V-Spec Performance’s 2019 Vic Time Attack was another successful event this year with a turn out over 40 cars in 4 classes. The Zenox Australia Supercar Class, Royal Purple Unlimited Class, Topstage Modified Class and Martini Racing Street Class.
As the sun rose in the morning, the pits and paddock of the Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit filled with cars, as mechanics make their final adjustment before the first group of cars are sent out onto the track.
At 9:15am the first class set out onto the track as drivers got their bearings with the track and warmed up to the feeling of their cars.
Earlier, during the drivers briefing, it was brought up that geese had been a problem recently with them grazing around the track and sometimes landing on it. The drivers got their first taste of this when the Supercar Class and Unlimited Class were out in their first session. The session had to be red flagged while track marshals cleared the geese away.
It wasn’t long until the track was cleared again and the cars were back out on track.
It wasn’t until around mid day that disaster struck for the KTM Crossbow catching fire while heading into turn 1 and stopping at turn 4 while fire marshals up out the fire from the rear of the car.
Once the car was taken off track the class sessions started up again. At 12:30pm the pits were opened up to the public to come in and look around at the cars.
After 1pm the track was opened up again for the cars to continue their sessions and try and nibble more time off of their lap times.
As the afternoon progressed times became smaller while drivers pushed their cars to the limit. Some cars going that little bit too far.
At 3:15pm it was time for the class shootouts.
Richard Perini in his Ginetta G55, managed to set the fastest lap of the day on his shootout lap and won in his Royal Purple Unlimited Class with a 1:36.4022
Even with a devastating end to the day Chris Withers was still able to grab the fastest time in his class with a 1:37.9549.
Bill Gulasi was definitely a crowd favourite in his white Evo VIII. Coming down from NSW he managed to set a 1:41.0048 making him the fastest in his class by over 2 seconds.
The youngest driver on the day was 16 year old Daniel Petselis who managed to grab the win in his FNA Street Class. Previously he’d only driven his auto Giulietta. So it was awesome to see, after only driving a Manual car a handful of times, he was able to jump into an EG Hatch for the day and still keep up with the other drivers.
Another great Vic Time Attack was had leaving some drivers hungry for next years event in 2020.