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The 2023 Australian Truck Racing Championship reached its season halfway point last weekend.
Steve Zammit won all four races of Round 2 at Winton Motor Raceway – where all four 2023 championships races will take place – but he has only a slim chance of winning a record-breaking seventh title.
That would put the 39-year-old one title ahead of the late Rodney Crick.
Others with multiple titles are four-time champion Bob Middleton, who owns the Touring Car Masters Whiteline Racing Chev Camaro team, and Beau Hewat and New Zealander Inky Tulloch who three each.
This year’s series is currently led by Barry Butwell who – like Zammit did in Round 2 – clean swept the first round back in April aboard his Butwell Racing Team Mack Superliner.
Robbie Fern in his MLC Racing Volvo White followed Butwell home in each outing. Zammit was forced to sit out the meeting as the SRZ Racing Kenworth was in quarantine after the team finished its campaign in New Zealand, which had significant ramifications on his title hopes.
“We didn’t get the truck back until two weeks after the meeting,” said Steve’s father, Charlie, who explained that the Mack went directly to the Butwell Racing Team’s workshop where they stripped the racing truck down in preparation for the second round.
“We went down there to rebuild it and Brett Dalglish, our driver for the Teams’ event, finished it off as he lives in Melbourne.”
“We can’t win the title by winning all the remaining races. To win the championship would take the others having DNFs – but we don’t want to win it that way,” Charlie Zammit added.
Butwell finished runner up in Round 2 with three second places and a third, which came about after he spun out of second place. It was a positive result given dramas in Friday’s practice which required a trip back to Melbourne for an engine rebuild which Zammit assisted with.
Shannon Smith (GLE Racing Kenworth) who scored second overall at Round 1 missed the latest outing due to gearbox issues.
Also absent was Anthony Tringali (International Transtar) after recovering from a road accident, and Frank Amoroso’s Kenworth, which was still being repaired from its crash at Round 1.
Butwell is the points leader after two rounds, ahead of Fern.
The next round is scheduled for September 16-17 with the finale on November 18-19.
2023 Australian Truck Racing Championship (after Round 2)
1 Barry Butwell (Mack Superliner) 138
2 Robbie Fern (Volvo White) 111
3 Mark Noonan (Scania T123) 98
4 Steven Zammit (Kenworth 401) 74
5 Lachlan Fern (Isuzu SBR) 74
6 Shannon Smith Kenworth T900) 68
7 Mark Schutz (Isuzu SBR) 55
8 Harvey Dale (Isuzu SBR) 10
