Motorsport: Leitch powers into round two

Damon Leitch took fourth place in the second Toyota series race at Invercargill's Teretonga Park Raceway on Sunday. Photo / Supplied

A Kiwi, and a local lad to boot, holds the bragging rights as the Toyota Racing Series arrives in Timaru for round two of the TRS championship, and round four of the Premier New Zealand Motorsport series.

Damon Leitch is in the box seat ahead of 18 other drivers after the teenager from Invercargill mastered the stormy, wet and windy conditions that greeted the drivers at the opening round.

Leitch has a narrow point's lead over fellow Kiwi Nick Cassidy with the first of the international drivers, with Hannes van Asseldonk for the Netherlands in third.

The overseas pilots outnumber the New Zealand drivers three-to-one, and Leitch is hoping to keep his point's advantage after the weekend.

"I'm really happy how last weekend panned out and it's great to be leading the championship after the first round," said Leitch.

"We've arrived in Timaru with some confidence and the car showed good speed in Teretonga. I just need to get my qualifying organised a bit better and that'll help things as well.

"The car felt really good in practice in the hot weather and we'll be putting new tyres on for qualifying and we should be right there."

While Cassidy sits just behind Leitch, both drivers will be keeping a wary eye on van Asseldonk.

He won the first major trophy of the series, the Spirit of a Nation Cup, and was awarded the red-flagged third race after spinning off in heavy rain.

The most improved driver in the 2011 series, Josh Hill who's the son of former World Formula One champion Damon Hill and grandson of Graeme Hill, went one better than his grandfather and won the opening race at Teretonga and sits fourth on the table four points behind Van Asseldonk.

Just 62 points separate the top eight drivers and with 75 points up for grabs for a race win, this weekend should not be short of excitement.

And speaking of excitement, although the numbers in the BNT NZV8 field might be down, the racing is far from dull. There are four drivers; Angus Fogg, Australian V8 Supercars and Bathurst winner Jason Bargwanna, Martin Short and Tim Edgell who are going hammer and tongs to win their first national V8 championship.

"It's probably my favourite circuit - I seem to go very well there in whatever I drive," said Fogg. "Our aim, as always, is to win all three races and would like to think we could set a new lap record this year."

Bargwanna has been at pains to mention he's here for one reason and one reason only - to be the first Aussie to win a national New Zealand V8 championship.

"We've got an Australian intent on putting his name in our record books. They don't like it when we beat them on their turf so our team is pretty focused on turning out a perfect car for me to keep the cup in its home country," said Fogg.

The man who really took it to Bargwanna at Teretonga, Martin Short, is only in his second season of tin top racing but sure knows how to hustle the big banners around a race circuit.

All weekend long the 20-year-old brought the fight to the 14-season V8 Supercar veteran, showing he could just be one to watch in the future.

"The car is handling very well in the corners and we've got a new engine," said Short. "We didn't have the budget for rebuilds before.

"I found I could carry a lot of the experience from Formula Fords over to the V8s, though it was a big step up racing guys with a lot of experience."

Also on hand to provide entertainment for the fans will be the Formula Fords, V8 Utes, Suzuki Swifts, Production and Sports GTs and all classes have one race today and two tomorrow.