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Carnival City 400 This being the final race of the year, 1 of 5 people stood a chance to win the Overall Special Vehicle Championship and Class A would be decided between The Prolong BAT Team (Gerald Mundell and Billy Bond) and The Adrenalise BAT Team (Gary Bertholdt and Brandon Harcus).
The race would consist of a new format for the prologue, thus being a 5km short course stadium section. The atmosphere was electric and it made for exciting spectator viewing. Hannes Grobler was seeded 1st for the prologue, Brandon and Gary sat waiting at the start line facing the penultimate jump and saw what was the biggest jump South Africa will ever see by Hannes Grobler (IT WAS AWESOME!). He was followed by Duncan Vos who's jump was just as spectacular! Upon landing Brandon and Gary saw the back door of Vos's Nissan fly open and that their rear tyre had burst, this left the Adrenalise Team apprehensive and forced them to tap off for the last two jumps as they had a Championship to win and didn't want to end their chances in the Stadium Section by damaging the BAT. The Adrenalise BAT qualified 2nd overall and 1st special vehicle, once again maintaining the BAT dominance of Prologues. The race would start on corrected times with 30 second dust gaps, and would comprise of three loops of 131km.
The race started in ideal conditions with relatively little dust, allowing Brandon and Gary to attack the two Nissans. To their dismay they watched Duncan Vos drive into the back of Hannes Grobler and during all the commotion they slipped passed the two Nissans. Seventy Kilometres into the first lap, the Diamond Diggers passed them for the overall lead. At the end of the first lap there was pandemonium and nobody could find the entrance to the stadium section. This was a major problem for Brandon and Gary as it allowed three or four cars including the Prolong Team, which started two minutes behind them to catch up and left Brandon and Gary two minutes down on their Championship rivals. The second lap started and Brandon and Gary trailed Gerald and Billy by two minutes on corrected time although they were right behind them on the road. Ten kilometres into the loop, Gerald overshot the corner allowing Gary to pass. Brandon and Gary now had to open up a lead in order to regain first place, one good thing that came out of all the stadium confusion was that the Diamond Diggers rejoined the race behind Gary who was now second on the road behind Hannes. Halfway through the second lap Hannes pulled over with a broken steering rack, this allowed Gary and Brandon to take advantage of the clear road with no dust. This didn't last long before the Digger's passed them again. Knowing that the had to win, it left Brandon no choice but to let Gary continue driving as a driver change would take too long. Their pit stop was very good until the fuel filler cap wouldn't go back on properly as they had hoped to pass the Digger's with a super quick pitstop. Gary trailed the Digger's for seventy kilometres keeping the pressure on them and finally it paid off when the Digger's came to a stop on top of the mountain section due to a rock ripping an oil pipe out the engine. The Digger's misfortune left Gary with an eight minute lead with sixty kilometres to the finish. "Arriving at the finish first overall was the most awesome feeling knowing that we had clinched the South African Class A Championship Title" A good party was had by all the BAT team Final Results for the Carnival Race were: 1st Place - Gary Bertholdt and Brandon Harcus (Adrenalise BAT) 2nd Place - Clint Gibson and Mike Brown (Preasidium BAT) 3rd Place - Mark Corbett and Juan Mohr (Century Property BAT) 5th Place - Danie Marais and Andrew Utterson (Intelligence BAT) 4th in Class B - Henry Kirstein and Renier Jooste (Atlas Copco BAT) |
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