The final round of the 2023 McPherson Mechanical Autocross Series took place on Saturday, with a day/night event to round out the busy year at SEAC Park.

Coordinator for the year Daniel Oldaker managed to assemble enough officials to have the round take place, after the previous round had to be cancelled due to lack of volunteers being available.

Clashing of dates always causes problems with the club’s volunteers also involved in other motor sporting activities.

After the compulsory driver’s briefing and a “look around” lap, Director Dan put his race hat on and led the pack away for Round 1.

John Whitehead’s light weight buggy topped the time sheet for this Round, 3 seconds clear of Sam Thomas in his Rally Subaru.

Barry Edwards managed a good open lap and snuck in third from son, Jayden a further second behind.

Matt Kirby made the trip across from Warrnambool and his laser made its way around a roughening track for a well-earned 5th spot, Aaron Bowering next in the shared BMW in 6th, Geoff Wilson made 7th in a not happy Pug, Gary Brown driving in his “normal” manner slid the FG Falcon home in 8th, Kyle Johnson 9th in the Datto 1600 and Dale Cagney 10th in the Mazda Coupe.

Whitehead continued on in Round 2, only a half a second clear of Thomas, Jayden Edwards, Barry Edwards, Kirby 5th, Bowering holding onto 6th, Kyle Johnson 7th, Gary Brown 8th, Geoff Wilson 9th and Cagney 10th.

With several areas on the track opening up, some places required a little extra caution, but Thomas made good use of the rally developed suspension and set the pace with a very good run of 1:48.15 seconds, to hold out Whitehead’s buggy by a second and a half.

Jayden Edwards again made third spot, Kirby doing enough on this run to pinch 4th from Barry Edwards, Cagney “learning” a 2WD Front Wheel Drive made it up the list to 6th, less than a tenth of a second in front of Gary Brown 7th, Johnson 8th, Ashton Slotegraaf 9th and Keith Cuttle doing an excellent job in the Commodore rounding out the top 10.

As round 4 got under way, the track surface was showing its age from constant race traffic and mother nature’s control, requiring even more concentration to avoid the “worst” spots.

Whitehead rode the bumps well and again made it the time to beat, with a 1:48.13 second blast that Thomas could not match on this round with his 1:51.09 for the second spot on the time sheet, Jayden Edwards 1:51.32 run his best for the day and enough for third with dad Barry doing a 1:51.40 and locking in 4th.

Kirby’s 1:54.12 run gave him 5th, Johnson 6th, Cagney 7th, Slotegraaf made it a round with a 1:57.94 second run his best run for the day, giving him 8th spot, Brown in 9th and Cuttle again making the Top 10 with his 1:59.81 seconds effort in the Commodore.

The track conditions had by now claimed a few cars with four or five succumbing to the testing conditions.

A double lap was the requirement for Round 5 and Thomas made the quickest run, a second clear of Whitehead in second, J Edwards third, Kirby 4th, B Edwards 5th, Gary Brown 6th, Dale Cagney, improving at each run, next in 7th, Kyle Johnson also improving at each run in his tidy 1600 Datsun 8th.

Kevin Millard did a patch job on the BMW’s cooling system from an earlier failure and got it going for this round and collected 9th spot as a reward.

Mark Jennings made it into the “10” with his double lap effort of 3:58.32 seconds a fitting reward in the FG Falcon he share drives with Browny.

With still plenty of daylight, Round 6 took place before a tea break and Thomas improved his time each run, this one a very quick 1:47.44 seconds setting the pace for the rest to beat.

Barry Edwards pulled a 1:50.56 to be the best of the rest in a pretty good drive of his Commodore.

Kirby made third spot by a hundredth of a second from Jayden Edwards, 1:51.93 and 1:51.94 for each effort.

Whitehead had to settle for 5th half a second behind, with Kyle Johnson nipping at his heels in 6th (1:53.90) Gary Brown 7th, Cagney 8th, Ashton Slotegraaf 9th and Mark Jennings 10th.

Lights fitted and tea completed, Round 7 got under way and it was no surprise to find Thomas at the top of the time sheet, with the conditions all suiting the well prepared Subaru Rally WRX and a driver fresh from a win in the VCRS series the week before, some six seconds clear of a big effort from Jayden Edwards in second place.

Matt Kirby also did well in his Laser, making it home in third spot, half a second in front of Barry Edwards, Kyle Johnson 5th, Whitehead 6th, Brown making it all look so easy in the long-suffering FG Falcon, next home in 7th, Cagney 8th, Slotegraaf 9th and Director Dan (Oldaker) getting home in 10th spot.

In the penultimate Round 8 Thomas made another top entry well clear of a big charge from Jayden Edwards and John Whitehead, 2nd and 3rd, Barry Edwards 4th, Johnson 5th, Matt Kirby 6th, Brown 7th, Slotegraaf in 8th, Max Viitanen making it into 9th spot with another well driven lap and improving at each outing and Dale Cagney rounding out the top 10.

In the last round with the track rough and grooves showing, Sam Thomas “rolled” around to finish the day with an undamaged car and points for the quickest lap of 1:51.12, closely followed by John Whitehead (1:52.09) Jayden Edwards (1:52.81) for another 3rd, Gary Brown (1:56.50) 4th, Barry Edwards (1:56.75) in another good day at the office 5th.

Kyle Johnson is showing signs of following his dad Ian’s long chequered history of motorsport, improving each time he gets some seat time in the tidy Datto.

No doubt Ian has passed on a pointer or two about how to go quickly.

Kyle has ended this outing with 6th quickest lap time (1:58.97) and holding out a big drive from Ashton Slotegraaf in his Falcon (2:00.00) 7th, Cagney (2:02.15) 8th, Oldaker (2:02.25) 9th and Keith Cuttle again making the 10 with his 2:06.44 second lap.

Outright positions for the day were:

Results will be added to the past rounds and winners will be advised at the club presentation dinner at a venue and date to be advised.

Thanks must go to all involved in the series.