2023 Season 1 Round 1 Thunder Results
Thunder Series Review
A wait of 105 days finally ended on Wednesday night, as Round 1 of the 2023 ANZCAR Thunder Series kicked off on the high banks of Daytona International Speedway. 39 drivers would line up to take the starters orders, with Scott Griffiths taking the first pole position of the year, with the top 24 cars covered by less than a tenth of a second.
As the green flag flew, carnage was erupting in the mid pack with the #007 entry of Mark Smith experiencing an engine detonation from a possible missed gear shift. At least a dozen cars were involved, with Smith, Glenn McLeod and Barry Neale all out on the spot. The remaining drivers patched their cars up the best they could, knowing that positions could be made up with others retiring throughout the race and the anticipation of another “big one”.
Lap 5 and the race finally gets its first green flag laps, with Griffiths leading the field, pushed by Josh Michelmore on the bottom lane whilst Joshua Carroll-Walden and Dave Douglas were leading the high line train of 5 cars. Most drivers were just happy to hold the draft and stick to the bottom grove whilst they worked out what type of race car was underneath them.
Things remained the same until Lap 19, when Michelmore was able to get a run on Griffiths coming out of T2 and slingshot around the outside into the lead. But before long Carroll-Walden was finally able to get the high line working and drop in front of Michelmore before the end of that lap. Lap 23 and the second caution flew with contact in turn 4 whilst trying to navigate lapped traffic, resulting in several cars getting heavy damage. It also meant all drivers headed to pit lane for tyres and fuel, with this needing to be the only fuel stop of the race, strategy coming in to play with how much fuel drivers felt they would need to make it to the end.
Darren Mckenzie led the field away from the Lap 26 restart ahead of Carroll-Walden, Michelmore and Paul Drady. Drivers quickly found gaps to move to the low line, as the high grove just wasn’t anywhere near as quick. From time to time, pairs or small group of drivers would go high to see if they could move forward and gain positions, but usually this just resulted in dropping down the train until a big enough gap opened and they slotted back into the low line.
By half race distance, the leading pack had reduced to just 21 cars, with more cars gradually falling off the back as their damaged equipment struggled to hang on. Around this time of the race, an initial 3 car train of Luke Kenny, Paul Drady and Phil Bissett moved to the high line and were making forward movement and were soon joined by Jason Martin. Working well together, these 4 were able to get up to the front of the field.
With the laps winding down, and Mckenzie having a great drafting partner in Michelmore, other drivers were trying to work on their own strategy to get to the front for a shot at winning it. Douglas, who had been in P3 on the bottom, took his shot and joined the front of the Kenny train on the high line. Michelmore then decided 2nd wasn’t where he wanted to be and slid up in front of Douglas. All this nervous energy assisted in splintering the pack, with small gaps emerging and a core group of 15 remaining together with 10 to go.
It would all come down to how could hold onto the draft the best and maintain their momentum whilst navigating the growing number of slower lapped traffic. Coming to the white flag, and teammates Drady and Bissett elected to make it three-wide in attempt to push their way forward.
However, this would come to nought with Drady up into the wall in T2 but managing to hang onto it and scattering some of those following nearby. With a great push from Carroll-Walden, Mckenzie was able to claim the win by 0.058 with Carroll-Walden pipping Michelmore on the line for 2nd. In the end, of the 39 cars that started the race 21 cars finished on the lead lap, which is quite surprising given the amount of cars impacted early on.
Race Summary:
66 Laps
2 Cautions for 7 Laps
4 leaders
10 Lead Changes
1st - #02 Darren Mckenzie
2nd - #35 Joshua Carroll-Walden
3rd - #31 Josh Michelmore
4th - #231 Paul Jackson
5th - #10 Dave Douglas
Stewards Summary:
Cautions:
Lap 1 - #007 Mark Smith – Incident Noted
Lap 23 - #212 Christopher Tomlin – Incident Noted
Restarts:
Nil
Protests Received:
Lap 48 – Contact made from #52 Aiden Schultz into #212 Christopher Tomlin in the tri-oval. During investigations, it was also found that further contact was made by #212 Christopher Tomlin into #52 Aiden Schultz in turn 2 on Lap 49 – Incidents noted for both drivers
Darren Mckenzie takes a small 3 point lead in the Thunder Championship over Joshua Carroll-Walden with Josh Michelmore a further point behind. This also means that Mckenzie is currently leading the Superspeedway track championship title, with round 2 of this championship to be contested at Talladega on the 12th April. But don’t worry race fans, the wait for more on track action in the Thunder Series is only a week away with drivers heading to Fontana, California and 77 laps at the Auto Club Speedway on Wednesday 22nd February.
Full race results: https://www.simracerhub.com/scoring/season_race.php...
Full driver standings: https://www.simracerhub.com/scoring/season_standings.php...
