The Motorsport Australia Victorian State Circuit Championships continue to thrive in 2021 with more than 200 entrants competing in the season's second round at Winton over the weekend.
The highly attended event follows on from last month’s first round at Sandown where more than 300 entries competed in the race meeting, making history in the process.
While there may have been slightly less entrants at the rural circuit, it was still a hugely successful event as competitors across the nine categories put on an entertaining display.
The largest field of the weekend belonged to the Improved Production cars with 36 competitors, but it was Damien Milano in the HSV Clubsport VY who comfortably secured round honours courtesy of two wins and a third place.
Despite not winning a race, Andrew Butcher and Jarrod Tonks ended the weekend on the round’s podium, the latter just edging out the final race winner in Paul Cruse.
The next biggest field was the Hyundai Excels as 29 drivers battled it out across three races and unlike Milano, the category’s winner in Jarred Farrell was able to secure a clean sweep of victories across the weekend.
Farrell wasn’t the only driver to pick up maximum points in his respective category with Cameron Beller in the Porsche 944 Challenge, Vincenzo Gucciardo in the joint MGs & Invited British Sports Cars and Benjamin Schoots, who was victorious in both the Sports Cars’ endurance and sprint race, all enjoying commanding weekends.
The other individual to clean sweep their fellow competitors was Thomas Sargeant in Formula Ford, the Mygale SJ2013A pilot comfortably winning all three races, while Brendan Jones took out top honours in the category’s Formula Ford 1600 class.
The remaining four categories all had similar stories with the outright winning driver showing plenty of dominance throughout the whole weekend, but ending just short of a perfect score.
In Saloon Cars, round winner Travis Lindorff fell just two tenths behind Shawn Jamieson in the opening race but managed to overcome Jamieson in the second with a four second win. In the final race of the weekend, Jamieson failed to finish, allowing Lindorff to cruise to a four second win over Simon Tabinor.
Like Lindorff, Jeremy Payne started the race meeting off with an extremely close second place to Chris Bell in the BMW E30s, less than half a tenth separating the duo, before taking control and easily winning the remaining two races.
In Formula Vees, Michael Kinsella got off to a strong start, winning the opening two races before retiring on the third race, which ultimately handed the Wade McLean the race win.
Although Kinsella’s two wins was a deserving result, it was his battle with Reef McCarthy and Daniel Reynolds which was the major talking point – the trio so close in the first race, only four tenths split all three of them as they crossed the finish line.
In the final race, all three failed to finish the race together, which gave McClean the win.
Kinsella wasn’t the only one driver to produce two wins and a DNF on the weekend - Michael Robinson bouncing back from a DNF in the opening Sports Sedans outing to win both remaining races.
Tony Groves was the driver lucky enough to enjoy the category’s top honours at Robinson’s expense after winning the first race and finishing just behind the two-time race winner, becoming the only driver in the category to place on the podium in every race.
The next round of the Motorsport Australia Victorian State Circuit Championships takes place on 15-16 May at Phillip Island.