by Brett Swanson
Finally the new season got underway down here in Victoria, Australia with the running of the Jackpot Invitational at Avalon International Raceway.
It was great to see the owners making continual improvements over the winter break with some new corporate style suites being erected.
The jackpot event carries a $10,000 first prize and as the name suggests it’s open only to invited drivers who have either won a heat or stood on the podium in the previous season. It can also include some “wildcard” invitees.
For whatever reason numbers were down a bit from last year and interestingly some of those invited actually passed the track to head another ten hours up the highway to Sydney Speedway.
The Jackpot has a unique format with the field split in two with 16 cars in two 15 lap qualifiers. The top six from each qualifier go straight into the Semi Final and the rest go into the last chance qualifier where they race off again over another 15 laps from where the top six then join the other 12 cars in the Semi Final.
The Semi Final is run over 20 laps and the top 12 then race-off against the clock over a single lap.
Only the ten fastest cars make the final which is a 15 lap dash for the cash.
So in theory you can have a bad night through the qualifiers and still start on pole which is exactly what Steven Lines did. Lines never made it through his qualifier and then only, just made it through the non-qualifier but a blistering lap put him on pole while Grant Anderson who until the time trial had been dominant, made one little error and started from 5th.
In previous years the final has only been a ten lap affair which meant you didn’t have much time to go forward if you made a mistake or qualified poorly. At least this year you had more of a chance and Anderson took that chance. His speed early on was the same as the field but over the last half dozen laps he really got going and was in second, despite the second place car trying to drive him into the wall deliberately.
Just when Lines thought he’d redeemed his bad night he heard Anderson coming and then almost in a panic he reacted and hit an infield marker and tore the front end out of the car leaving Anderson to take the win.
The way Ando was driving he was going to get the win anyway – he was the only driver passing cars. The second generation racer pocketed $10,000, a good start to the season.
Another great performance came from 17 year old Brayden Parr. With only a 360 engine and only one season under his belt he put his machine into the final while his younger brother Liam was lying in a high dependency ward at the city’s hospital. Liam has been there for over a month now, most of it in intensive care, and will have another 6 to 8 weeks before he can go home. Great supporters Like David Dickson who provides a car for Ian Loudoun and sponsors half the field in some way, lifted young Liam’s spirits by donating a brand new sign-written helmet and fellow racer Brett Milburn, the defending local series champion, arranged a raffle at the Jackpot event to raise some money to assist the family. It’s moments like these and the outpouring of grief and support we saw recently for Bryan Clauson that makes you proud to be part of this great sport.
1. Grant Anderson V37
2. Darren Mollenoyux V52
3. Corey McCullagh V90
4. Jye Okeeffe V42
5. Daniel Pestka V88
6. Brayden Parr V77
7. Domain Ramsay V2