Home again at Calder Park, there were changes at the venue this time around, tickets were at the security gate, the PA system was being used and SCA was in the NASCAR garages.

For those who don’t know, the garages in parts retain their Australian NASCAR history, telephone instructions from 1995 are still on the wall.

Saturday

A beautiful day with a bit of wind greeted the field for qualifying.

Scott Nind needed four laps to bank his fastest time of 1:02.1493 while Jeff Stubbs and Richard White secured spots two and three.

The next three spots were occupied by Daniel Stubbs, Danny Burgess and Robert Marchese.

Seventh was Michael Rice in the VT Commodore, Michael’s appearance was a surprise as he wasn’t expected to be on site until later on.

Eighth was Colin Matton in the #2 SCA AUSCAR, essentially on pole for the class.

Ninth was occupied by Mick Heppleston his #304 OzTruck.

Tenth was the popular return of Laurence McKinnon in the #82 Ford Falcon, eleventh was Jamey Hollier in the Ford Falcon and rounding out the field was Chris Robinson in the splendid sounding Falcon.

Race 1

Scott Nind raced away in the #16 Ford Mustang with Jeff Stubbs in second and Richard White in third.

Ranald Maclurkin’s race in the Corvette ended after two laps.

Lap three saw Scott Nind, Richard White, Jeff Stubbs and Danny Burgess all record their fastest laps.

The field was starting to be in bunches, Scott Nind and Jeff Stubbs were close together on track while Richard White was all by himself.

Danny Burgess and Daniel Stubbs were under three seconds apart in the battle for fourth position.

Robert Marchese was comfortably in sixth in the #84 OzTruck with Colin Matton the first of the SCA AUSCARs in seventh.

Lap 4 saw Jamey Hollier record his best lap of 1:12.9108 in the Ford Falcon.

Lap 5 saw Robert Marchese record his best lap of the race with a time of 1:06.4215.

Michael Rice whose best lap of 1:10.1507 was eighth best slowed dramatically in the last half of the race but carried on to finish the race.

The seventh lap of the race saw Daniel Stubbs record his best lap time of 1:04.3850 in the #19 Chevrolet Monte Carlo.

Laurence Mckinnon’s eighth lap was his best with a time of 1:10.1115.

Colin Matton and Mick Heppleston’s ninth laps were their best ones with times of 1:10.7674 and 1:11.2939 respectively.

Chris Robinson’s tenth and last lap got the #54 Ford Falcon a best lap of 1:10.1507.

The battle of the race was Scott Nind and Jeff Stubbs, just over 1.5 seconds separated the two at the finish.

Scott Nind won the race from Jeff Stubbs and Richard White rounded out the Top 3.

Danny Burgess was fourth, Daniel Stubbs was fifth and Robert Marchese was sixth.

Colin Matton was the lead SCA AUSCAR with a seventh place finish.

Eighth place went to Mick Heppleston and ninth went to Laurence Mckinnon.

Jamey Hollier finished in tenth and Chris Robinson in eleventh.

Thunderdome laps (Saturday)

Having gone for a ride in the #7 AUSCAR last year, this year was time for a turn in the #3 Lumina.

After getting fitted in, we went to the Thunderdome, to find that the gate was shut!

After a bit of wait, the gates were opened and we were on pit lane readying to go and boy did we go.

The wild part was there were parts of the ride where the speed would start to overwhelm me having not been used to such speed or force and then we’d hit the turns and I wanted more.

A special moment was when the #2 Pontiac was doing laps and we got up close to it to for the benefit of the photographers.

Late in our run, we were coming down the backstretch when we noticed that the photographer on Turn 3 was signalling and there were remains of a tyre on the corner.

Jake Frisch in the HQ Holden was having a great time on the Dome when the right rear tyre had enough and blew, Jake got the car on to pit lane (pit road) and the HQ was parked.

After a twenty minute run, it was time to get off the track and let the AUSCARs, Sportsman and other vehicles have a go, the split was done in the interest of safety.

Zac O’Hara was given Lukas Gates’ AUSCAR for the session and he made the most of it by logging as many laps as possible.

A fleet of Excels also cut some laps of the track and they looked to have had a pretty good time of it.

Race 2

A crowded start pushed Richard White off track and down to seventh position.

Meanwhile Colin Matton was leading the SCA AUSCAR field in the #2 Commodore.

Ranald Maclurkin’s race and weekend in the Corvette ended after two laps.

Michael Rice’s race in the VT Commodore sadly ended after three laps.

Richard White was making his way back up the field, recording a lap of 1:04.1701 on lap 4 to be the second fastest in the field.

