Excitement Builds For Ross as First Race of 2015 Nears

Excitement Builds For Ross as First Race of 2015 Nears

Defending NZV8 Touring Cars TLX champion Nick Ross is looking forward to the opening race of the season on Saturday at the Mike Pero Motorsport Park, Ruapuna in Christchurch.

This weekend will be not only the start of the South Island leg of the series but the first time the New Generation TLX cars have competed on the Ruapuna circuit throwing up stiff challenges to all teams as they fight to get their cars up to speed before all others.

The Concept Motorsport crew have worked tirelessly at each round this season to extract all they can out of the brand new Total Lubricants Nissan Altima.

Their work has paid off and even with the new machinery have been able to match the pace of their main rivals at both Hampton Downs Motorsport Park and Pukekohe Park Raceway in the opening rounds of the season last November.

Ross currently sits in a strong second place on the points table with two rounds completed and one race win under his belt at this stage.

"We have been very much looking forward to getting the car on to the track at Ruapuna and have been trying some things here today and it all seems to be going very well." said Nick Ross from Ruapuna.

Whereas the visit to a new circuit on the calendar presents challenges for Ross and the team there will be great memories of the racing in the South Island from around this time last year.

Last season the South Island rounds brought much success for Ross and the team when he moved into the lead of the series at Invercargill's Teretonga Park in January at round two.

He took hold of the lead and gripped it tight with a strong defence at Timaru's Levels circuit following up by eventually claiming his first NZV8 Touring Cars Championship title three rounds later at an incredibly exciting final held at Pukekohe Park Raceway in April.

This season the NZV8 Touring Cars visit Teretonga Park once more for round four held next weekend but the series will not be returning to Timaru this time.

The Concept Motorsport team will be running two cars this weekend at Ruapuna in the TLX category with Hamilton's Bronson Porter jumping into the championship winning Total Lubricants Holden Commodore.

Porter was impressive last season when contesting the NZV8 Touring Cars TL Championship in a Holden TL taking one race win at Taupo Motorsport Park.

The NZV8 Touring Cars action gets underway Saturday morning at 11.36am with a qualification session followed by the first race of 2015 with a 12 lap sprint starting at 3.41pm.

On Sunday the action heats up with race two at 11.36am which is a top five reverse grid 14 lap race. This is followed by race three at 3.38pm which is 18 laps long and includes a mandatory wheel change for the TLX cars.

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