Daniel Mettam leading Sloan Frost, Horst Saiger and Tony Rees during the Taupo round of the Suzuki Series.
The final round of the Suzuki Series at Whanganui's Cemetery Circuit today promises to be a cracker with a sidecar world champion and three riders with a combined 16 Isle of Man TT victories in the mix.
In the F1 Superbikes, series leader Sloan Frost and Tony Rees won a race each during the opening round at Taupo, while Horst Saiger won both legs at Manfeild Circuit Chris Amon during Round 2.
With 91 points, Frost has a slim three point lead on his GSXR1000 for the Fujitsu TSS Red Baron Suzuki NZ, just over the Liechtenstein-based Saiger, who won the series in 2014 on his Red Devil Racing Kawasaki ZX-10R.
Both riders went to Whanganui equal on points a year ago but Saiger suffered a crash which left Frost to take the 2015 title.
Neither rider won last year as Tony Rees, 49, took his Honda Rider Insurance CBR1000RR to victory in both the F1 points races, as well as the prestigious Robert Holden Memorial - his sixth win in this feature race since 1990.
Rees is eight points adrift of Frost and all three riders have a chance of winning the 2016 series.
There are 25 points for a win, 22 for second and 20 points for third, so there are several scenarios which could play out to decide the F1 crown.
If Rees wants the title, he has to win both superbike races with Frost placing no better than third.
But if Frost gets a second and a third position, the pair will be equal on points.
Under those circumstances, if either secure the one point for pole position then the series is theirs.
Rees was unstoppable last year, and it turns out he was also giving out riding lessons to his following rivals.
"Whanganui is one of those places where you pull the bike out of the van and if it works you can have a good day, and I've had that for a bit.
"My Honda has been nice to ride, it's a different bike to last year, it doesn't have the most horsepower but it is very smooth and it's handling really well.
"I always go there to give it a nudge, but you can only do what you can do - it's always nice to win but the guys in front are riding really well."
Saiger would win the title if he wins both races, or wins at least one race and gains second in the other while Frost at best comes second and third.
"Now it'll be my third time there. For sure we'll make it better than last year because in my first year [2014] we had a good plan," Saiger said.
"But in the second year we thought the bike is really doing well so we do things completely different.
"At the end it didn't work out, I tried to push too hard in the wrong place and I crashed, so everything was really bad.
"Only in the last race I could follow Tony Rees for a couple of laps where I saw how easy he was going, which was completely the other way that I tried, and that was much better.
"So, I take this knowledge with me for this year."
For Frost to win the title, the math is win both races or place second once to Saiger, so he can't afford to cruise.
"Last year we had a problem, in practice we had a tip-over sensor that cut out so I lost that practice, which meant my qualifying time was slow," Frost said.
"This year we've been doing our homework and my Suzuki has such good punch off the corners it will be a good bike for Whanganui.
"We are going to gear it a bit differently this year, I learnt stuff last year that I wasn't doing in previous years, after following Tony a bit.
"We've got two Suzuki Series races to knock out, and then we've got to try to get Michael Dunlop to take away the Robert Holden race.
"That's why he's come here and it is pretty important to him."
A crowd draw card on the Suzuki NZ GSXR1000, Northern Irishman Michael Dunlop might have a say on who finishes where, but his sights are set on the Robert Holden Memorial trophy.
Dunlop was the fastest rider ever around the gruelling Isle of Man TT course this year with an average speed of 215.591kmh, or 133.962 mph.
The 27-year-old's 13 Isle of Man TT wins are a testament his competition need to take seriously, so he was asked if winning at Whanganui should be a walk in the park.
"Obviously the circuit here is not what we're used to at home so we just need to keep pushing and see where we end up," Dunlop said.
"Whanganui is not like a road circuit, it's a couple of road ends by the looks of things, so it's not what I call a road circuit with fifth gear turns - the real big stuff.
"Whanganui is more stop-start stuff but we can't really judge it until we get there. So I'll take it as it comes."
Rees raced against Dunlop's uncle, the late great Joey Dunlop, in 1992, so there's added interest to see how the nephew fares against the veteran 25 years later.
The two sidecar races are must-see events as five-time world champion Tim Reeves has flown all the way from the United Kingdom just to race at Whanganui on a Carl Cox Motorsport Suzuki F1 sidecar, along with passenger Mark Wilkes who was injured for Cemetery Circuit last year.
Two teams are locked on equal points for the F1 Sidecar title and both have the pedigree to win it.
John Holden/Robbie Shorter are tied on 94 points with Barry Smith and Tracey Bryan, who plan to race their Carl Cox Motorsport Suzuki F2 sidecar to be more competitive around the twisting street course.
Smith, 57, and Bryan took victory in both F1 Sidecar races at Manfeild on their fast F1 'chair'.
British sidecar rider Holden, 60, and Tauranga passenger Shorter were second in the opening leg on their visibly slower Barnes Racing LCR Honda 600 F2 machine, then relegated to third in Race 2 by an improving Spike Taylor and Craig Pedersen on their Mobility Wairarapa LCR GSXR1000 sidecar.
The Warkworth-based Lawrence brothers Chris and Richard (Shorai Anderson R1) and the Pete 'Pirate' Goodwin/Kendal Dunlop duo are getting faster on their Shorai Anderson R1 sidecar.
However, they all might be lucky to win a race given serial Suzuki Series winners Adam Unsworth and Stu Dawes have decided to return one round on their Boss Engineering Eni Windle F1 machine.
The pair were injured during practice for the opening round at Taupo and will be keen to make amends.