The fourth round of the South African Endurance Series Championship is very much a make-or-break event for those chasing points but is equally important for all competitors who would like to leave with a Kyalami win under their belts.

The three rounds run so far have all produced last lap winners and losers and the expectation is Kyalami will be as closely fought as those previous events.

Nick Adcock's Nova NP02

One team aiming for top honours on the day is the Adjust4Sleep/Rico Barlow Nova NP02 headed by Nick Adcock who will share driving duties with Michael Jensen and the super quick Charl Visser.

It was bitter disappointment for the team at the last round in Gqeberha at Aldo Scribante when the gearbox on the Coyote-engined racer failed and they were unable to make the start line.

“We ended up sending the gearbox to Century Racing in Johannesburg and they weaved some magic to do a complete rebuild and send it back to us here in Cape Town,” says Nick Adcock. “I am confident it will not pose any problems at Kyalami and we most certainly looking to get a good finish.”

The drama-filled round at Aldo Scribante saw the winners across the line, the Into Africa Racing Lamborghini Huracan of Xolile Letlaka and Stuart White get demoted to second with a penalty for a yellow flag infringement – making them doubly determined to erase that disappointment and get across the finish line at Kyalami in first place.

Paul Hill Promigen Audi endurance racing car

Paul Hill and Bradley Liebenberg in the Promigen Audi, who inherited the win in Gqeberha, are just as keen to get across the finish line in front and take flag in an outright victory – but they know it is going to be along four hours of racing with the likes of the BBR Racing trio of Henk Lategan, Hein Lategan and Verissimo Tavares just as pumped to get to the flag first.

Consistency in endurance racing pays off and the Championship log leaders are the Ppl Group trio of Phillip Meyer/Mark Harvey/ Dean Wolson (Backdraft Roadster) who are sitting on 100 points after three rounds having racked up good scores in each event so far.

They are five ahead of the Hill/Liebenberg pairing with the BBR Racing team not far back on 91 points and Into Africa just one point adrift of that.

Ppl Group Backdraft leads the SA Endurance Series Championship

Within the SA Endurance Series is the Backdraft Roadster Championship for the identical cars of the previous Class E and this is being led by the Ppl Group with Pesty Racing in the form of father and son combination, Harm and Barend Pretorius, second in the Class and being chased by the Tradecore Racing pair of Jean-Paul Briner and Anthony Hoare.

Class B, which features modified version of the Backdraft cars is currently led by Lonika Maartens who has had different co-drivers at each meeting and she is followed by one of those in the form of Fabienne Lanz with Antony Pretorius in third place. Pretorius started the season in a Backdraft but is now running the Fast Development Audi R8 GT4 with Ryan Naicker.

Karah Hill and Jurie Swart top the Class C log in their Kalex VW Polo, while David and Roberto Franco rule the roost in Class D in their VW Supa Polo.

Karah Hill in the Kalex Volkswagen

However, all drivers will have to drop one race from their scoresheets at the end of the season and it cannot be one in which they did not make the start line – not only making every point vital but likely to throw the proverbial spanner into the works when the final tally is done.

Just to add more spice several cars not seen so fa this season will be on track, including the Harp Motorsport Ginetta G57 of Craig Jarvis and Sean Moore, a second Into Africa Lamborghini Huracan for Axel Jeffries and a co-driver to be decided and the Spheremotorsport Toyota Altezza in the hands of Marco da Cunha and Sergio Alvares.

Regular contenders Mike McLoughlin/ Steve Clark will again be aboard the blisteringly quick Backdraft Carbon Car, while MJR Motorsport will be back with its Audi R8 LLMS GT3 after quite a torrid time at Aldo Scribante that even involved ending up backwards on the banking for a while.

Samlin Racing (Nathan Hammond/Sam Hammond) missed the last round and are looking for a big score in their Lamborghini Huracan Super Trofeo Evo 2 and one to watch will be the Stradale Motorsport entry for Arnold Neveling and Charl Arangies in the Mercedes-AMG GT3.

Samlin Racing Lamborghini Huracan

Porsche will be represented by G&H Racing with Gianni and Riccardo Giannoccarro and Ant Blunden aboard the Porsche 997 with Damian Hammond taking charge of the second Samlin Racing Lamborghini.

Other new names include Kia Le Mans Racing, a Class D Picanto in the hands of Pedro Garcia/Andre Bettencourt/Critian Bouche plus the Backdraft for Strong Racing (Stuart Miles/Leo Branders) and the similar car for Fire Boys (Robert Mordaunt/Mark Futcher).

At each round of the series there is a race-within-a-race in the form of a 1-hour dash and Andre Horne (Ligier JS49) will have his hands full in this with Mike Verrier (Shelby CanAm) and Juan-Pierre Stander in the Rico Barlow Racing Ligier JS 53 Evo 2.

The Kyalami race will start at 14:00 on August 03 and the sunset along with fading light towards the 18:00 finish will not make it easy for the drivers – so anything can, and probably will, happen.

There is full programme of action for the day with this event featuring the Motorcycle Racing Series SA (MRSSA) contingent for the first time and, based on the races run so far this year, it will be a thrill a second for spectators.

Motorcycle racer from above

MRSSA runs several classes and the huge field has been split into two groups with each getting two heats on the day. The first group will comprise the 1000, 600, Masters and BOTTS (V4 and V-Twin machines) while the second will see the Novices and Classics strut their stuff.

According to the series, ‘The goal of the MRSSA Racing Series is to put the fun back into competitive racing, keeping it simple with minimal rules, whilst still racing in a safe environment. The motorcycle-only racing series is founded on the idea of catering for every kind of racer in an affordable manner’. 

That said, the racing so far this season has produced some extremely close action throughout the classes with Kyalami set to see this continue.

The second support race will be the Silver Cup Series with a huge entry of 50 cars featuring a full spectrum of brand names from Alafa Romeo to Volkswagen. As a grassroots form of track racing the cars are categorised by engine capacity and tyre sizes are limited to keep it affordable.

Cars to watch out for will be Michael Kernick in the Sullivans Mom’s Insurance Nash MVW3, Devin Robertson in the Big Boss Auto Renault, Wayne Lebotschy aboard the Shield Racing VW Golf and Dewald Pretorius in the SPS Racing Mazda.

Formula Super Vee racing

Formula Super Vee is the regular support series for SAES and they will be back in full force with vital championship points at stake as the season moves into the second half. Jeandre le Roux Lushen Ramchander and Kyle Lawrence are the drivers to watch at the sharp end of the field.

However, with the cars being prepared to the same specifications anything can happen on the day and spectators can expect vigorous challenges coming from the likes of Blane de Meillon and Mark Tucker.

Supplied by: SAES

Images: Colin Windell