Round three of the Donaldson Cross Country Championship, the Nkomazi 450

Drivers are hoping for some good luck in Nkomazi this weekend. The Nkomazi 450, as part of round three in the Donaldson Cross Country Championship, will take place on May 16 and 17.

Riverview Preparatory School, approximately one kilometre out of Malalane, will host the event. The start and finish will be on the school grounds, as well as entertainment for the whole family.

In the production vehicle category last year, Chris Visser and Japie Badenhorst (Ford Ranger) took the victory with Gary Bertholdt and Siegfried Rousseau (Toyota Hilux) in second place and Duncan Vos/Rob Howie (Toyota Hilux) third.

The first two events of the Donaldson Cross Country Championship produced tit-for-tat situations, and sparks are set to fly in the production vehicle category at round three of the series.

The opening round of the championship, the RFS 450, saw the Team Castrol Toyota Hilux combinations of Anthony Taylor/Dennis Murphy and Leeroy Poulter/Rob Howie score a one/two, with Atlas Copco Ford Racing pair Manfred Schroder and Japie Badenhorst taking the final podium position.

The roles were reversed in dramatic fashion on the Toyota Dealer 450 when Schroder/Badenhorst led home teammates Gary Bertholdt and Siegfried Rousseau, with privateers Johan and Werner Horn third in the Malalane Toyota Hilux.

Schroder and Badenhorst will take to Malalane an 11-point lead over Poulter and Howie in the production vehicle overall standings.
Reigning champions Taylor and Murphy are four points in arrears, with Bertholdt/Rousseau and the Horn brothers locked together a further two points behind.

The first two races confirmed that the two factory teams were the ones to beat, with the Nkomazi event returning crews to more familiar territory after the opening events broke new ground in Harrismith and Mooi River.
Chris Visser and Badenhorst won last year’s race, with Bertholdt and Rousseau second in a Toyota Hilux, and the Atlas Copco Ford Racing squad will be hoping history will repeat itself.

The special vehicle category results for last year were Colin Matthews/Alan Smith in first place (CR3) with Herman Sullwald/Wichard Sullwald (BAT) in second, while Quintin Sullwald/Karl-Heinz Sullwald (BAT) took the last podium position.

Gerhard du Plessis and his teenage son, Hardus, go into the Malalane outing in an ageing Jimco with an early season 15 point lead over another father/son pairing in Quintin and Kallie Sullwald, in the Elegant Fuel BAT Venom. The catch, however, is that only 15 points separate the Sullwalds and the next 10 crews in the overall championship – with a couple of Class P teams in among the Class A big guns.

Consistency and reliability are key ingredients when it comes to winning championships, and the Du Plessis combination are the only Class A crews to have finished both events this season.

Either way the stakes are high – even at this early stage of the season. Crews will, however, welcome a return to more familiar territory after the RFS 450 and Toyota Dealer 450 took teams into the unknown.
Two drivers in the fledgling Class G category will go into round three separated by only four points.

Leander Pienaar (Can-Am Maverick) has a slender four point lead over motorcycle legend Brian Capper in the Regent Racing Polaris. Each drivers has a win apiece with the difference between the pair, a second place for Pienaar on the Toyota Dealer 450, and a third for Capper on the RFS 450 at the start of the season.

The Elegant Fuel cross-country motor racing team head into the event looking to bounce back after a disappointing round two in Natal.
Last year’s event saw the two Elegant Fuel race cars take a 1-2 in class A and the team will be hoping for a repeat performance.

Quintin and Karl-Heinz Sullwald in the Elegant Fuel BAT Venom took the first win of the season when they stormed home to a convincing victory on the RFS 450 and currently lie in second position on the overall championship leaderboard.

Hermann and Wichard Sullwald in the Elegant Fuel Stryker will be hoping to bounce back after a run of reliability issues on a event that they won last year.

“Round two was not a great event for the team and we hope to come back in a big way in Malalane. Many of our trucks pass through the town on a regular basis and it’s also the closest, so we consider this to be our home event. Reliability is going to be key for the rest of the championship and we need to drive accordingly,.” said the Elegant Fuel team.

The event gets underway on Friday afternoon with a 100km prologue to determine start positions.
The main race starts at Malalane Toyota on Saturday morning at 08:30 and consists of two 175km loops with a compulsory 15min stop after the first.

The Elegant Fuel team look forward to meeting up with race fans at the designated service park and putting on a show for them along the route.