For full race replay and future Thunder Series broadcasts, please head to Performance E-Streaming on Facebook and Youtube or click on the image links above
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uELYmn4gFY
A wait of 105 days finally ended on Wednesday night, as Round 1 of the 2023 ANZCAR Thunder Series kicked off on the high banks of Daytona International Speedway. 39 drivers would line up to take the starters orders, with Scott Griffiths taking the first pole position of the year, with the top 24 cars covered by less than a tenth of a second.
As the green flag flew, carnage was erupting in the mid pack with the #007 entry of Mark Smith experiencing an engine detonation from a possible missed gear shift. At least a dozen cars were involved, with Smith, Glenn McLeod and Barry Neale all out on the spot. The remaining drivers patched their cars up the best they could, knowing that positions could be made up with others retiring throughout the race and the anticipation of another “big one”.
Lap 5 and the race finally gets its first green flag laps, with Griffiths leading the field, pushed by Josh Michelmore on the bottom lane whilst Joshua Carroll-Walden and Dave Douglas were leading the high line train of 5 cars. Most drivers were just happy to hold the draft and stick to the bottom grove whilst they worked out what type of race car was underneath them.
Things remained the same until Lap 19, when Michelmore was able to get a run on Griffiths coming out of T2 and slingshot around the outside into the lead. But before long Carroll-Walden was finally able to get the high line working and drop in front of Michelmore before the end of that lap. Lap 23 and the second caution flew with contact in turn 4 whilst trying to navigate lapped traffic, resulting in several cars getting heavy damage. It also meant all drivers headed to pit lane for tyres and fuel, with this needing to be the only fuel stop of the race, strategy coming in to play with how much fuel drivers felt they would need to make it to the end.
Darren Mckenzie led the field away from the Lap 26 restart ahead of Carroll-Walden, Michelmore and Paul Drady. Drivers quickly found gaps to move to the low line, as the high grove just wasn’t anywhere near as quick. From time to time, pairs or small group of drivers would go high to see if they could move forward and gain positions, but usually this just resulted in dropping down the train until a big enough gap opened and they slotted back into the low line.
By half race distance, the leading pack had reduced to just 21 cars, with more cars gradually falling off the back as their damaged equipment struggled to hang on. Around this time of the race, an initial 3 car train of Luke Kenny, Paul Drady and Phil Bissett moved to the high line and were making forward movement and were soon joined by Jason Martin. Working well together, these 4 were able to get up to the front of the field.
With the laps winding down, and Mckenzie having a great drafting partner in Michelmore, other drivers were trying to work on their own strategy to get to the front for a shot at winning it. Douglas, who had been in P3 on the bottom, took his shot and joined the front of the Kenny train on the high line. Michelmore then decided 2nd wasn’t where he wanted to be and slid up in front of Douglas. All this nervous energy assisted in splintering the pack, with small gaps emerging and a core group of 15 remaining together with 10 to go.
It would all come down to how could hold onto the draft the best and maintain their momentum whilst navigating the growing number of slower lapped traffic. Coming to the white flag, and teammates Drady and Bissett elected to make it three-wide in attempt to push their way forward.
However, this would come to nought with Drady up into the wall in T2 but managing to hang onto it and scattering some of those following nearby. With a great push from Carroll-Walden, Mckenzie was able to claim the win by 0.058 with Carroll-Walden pipping Michelmore on the line for 2nd. In the end, of the 39 cars that started the race 21 cars finished on the lead lap, which is quite surprising given the amount of cars impacted early on.
Race Summary:
66 Laps
2 Cautions for 7 Laps
4 leaders
10 Lead Changes
1st - #02 Darren Mckenzie
2nd - #35 Joshua Carroll-Walden
3rd - #31 Josh Michelmore
4th - #231 Paul Jackson
5th - #10 Dave Douglas
Stewards Summary:
Cautions:
Lap 1 - #007 Mark Smith – Incident Noted
Lap 23 - #212 Christopher Tomlin – Incident Noted
Restarts:
Nil
Protests Received:
Lap 48 – Contact made from #52 Aiden Schultz into #212 Christopher Tomlin in the tri-oval. During investigations, it was also found that further contact was made by #212 Christopher Tomlin into #52 Aiden Schultz in turn 2 on Lap 49 – Incidents noted for both drivers
Darren Mckenzie takes a small 3 point lead in the Thunder Championship over Joshua Carroll-Walden with Josh Michelmore a further point behind. This also means that Mckenzie is currently leading the Superspeedway track championship title, with round 2 of this championship to be contested at Talladega on the 12th April. But don’t worry race fans, the wait for more on track action in the Thunder Series is only a week away with drivers heading to Fontana, California and 77 laps at the Auto Club Speedway on Wednesday 22nd February.
Full race results: https://www.simracerhub.com/scoring/season_race.php...
Full driver standings: https://www.simracerhub.com/scoring/season_standings.php...
For full race replay and future Thunder Series broadcasts, please head to Performance E-Streaming on Facebook and Youtube or click on the image links above
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uELYmn4gFY
