Thomlinson
and Toyota Take Championship!!
by Tony Bunyan
Congradulations
to Barrie Thomlinson and the Toyota Team on their dominating
performance in the 2002 New Zealand Touring Car Championship.
From their impressive debut at Pukekohe, to their dominance
at the completion of the season at Manfield, the Toyota
team have shown how exciting and refreshing an injection
of new blood into the 2.0 litre format can produce.
While other manufacturers have drifted away from the
Championship in recent years, Toyota has lead a revival
both in terms of performance and presentation. Enjoy
your success!
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Barrie
Thomlinson Won the 2002 New Zealand Touring Car
Championship in Style
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Major
changes were made to the format for the final round
of the New Zealand Touring Car Championship held at
the Manfeild Autocourse in Feilding. The weekend saw
the cars compete in a single ten lap race on Saturday
before combining with the V8 class on Sunday for two
25 lap races.
Race
One
Saturday's race was held in bright sunny conditions.
Phil Hellebrekers got the jump on team mate and Championship
leader Barrie Thomlinson to lead into the first corner.
The Nissan Primera is very quick off the line and John
McIntyre used it to full advantage, blasting past Thomlinson
and into a Toyota sandwich. Thomlinson wasn't content
to hang back for long. Showing the outright straight
speed of the Altezza, Thomlinson blasted past McIntyre
down the Hulme straight to pressure Hellebrekers. Further
back Tony Oliver had overhauled Aaron Harris's E36 BMW.
By
the third lap Thomlinson had regained the lead. With
only Hellebrekers having a mathematical chance of beating
Thomlinson for the Championship the pair dueled for
lap after lap. Their dicing didn't slow progress and
they opened a gap on third placed McIntyre who held
a lonely vigil well ahead of Oliver and Harris.
Aaron
Harris had not conceded to Oliver as his tyre smoke
through Castrol indicated. For lap after desperate lap
he probed looking for a way around the beautifully prepared
Toyota Corona.
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Click
on the Image for an Enlarged Version of the Circuit
Map
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Hellebrekers
too was on a mission and on lap seven his persistence
paid off, flashing past Thomlinson and back into the
lead. Harris too was putting tremendous pressure on
Oliver and on the next lap nailed home his advantage
at Pepsi to move into fourth place.
If
there had been any team orders, they had certainly gone
out the window at Toyota Motorsport. The inevitable
finally came at Castrol on lap nine. The corner is just
not wide enough for two race cars and the contact sent
Thomlinson off the track and onto the grass. His race
had turned from a battle for the lead to one of salvaging
as many points as he could.
The
incident paid dividends for McIntyre and Harris, who
suddenly found himself in a podium position. Thomlinson
did well to fight his way back to fourth in a very short
time. But time was not on his side has the cars crossed
the line, Harris beating him to the flag by barely a
bonnet. Hellebrekers achieved his goal of gaining maximum
points and keeping himself in the game. Thomlinson will
have to wait for Sunday's races to score enough points
to take out the championship. "Anything can happen
in racing", commented Thomlinson. "Look what
happened to Brett Riley's points lead last season. And
the outcome of racing with the V8s is something no one
is prepared to predict".
Race
2
Combining with the V8s for a gruelling 25 laps, the
leading 2.0 litre car of
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