Beautiful weather was the icing on the cake for Paul Height and his team of officials from Limestone Coast Off Road Club (LCORC) to finish off season 2023’s Khanacross series.

The sideshow alley bitumen at the showgrounds, including the “skid pad” area can provide many challenges to a driver to tackle a course layout set up by driver/directors using imagination, knowledge of what a car can and cannot do or what reactions can be caused by having some minor direction changes around the ‘U’ shaped track layout.

Rumour has it that Paul “Keg” Height had some assistance from Bruno Vadori in some of the track setups and that he would accept credit where due, but if anyone had a problem on track the blame was to be directed to Bruno.

After the day of competition, credit was definitely due to both for some creative changes to each of the four layouts run in both directions for a very entertaining outing for the 21 willing and eager drivers who made the effort to come and play.

First layout, straight up the roadway, four offset gates to keep the speed under control, a tight left turn through a narrow gate, into another pair at the turn left onto the skid pan a 360 degree turn around a square of cones, then three more offset gates and into the finish box.

Sounds simple, but you need to miss all the little red soldiers (cones) that were standing guard and the quicker you tried to go the more risk in hitting one or more of them, or, skidding through the finish garage coming home too fast.

Peter Gandolfi has been using his Skoda Wagon for a while now, is very comfortable exploring the limits of this very well-built car and made the top of the time sheet for this run (33.22) followed by one of the club’s up and coming Juniors, Max Viitanen (33.92), Paul Razum 3rd (33.98), Dillan Young (34.14), Josh Munn (34.41), Aaron Bowering (34.45), Bruno Vadori (34.56), Murray Height (34.91), Harrison Bliss (35.81), and Jason Sims (36.22) rounding out the top 10.

Same test, same direction Paul Razum was quickest (32.40) from Dillan Young (32.61), Peter Gandolfi (33.23), Josh Munn (33.46), Harrison Bliss (33.61), Max Viitanen (33.78), Geoff Wilson (33.99), Jason Sims (34.07), Murray Height (34.11), and Aaron Bowering making the top 10 (34.26).

Layout the same, reverse direction for Test 3 and Dillan Young (31.58) set the pace, with Murray Height finding some grip/speed next (32.69), Gandolfi (33.10), Max Viitanen (33.44), Jason Sims (33.59), Aaron Bowering (33.63), Josh Munn (34.16), Geoff Wilson (34.33), Bruno Vadori (34.76), and Patrick Hughes (35.58), coming to terms in his “new” Nissan S13 rally prepped car, rounding out the 10.

Second pass and Murray Height (32.20) topped the list, Jason Sims (33.00), Paul Razum (33.07), Josh Munn (33.25), Geoff Wilson (33.57), Bruno Vadori (34.19), Michelle Razum (34.25), Justin Devlin (34.88), Henry Sims (34.95), and Hughes (35.49) again in the top 10.

As can be seen by the times, all the competitors were having a go and this round there were five cone penalties listed against some of the previous top runners, pushing them well down the time sheet.

Drivers were taken on a tour to show where the track had been re-worked and Test 5 got under way.

Murray Height made another fastest time (31.16) from Paul Razum (31.54), Dillan Young (31.58), Gandolfi (32.06), Josh Munn (32.33), Devlin (32.47), Jason Sims (33.06), Aaron Bowering (33.09), equal time with Geoff Wilson (33.09) and Max Viitanen (33.32) completing the 10 at the pointy end.

On the second time through Dillan Young (31.54) was the one to beat from Paul Razum (31.90), Gandolfi (31.94), M Height (32.00), G Wilson (32.22), Viitanen (32.25), J Sims (32.28), A Bowering (32.98), Hughes (33.53) and Devlin (33.66) having another tidy drive for the 10th spot.

Run reverse of the previous layout, Murray Height again topped the list with his tidy effort (32.19) from Gandolfi (32.28), Josh Munn (32.97), J Sims (33.06), A Bowering (33.25), Viitanen (33.29), Wilson (34.02), Michelle Razum (34.07), Devlin (34.17) and Hughes (34.38) in 10th.

Same direction, same layout and there were cone penalties everywhere as more speed caused some cones to be relocated, each one costing a five second penalty and pushing the unlucky recipient way down the timing order.

Paul Razum (32.10) was the quickest on this run from Dillan Young (32.68), A Bowering (32.76), Michelle Razum (32.97), M Height (33.13), Harrison Bliss (33.49), Hughes (33.71), Vadori (34.28), H Sims (34.99) and Denvor Herbertson, another junior having a drive making the 10th spot with his clean run through the course in a time of 35.62 seconds.

Another minor track change, Jason Sims liked what he saw on the look around lap and set the fastest time for this test with a 33.49 second run, Paul Razum (33.59) right behind and Geoff Wilson also liking the course (34.05), Josh Munn (34.51), Gandolfi (34.57), Height (34.64), Young (34.83), A Bowering (35.00), H Sims (35.29) and Max Viitanen 10th with a 35.54 second pass.

Second run of this layout, J Sims again set FTD with a 32.39 second pass, Paul Razum (33.14), Josh Munn (33.26), A Bowering (33.47), Wilson (33.58), Gandolfi (33.94), Young (34.07), Height (34.23), Viitanen (34.35) and Henry Sims making the top 10 with his 34.43 second run.

Reverse direction for this layout and there were a few penalty cones listed again to mix up the order.

Top time for this run, Jason Sims (31.95) continued with his penalty free runs, Young (32.87), Viitanen (33.18) another good run, Wilson (33.91) equal with Gandolfi (33.91), Height (34.08), Hughes (34.64), Munn (34.98), Devlin (35.24) and Henry Sims (35.30) into the top 10 with another clean drive in the family Toyota Celica.

Pass 2 of this layout put Jason Sims in the box seat having set a time of 32.54 seconds.

Josh Munn had a big go in the Datsun 180B SSS and managed a 33.01 second pass for second spot.

Max Viitanen again pushed the auto Commodore quickly around all the markers and picked up third with his 33.07 second drive.

Paul Razum made fourth with his 33.23 seconds effort in the pretty Hyundai Excel, Young next (33.47) from Gandolfi (33.72), Height (33.74), A Bowering (33.87), Wilson (34.01), and H Sims (34.55) in rounding out the top 10.

Switching the layout up for the final drive of the 2023 Season, Dillan Young made the most of this run with his effort in his Pulsar (27.61) good enough for FTD, M Height (28.55), Paul Razum (28.77), Gandolfi (28.99), G Wilson (29.07), Viitanen (29.38), J Sims (29.65), Harrison Bliss (29.86), Henry Sims (29.93) and Hughes (30.06) for 10th.

Final lap, Peter Gandolfi made it to the top spot with a quick run of 28.19 good enough for first place on the time sheet, Paul Razum right with him (28.61) ahead of J Sims (28.72), A Bowering (28.85), Geoff Wilson (28.86), Young (28.93) and Viitanen (29.03).

It is impressive to recognise the top seven runners were separated by less than one second, Height (29.46) for 8th, Hughes (30.15) and Henry Sims 10th (30.85).

Penalty seconds (five for each cone) when added to the day’s times shifted people well down the results list, but that is how it goes when driving hard.

A huge vote of thanks goes to Paul and Alison Height for their continuing Khanacross organisation, doing the job for both SEAC and LCORC – and thanks must also go to the dedicated officials that stand out in the weather to watch us competing and track around to reposition the cones that jump into the path of the vehicles.