Double Win for McAuley at Go Kart Legends
| 9 September 2015 |
| Tweet | |
Neil McAuley was has taken out two categories - Open Performance and Era 5 Vintage - at the inaugural Go Kart Legends Nationals at Stoney Creek Raceway on Saturday.
A former racer who worked in the industry in the 80s and 90s, McAuley was a fitting winner, having been a regular at Stoney Creek for some time. He was also one of the team that organised the event, and helped several competitors tune and repair their machines.
Above: The Legends line up before battle
pic - Adam Willison
The event spawned from the Facebook page Go Kart Legends, set up by John Wood (Spud). Run as a one-dayer with 33 entries, each of the three groups ran a couple of practice session, heats (random draw grid, then reversed) and a Final.
Many of the entrants were former AKA/KA racers. A number still compete under KA and there was a hundful of Stoney Specialists.
A couple of vintage kart owners I spoke with regularlry attend Karting Australia sanctioned vintage events, but preferred the GKL's meeting because they could actually race. "Under KA, we are only allowed to 'demonstrate' the karts and cannot race each other. Whereas here, those who want to race close to other karts can do so."
Results of the finals are below, along with a photos to tell the story of how much fun this group had.
Above: Video from GKL Nationals
Open Performance
1st Neil McAuley
125's
1st Mark Hegarty
2nd Rohan Ambrose
3rd Jack Hegarty
Clubman
1st Andrew Turnbull
2nd Mike Vella
3rd Ross Miller
Era 5
1st Neil McAuley
2nd Justin Gerada
3rd Chris Uhlhorn
Hard Luck Award
Tim Macrow
Hard Charger Award
Callum McCaughan on behalf of Stony Creek Kart Club
Best Presented Era 4
Paul Mckinnon
Best Presented Era 5
Mark Vukusic
Above: Paul McKinnon, who raced at the World Championships when he was a junior, came down from NSW with this immaculately restored PCR. After fixing some technical issues (the old girl blew a brake line) McKinnon revelled in this simple, lightweight (55kg) machine.
pic - Mark Wicks
Above: Tim Macrow dusted off the Swiss Hutless he last drove in the Australian CIK series
pic - Mark Wicks
Above: Glenn Maher, Dino/Dino
pic - Adam Willison
Above: Bob Uhlhorn (left) and Shane Lambert
pic - Adam Willison
Above: Vas Filips in the Mach1Kart, was having his first kart race since 1989
pic - Adam Willison
Above: Era 4 and 5 form up
pic - Adam Willison
Above: Ross Millar heads this bunch of (Yamaha only) Clubman racers. Despite breaking the chassis the week prior at Gippsland's club day, Miller would take 3rd in the final
pic - Adam Willison
Above: Stoney Creek have a number of quad bikes for push starting karts. Here, Ashley Cutchie gets a shove
pic - Mark Wicks
Above: Peter Macrow (left) and Mike Jacobson reflect on old times. Mike's son Billy doesn't seem too interested!
pic - Mark Wicks
Above: Mark Vukusic spun out of the GKL F100 final, but was awarded Best Presented Era 5 for his immaculate Tony Kart which he sourced from Canada with engine from Ollie Scullion
pic - Mark Wicks
Above: Macrow on the choke
pic - Adam Willison
Above: 'Hollywood' (Darren Formosa) checks the dash of his JPS-retro liveried SQ kart. He suffered a DNF in the 125s final with an engine failure
pic - Mark Wicks
Above: Lee Uhlhorn looked the part in the Mike Wilson kart
pic - Mark Wicks
Above: Claude Rossi jumps his Demon X6 (with Swiss Hutless nassau panel) across the chicane. Note the mechanical cable brake
pic - Adam Willison
Above: Neil McAuley hard at work - on a rivals kart! This image very much somes up the spirit of GKLs
pic - Mark Wicks
Above: Glenn Maher's Dino 386 was fitted with a Dino rotary valve engine (below), Dino pipe (above) and even sat on a genuine Dino kart trolley!
pic - Mark Wicks
Above: John Wade working on Ashley Cutchie's Arrow
pic - Mark Wicks
Above: Paul Stania turning the spanners on Jason's twin. The plan is to race this monster at GKCV club days
pic - Mark Wicks
Above: The fast guys took a LOT of kerb through the chicane
pic - Mark Wicks
Above: Justin Gerada (4) took a strong 2nd in the Era 5 final. Here he leads Lee Uhlhorn, John Wade (5), Mark Vukusic (21), Tim Marow (25), Neil McAuley, Alan Saint (54) and Vas Filips (26)
pic - Mark Wicks
Above: Andrew Turnbull had pace on the rest in Clubman, winning the 12-lap final
pic - Mark Wicks
Above: They didn't always keep going... luckily for Matt Sydenham, this was just a broken earth wire.
pic - Mark Wicks
Above: Chris Uhlhorn only finished one race, but was rewarded with third in Era 5
pic - Mark Wicks
Above: Red-top PCR
pic - Mark Wicks
Above: Tim Macrow was on a charge in the Era 5 final and had just latched onto the tail of the leader, Neil McAuly, when his engine seized.
pic - Mark Wicks
