In his Porsche Michelin Sprint Challenge debut, Nash Morris has delivered TekworkX Motorsport its second race win for 2023 and its first 1-2 result as teammate Aron Shields was a comfortable second under the Sydney Motorsport Park lights.
The pair had qualified on the front row for Round 3 except in the reverse order and from the start they ran side-by-side through the first three corners before Morris edged ahead at Turn 4. From there he never looked likely to lose the lead and won by 3.6s.
Morris’ win adds to prior success in other categories which include Super3, Trans Am and TA2 as well as recent good form in Super 2.
It was similar race for Shields as he maintained second position throughout and was 8.5s up the road from Marcus Flack at the end. The Sonic Racing pilot had gained third at Turn 1 on the first lap, a result of Earl Bamber Motorsport’s Zac Stichbury having a brake lockup which dropped him to sixth behind Sonic’s Ronan Murphy and McElrea Racing’s Lachlan Bloxsom.
Flack endeavoured to hold his spot to the end, but it was all in vain as he had a 5.0s penalty hanging over his head for starting outside his grid box. Because he had several close behind, he would be relegated to just outside the top 10 in 11th.
Bloxsom slipped by Murphy at Turn 5 on Lap 7 to secure what would eventually be third place. Behind the latter it would be EBM teammates Marco Giltrap and Adrian Flack who won Pro-Am, TekworkX’s Hamish Fitzsimmons, Sonic’s Harrison Goodman and Grove Racing’s Oscar Targett.
They were followed by Tom McLennan, Tom Taplin and Caleb Sumich who recovered quickly from a spin at Turn 10. In 15th was Matt Slavin, second in Pro-Am and ahead of class rival Andrew Goldie and Class B winner Brad Carr. Sam Shahin’s record of wins in Pro-Am came to an end when he speared off at Turn 1 and finished 23rd.
The first race casualty was Lachlan Harburg after contact with Eric Constantinidis on the second lap. The latter had a second incident, when contact with Lachlan Gilksten broke the right front suspension.
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