An eclectic mix of touring cars will join the Repco Supercars Championship at Pukekohe Park Raceway this weekend.
Historic Touring Cars NZ will welcome not only some legendary models, but drivers too as former Bathurst winners Greg Murphy, John Bowe, Steven Richards and 12 Hour winner Nigel Arkell will do battle, but also not forgetting two-time Touring Car World Cup winner Paul Radisich.
Combining a variety of eras including the Group C, A, 4, Super Touring and New Zealand’s unique Schedule S regulations.
Murphy will reunite with the Ford Sierra he made his touring car racing debut back in 1992 alongside Kayne Scott, the legendary Whitaker’s Peanut Slab entry.
Another to be returning behind the wheel of a Ford Sierra is Bowe in a Shell example raced by the Dick Johnson Racing squad during the early 1990s.
Moving to the Super Touring class, Richards will race an ex-factory Nissan Primera entered in Spain during the mid-1990s and a model he raced in the Australian Super Touring Championship for Garry Rogers Motorsport in 1997. The following year, Richards became a test driver for the Nissan British Touring Car Championship team.
As for Radisich, he will contest the event in a Ford Mondeo raced by German factory operation Wolf Racing in the STW Series back in 1995. Previously, Radisich has driven the three specifications of Mondeo currently racing in New Zealand, including the one he took to Touring Car World Cup victory at Donington in 1994.
Arkell’s Honda Accord is very different to other super tourers as it raced in America in a short lived series across the Atlantic and is one of a few built using a JDM body by constructors at the time MSD. It remained unused when the North American Touring Car Championship ended in 1997 before Arkell purchased it and returned the Accord to the track in 2018.
Group A entries include another two Ford Sierras, a Rover Vitesse, three BMW E30 M3s, a Ford Mustang, Jaguar XJS and a Nissan R32 Skyline GT-R, otherwise known as Godzilla.
Eccentric Japanese models including a rare Mazda Xedos, which ran in the British Touring Car Championship and a South African Toyota Camry raced by former Grand Prix driver Julian Bailey are among the entries in Super Touring. These are joined by the usual BMWs, Ford Mondeos, a Nissan Primera and a five-litre Volvo S40.
Other representatives include a Group 4 Ford Capri, the JPS BMW 635csi and Mazda RX-7 built to Australian Group C regulations, while Schedule S models include an Alfa Romeo 155, Suzuki Baleno and a BMW E36.
The category adds to the historic nature of the meeting this weekend as Pukekohe Park Raceway will close next year, with the Repco Supercars Championship bidding farewell to its first host venue in New Zealand.