News
Hazelwood Claims Victory in Action-Packed Trico Trans Am Opener at Hidden Valley
Todd Hazelwood has taken first blood in race one of the Trico Trans Am Series at Hidden Valley Raceway in the Northern Territory this morning leading home Nash Morris and a hard charging James Moffat after a turn one incident brought the field under the control of the safety for the first three laps.
Racing Academy team mates Cameron Laws and Blake Tracey suffered heavy damage when the field compressed into turn one leaving little room for Jordan Cox, Jordan Boys, and Elliot Barbour with all but Cox retiring their cars straight after the incident.
Trico Trans Am debutant Aaron Love’s race start came under the scrutiny of race control with the #45 Camaro later given a 5 sec penalty for starting outside his grid box however it was Hazelwood who dominated after returning to green flag conditions winning the race from Morris and Moffat although a scare was sent through the TFH Racing camp when the #1 Mustang began sending smoke signals from the engine bay within a lap of the flag, later to be determined as a small slit in the gearbox boot allowing oil to escape.
2024 TA2 Champion Josh Haynes who was earlier caught up in the turn one melee dropped to as low as 23rd place but drove back through the field enjoying a scintillating battle with Bargwanna, Evennett and Bailey.
In the closing stages of the race, Haynes made contact with Evennett’s Mustang sending the Qld’r off the road at turn 14 and while blame was thought to have lied with Haynes it was Bargwanna that was eventually called to the Stewards office as video evidence showed it was he who ran into Haynes forcing Haynes into Evennett, however after a lengthy investigation it was deemed a racing incident with no penalties applied.
Race two and three will take place at 8:00am and 12:45pm live on Fox Sports and Kayo Sports.
QUOTES
Todd Hazelwood, #1 TFH Racing
“It was good to get a win today as sometimes it’s tricky to get the best start from the dirty side of the circuit but we got the job done.”
“Our pace wasn’t as good as I would have hoped for but the boys are on it at TFH Racing because tomorrow will be frantic with Morris and Herne and we’ll need to be on our game.”
Josh Haynes,#37 Herzog Steel Mustang
“Getting caught up at turn one wasn’t ideal because the car has real pace as we saw in qualifying but I really enjoyed the scrap with Bargs and Lachy right up until I got a whack from behind and accidentally pushed Lachy off the road.”