Speedway: Oceanview North Island Sidecar Championship

The newly-crowned New Zealand champions Dylan Moohan and Sean Mason will start the night as the team to beat. Photo / Kenneth Fox Digital Imagery

Fast Lane Spares Oceanview Family Speedway hosts its sole Speedway NZ title for the season today.

Sidecar riders and swingers from all over the North Island will descend on Wanganui for the RB Storage North Island Sidecar Championship.

Sidecar racing has been an Oceanview staple since the track’s third season, and Wanganui competitors have had a proud record, winning five New Zealand titles since the 1986-87 season when Tony Cave and Graeme Uren became champions at Rotorua.

The first North Island championship was held at Oceanview in the 1980-81 season, where Don Cosford and Phil Robinson were victorious.

Since then, Wanganui contestants have won a total of 12 North Island titles, with John Hannan and Jason Wallis having won the event five times, including four straight years in the mid-2000′s, and Murray Hackett and Steve Heibner having won three in a row in the late 1990′s.

Tonight marks the 10th time the event has been contested at the tight Oceanview circuit.

With 25 teams entered, the 2022-23 championship will be keenly contested.

Topping the bill will be the winners and third placegetters at the recent New Zealand Sidecar Championship, run at the Rosebank track in Avondale.

The Auckland combination of Dylan Moohan and Sean Mason won their second title in three years and will start tonight as favourites.

Moohan’s brother Jamie and swinger Patrick Larsen finished third at Rosebank, and are the defending North Island champions, with the event not having been contested last year.

Jamie Moohan knows the Oceanview track well, having finished second at the New Zealand Sidecars here in the 2016-17 season.

The rest of the field is wide open, and any one of more than a dozen teams could come through the heats to win.

Mike Zachan/Ben Franklin are always competitive at Wanganui, as are Craig Boaler/Ann Plummer from Hawke’s Bay and veteran Kieran “Wingnut” Payne with his swinger Sam Carter.

Local hopes sit with former New Zealand champion John “Handbag” Hannan and his swinger Nigel Sturgeon, and brothers Aaron and Bryce Rose on their immaculate 34V machine.

Hannan has had no end of frustrations with his BMW-powered machine, but it is one of the fastest bikes in the country when everything falls into place, whilst the Rose brothers haven’t raced a lot this season, but always rise to the big occasion.

The sidecars race in the opposite direction to cars, so Oceanview’s infamous southern bend comes at the end of a lap, not the beginning.

All the heats and finals are four-lap races, so a good start is essential then the combination between rider and swinger becomes vital.

With no brakes, control of the bike is a mixture of throttle control, and the body position of the swinger, which changes during the course of a lap to keep the bike balanced and stable.

In order to give the sidecars the best possible racing surface, their heats will be held early in the meeting.

Every combination will race in five heats, and race against everyone else over the course of the evening.

Superstocks, stockcars and ministocks are the support classes, but most of their racing will take place in the second half of the meeting.

The Sidecars will have practice runs between 3.30pm and 4.30pm, there will be a Grand Parade at 5.45pm and racing starts at 6pm sharp.