Jeff Stubbs and Danny Burgess both struck trouble and retired on Laps 4 and 6 respectively, at the time it appeared that being in second place was a curse.

The retirements of Jeff and Danny spread out the field with only Richard White and Daniel Stubbs close to each other as they battled for second.

Scott Nind won comfortably over Richard White and Daniel Stubbs.

Robert Marchese finished fourth and Mick Heppleston finished fifth to record his first Top 5 in the #304 OzTruck.

Colin Matton was the first SCA AUSCAR home in sixth followed by Jamey Hollier in seventh.

Breaking up the SCA AUSCAR line was Laurence Mckinnon who taken eighth spot in the #82 Falcon and Chris Robinson rounded out the field in ninth.

Sunday

Race 3

Race three started with the skies threatening to unleash a lot of rain that came from the south-west of Calder Park.

Jeff Stubb, Ranald Maclurkin and Michael Rice were out of action for the rest of the weekend but Lukas Gates joined the field after being away on Saturday.

Spectators who took a chance on the weather heard a new sound in the air, Scott Nind was in the #34 Ford Mustang and had to start from the back of the grid.

Rain was lightly falling when the field was ready to go for Race 3 but not in an amount to cause trouble.

The HQ Holden that blew a tyre on the Thunderdome was patched up, Stephen White provided a tyre and Jake Frisch was entered into Race 3.

The green flag was in the air and a Super TT led the field but all eyes were on Richard White the SCA leader and Scott Nind who was making his way through the field.

One of the interesting battles on the track was Colin Matton and Lukas Gates, the latter wasn’t around on Saturday but sure was on Sunday and the two Commodores were running close all race long.

Scott Nind was having a bit of trouble carving through the field but made it into second by passing Daniel Stubbs.

It turned into a Mustang vs. Monte Carlo battle as Daniel Stubbs stuck close to the Mustang in the closing stages of the race.

Mick Heppleston’s OzTruck encountered problems late in the race but would finish it and would later require a push into the garage.

Danny Burgess’ fastest lap came on Lap 9, the time of 1:07.8323 made him the third driver to have a best lap in the 07’s.

Richard White won his first Stock Cars Australia race while Scott Nind and Daniel Stubbs battled to the line with the #34 Mustang taking second by .0800 seconds.

Fourth was Danny Burgess in the #7 OzTruck.

Lukas Gates was the first SCA AUSCAR home in fifth position followed by Colin Matton in sixth, Jamey Hollier in eighth and Chris Robinson in eleventh.

Thunderdome Laps (Sunday)

Rain threatened to ruin Sunday but as noon approached no serious rain was near Calder Park and so the Thunderdome was opened to any drivers willing to have a go.

Over 50 people watched the SCA AUSCARs have a go and then came the Excels, while watching the latter thoughts turned to whether Excels could race on the Thunderdome in the future or make regular use of the track in solo or other efforts.

It was time to farewell the Thunderdome for the round and head on down to the garages with Race 4 planned for a 2:45pm start to close out the VMRC round.

Race 4

The dark skies lifted a little for Race 4, there was a little traffic jam before the race as delays in on track action led to the Excels having to wait on the dummy grid for their race and the SCA field was lined up outside it as the action went into overtime.

Scott Nind quickly jumped into the lead of the race, Jamey Hollier was head of the SCA AUSCAR field in the Falcon.

Danny Burgess was stuck behind the lead Super TT car while Robert Marchese was running all by himself in the #84 OzTruck.

Lukas Gates was chasing down Jamey Hollier while Colin Matton was losing touch with the two leading SCA AUSCARs.

Laurence Mckinnon and Mick Heppleston were busy deep in the pack battling for position.

Scott Nind won the race quite comfortably but behind him Richard White was locked in battle with the #19 Monte Carlo of Daniel Stubbs, a common event for this round with the two finishing in that order.

Danny Burgess finished a few seconds back in fourth and Robert Marchese recorded another Top 5 finish in the #84 OzTruck.

Lukas Gates, Jamey Hollier and Colin Matton were sixth to eighth position, just over a second separated the latter two OzTrucks.

Mick Heppleston was ninth, Laurence Mckinnon was tenth and Chris Robinson in the great sounding #54 Ford Falcon rounded out the field in eleventh.

Aftermath

After the race came the presentation ceremony, it was held in Ron Goodman’s former garage which still has West Coast Racing paint on the floor.

Then came the process of packing up, it taken over an hour to pack up the Richard White Racing garage but a couple of stops were made along the way as people popped in and out, the other end of the garages were sitting back having a drink.

The last of the teams left just a little after 5pm, rain was starting to fall over the circuit, it was as if the weather gods decided to wait for us to leave before giving the track a clean.