four Formula One victories. He was 22 years 3 months, at the time the youngest ever GP winner. It is a measure of his impact on world motorsport that his name remains on a team when Brabhams, Stewarts and Prosts have disappeared.
1963: John Surtees wins first NZ Grand Prix on the permanent Pukekohe circuit in a Lola. Subsequent winners included world Formula One champions Graham Hill, Jackie Stewart and Keke Rosburg.
1964: Levin hosts the first Tasman Cup race won by Denny Hulme in a Brabham-Climax. McLaren won the series. The series, which ran from 1964 to 1976 included races on both sides of the Tasman. Race winners including world champions Jim Clark, Brabham, Hulme, Stewart, Hill and Jochen Rindt. Kenny Smith was the last champion.
1966: McLaren and Chris Amon win the Le Mans 24-hour race in a Ford. Hulme is second in a sister car with Briton Ken Miles.
1967: Hulme, winner of eight Formula One Grand Prix during his career, wins world championship. Amon is fifth. Hulme in a Brabham-Repco wins at Monaco and the Nurburgring.
1967: McLaren and Hulme finish first and second in the Can-Am sportscar championship in a McLaren car. They dominate the series for the next three years.
1968: Amon drives a works Ferrari to victory in the NZ Grand Prix. He does the same the following year. The driver from Bulls competed in 96 Formula One races from 1963-76 without a win. In 1968 he came second to Swiss Jo Siffert.
1977: First world championship NZ Rally won by Italian Fulvio Bacchelli in a Fiat. Finn Ari Vatanen and Kiwi Jim Scott finish second in a very battered Ford Escort. Since then all the world rally champions have competed in New Zealand several times. Carlos Sainz, the most successful, still talks about his encounter with a sheep on the Whaanga Coast.
1978: Former Aucklander Jim Richards wins the first of three consecutive Bathurst 1000s with Peter Brock in a Holden. Richards has won seven of the races, the second-most successful driver.
1980: Kiwi Mike Thackwell was 19 years six months when he drove a Tyrrell-Ford in the Canadian Grand Prix. At the time he was the youngest-ever Formula One competitor. Thackwell wins the last European Formula Two championship in 1984.
1985: Richards wins the first of his four Australian touring car championships, two for BMW, two for Nissan.
1987: The first world touring car championship comes to the Wellington street race. Klaus Ludwig and Klaus Niedwietz take the points in a Ford Sierra. Roberto Ravaglia takes the series in a BMW. The street race had started in the mid-80s. Imported track inspectors quibbled about its safety so it was deemed to be a local race. Peter Brock said it was okay so the drivers couldn't disagree but the arguments over the first victory for Aucklander Robbie Francevic and Belgian Michel Delcour in a Volvo still rumble on.
1989: US-based Kiwi Rod Millen wins the Asia-Pacific rally title for Mazda. Possum Bourne, the pride of Pukekohe, subsequently wins it three times for Subaru. Even world officialdom called him Possum not Peter and he became better known in Japan and Australia than most of the world championship stars.
1993: Paul Radisich wins the FIA Touring Car World Cup at Monza in a Ford. He retains the title in 1994.
2001: Pukekohe hosts the first overseas round of the Australian V8 Supercar series and Greg Murphy wins all three races. Murphy is a Holden folk hero on both sides of the Tasman with four wins at Bathurst and a special Mountain moment when he and Ford rival Marcos Ambrose squared off in the middle of the track after a collision in the closing stages of the 2005 race.
2003: Scott Dixon wins the IndyCar championship at his first attempt. Experts still rate him one of the best drivers not to progress to Formula One.
2003: Wade Cunningham wins the world karting championship, following in the wheeltracks of some of the greats of the sport. He will be the New Zealand team's rookie driver in testing at Taupo today.
2006: Jonny Reid wins New Zealand's first A1GP race in Indonesia. He adds a second the same day.
2007: Taupo hosts the A1GP cars on a newly built circuit.