Current Race Season 2011/2012

New Zealand Midget Championship

This weekend was the big meeting the team has been waiting for, the 2011/2012 New Zealand Midget Champs.  Friday night was qualifying night and each competitor had to race in two heat races which determined the grid for the final race of the night.  The top four places in this race went straight through to the title races.  Race one saw the team miss the setup and the midget would straighten up mid corner and head towards the wall.  Ricky battled on though and finished 7th.  Back in the pits the team had setup guru Chris Street of CSR fabrications change the set up and the team was all ready for race two.  This race saw Ricky start fifth however mid way through the race the engine started to lose power and Ricky once again finished 7th.  Next up was the feature race and the engine was still slightly down on horsepower, but even so Ricky still pulled off an impressive wheel stand!  However Ricky only managed to finish 6th which meant he just missed out on qualifying for the title races.  Saturday night saw Ricky enter the repercharge and with Chris Street looking after our setup once again Ricky had one well handling midget!  he made his way up to 2nd place and then drove defensively as this was all he had to do to qualify and get into the title races.  Just when everything looked good the engine started losing power and Ricky lipped back to third place.  Although the team just missed out on qualifying the bigger issue was that the engine started smoking during the race and back in the pits the team could easily see why.  A main oil hose had loosened itself off causing the oil to pump out of the engine.  Not wanting to risk damaging the engine the team made the decision to pull out of the rest of the night and examine the engine back at the workshop to make sure there was no internal damage.  A real shame as the team was looking forward to showing what the Garage 9 Honda powered CSR midget could do.  Even after the championship Ricky still holds the second fastest outright lap time at Huntly this season.  The team is confident that they will be out for the next race meeting which is the 40 lapper at Huntly on the 19th of December, and after not being able to compete for the NZ title, Ricky will be hungry to show what he and the new machine can really do!!