Kerry Baily has won his sixth Kerrick Australian Sports Sedan Series title after recording a trio of top three finishes in the final round of the season at Wakefield Park.
Tony Ricciardello dominated proceedings in his Alfa GTV, storming from pole position to all three wins at the Shannons Nationals event.
It was not enough to overhaul the points deficit to Baily however, who ended a consistent first season of running for his Aston Martin DBR9 with the biggest trophy.
“I haven’t won it since 2003 and as one gets older it feels good to be able to run with the younger fellas,” said Baily, whose previous series wins came driving a Toyota Supra (1992, 1993 and 1997) and a Nissan 300ZX (2000 and 2003).
“We built this damn thing and it’s been good to us, but we can see it has so much more potential.
“We were only two-tenths off Darren (Hossack)’s new lap record but there are areas to improve. If we can improve them next weekend then we’ll be damn good.
“Darren and Tony were unfortunate early in the season but we were also unfortunate at Queensland where we missed a race when we had to change an engine so, it’s been back and forth all season.
“It is very satisfying to race with them and the competition has been very good. In the past there would have been panel damage but there wasn’t this year. Every person puts in a massive effort and it’s been a great year.”
Hossack took second behind Ricciardello in the second and third races after being let down by a electrical problem in the opening heat.
In the Australian Saloon Car Series, Simon Tabinor all but wrapped up the 2012 title, winning the round to take a commanding lead into next month’s final round at Sandown.
Harley Phelan and Josh Kean took up the fight to Tabinor in all three races, with the latter managing to slip passed the British-born Tabinor late in Race 3 to take the final win of the weekend.
Chris Delfsma mirrored Tabinor’s ‘two out of three’ effort in the non-points scoring ‘heritage round’ for the Kumho V8 Touring Cars.
Driving his ex-Bastian Motorsport Ford Falcon AU, Delfsma had appeared set to sweep the weekend before a mistake in the closing stages of Race 3 dropped him to fourth behind winner Aaron Tebb (ex-Prancing Horse Racing Falcon AU) and the ex-Perkins Commodores of Steve Ingwersen and Sean Fardell.
Adam Beechey was the class of a similarly small Commodore Cup field. The two-time and reigning title holder won the first and third races, and managed to take the chequered flag first in Race 2 despite a drive-through penalty for a jump start. A subsequent five-second post-race penalty for starting outside his pit box, however, handed the win to Chris Stevenson.
The 2012 Shannons Nationals will conclude at Sandown next month where the Touring Car Masters, Australian Manufacturers Championship, Kumho V8 Touring Cars Series, Dial Before You Dig Australian Saloon Cars, Hi-Tec Oils Australian Swift Racing series and V8 Commodore Cup will all be in action.
