Johnson goes back-to-back

The South Eastern Automobile Club (SEAC) ran the 9th Twin Peaks Hill Climb at the picturesque Port MacDonnell coast over the weekend of February 10 and 11.

A full field of 70 eager participants enjoyed the two testing road layouts that form the hill climb at the Bay.

Similar in length, the first track is quite complex with many corners, some off camber and double apex, with a mix of wind-blown sand in the bitumen road surface that continually changes the available grip level, whereas the second track has a wide open straight with a corner at each end and a chicane placed between them to control the speed of the vehicles a little.

To be crowned the champion for the Twin Peaks Hill Climb, you must have the fastest time for each day and that keeps the pressure on for those at the top end, right through both days.

Last year’s winner Doug Johnson would have gone into this event quietly confident of a repeat performance in his own prepared Subaru WRX, with any one of four or five of the hard charging 4WD Subys or Mitsubishi Evos that had made the return in the hope of getting to the top step of the podium.

Add to those, Peter Gazzard put in an entry for his first run for quite a while at any motorsport event and his first run at the Bay.

Saturday opened with some cool weather and then a bit of wind to keep the track temperature down, resulting in a loose track with not a lot of grip on offer and most of the drivers used this run to settle in and find out how the car reacted to the available surface.

Always some have to be different and Doug Johnson (pictured above – photos courtesy of Curtis Boyd), Peter Gazzard, Sean Day (pictured below – photo courtesy of Karl Thompson) and Damien Brand got down and dirty right from the start, pushing each other, along with Derrick White, Ashley Blanchard, David Harris and Brenton Byfield the quickest group on both tracks for the 4WD group.

Luke Day, Philip Wilson, Chris Hortop, Shaun Williamson were at the pointy end of the sheets for Saturday’s run in their 2WD cars.

Juniors having a drive for the first time at the Bay, Henry Sims, Max Viitanen, Harrison Bliss, Alexander, Lukas and Zachary Byham were all enjoying the challenges that arose through the day and all kept the car on track.

Sunday’s track suffered from the heat and with confidence from the previous day’s efforts causing the odd error or two in the last attempt at a better run, some had a moment along the way that may have been captured by the drone in action on the weekend, or by the on track live broadcast that put this event on show to the entire world for all to see when tuned in on the web.

A full list of results can be viewed on the club’s web page, live stream is also on the web, google Twin Peaks Hill Climb to view the track action. There are also many pictures from the weekend’s racing on the Club’s web page.

Hats off to another excellent weekend of racing, put together by Paul and Alison Height and the long list of officials, track setup and pack up people and to Grant District Council for allowing the event to be setup and ran at this picturesque venue.