Progress rewarded, target almost made in Toyota GR Cup thriller

The outcome of round six of the Toyota GR Cup at the Killarney racetrack in Cape Town this weekend wrote itself into fine print, but not in the way expected.

Same track, different challenge

Besides being the penultimate round of this year’s championship, and of the National Extreme Festival, it also marked the second and final visit to the Cape track, the only facility to host two rounds alongside Zwartkops where the finale will take place next month.

ALSO READ: Facing East London’s curveball of speed and rain in Toyota GR Cup

Although the circuit has been etched into our memories from the first round in March, it was to be the first time with the more powerful GR Yaris fitted with the eight-speed Direct Automatic Transmission (DAT).

Equally as uncertain was the role the unpredictable Cape weather would play as before the weekend commenced, rain was predicted overnight for qualifying, with overcast conditions on a greasy track come race one.

New champion

“Unpredictable” happened to be the right description as race day dawned dry, sunny and windy, with a capacity crowd present to witness one aspect that proved accurate, the crowning of a new champion.

Having dominated the entire year, SuperSport’s Nabil Abdool sewed the championship up after the first race, albeit not in his customary first place.

Instead, CAR Magazine’s local hero, Kyle Kock, took a clean sweep of victories to deny Abdool’s record streak continuing.

Lower down though, the picture wasn’t as clear. Having come into the meeting seven points behind AutoTrader’s Lawrence Minnie and a similar margin ahead of IOL/Independent’s Willem van de Putte, the objective after East London for me was simple; finish fourth in the championship instead of my current fifth.

But after eight weeks of race rustiness, uncertainty still prevailed as we headed onto the track for Friday practice.

Practice

My first lap recollections from March were still engraved in my mind though and having seen the growth in my confidence, race craft, speed and willingness to be brave, I set about trying to refine what I had learned.

Readjusting myself to driving in anger didn’t take long, though a few lairy moments and missing my brake markers did result in me needing to regather my approach as the familiarly became more prevalent.

Standing out, though, was the difference between the old 198 kW GR Yaris’ and the “new” 210 kW models.

Whereas round one saw us topping out at around 190 km/h down the back straight, we were comfortably exceeding 200 km/h this time around.

For me though, breaking 200 km/h wasn’t the main objective. Despite, unsurprisingly, having done so anyway, it was the improvement in time that mattered. And after practice one, the script was written; a 1.26.2 or 10 seconds faster than in March.

As delighted as I was, glancing at the result sheet had me within the top 10 overall and less than a second behind my AutoTrader rival.

It wasn’t without cost as during the latter stages, the brake pedal went to the floor, which made for a hairy moment and crossed arms into turn one.

Fortunately, this wasn’t the issue in practice two. With my confidence growing, no lairy moment were present, yet I still couldn’t get into the 1.25s.

Even slowing down to cool the car and brakes, and then booting it, only saw a tenth improvement to 1.26.1.

As has been the case throughout much of the year, the final session ended in disaster. Besides the soft brake pedal, my driving became sloppy and traffic in front too much.

Backing off, I took a deep breath and gave it everything on the last lap. The message from the Garmin Catalyst was again the same; a time of 1.26.6, still in the top 10 and STILL behind the AutoTrader GR Yaris.

Qualifying

Happy enough, the second target was to improve on my qualifying performance, which had been my downfall in earlier races.

For the first few laps, no traffic incidents, but a time between 1.27 and 1.28 had me fuming.

As with my last practice lap, I slowed down – even stopping to avoid impeding those on a flying lap – before giving it everything.

Crossing the line, the Garmin displayed a time of 1.26.7 – 12^th overall, fifth among the GR Yaris’ and directly beside Lawrence, whose best was only a few hundreds of a second up.

As delighted as I was, the memories of our tangle at East London on the first lap still lingered.

What’s more, and to avoid a 20 plus car pile-up, we were issued with a “don’t cross the line” instruction into turn one.

For those on the inside, it meant not crossing the dotted passing line in the middle of the track, while those on the pitlane side were required not to drive over the pit exit line.

After learning that I would be on the inside, my confidence skyrocketed. Not the dismissing the challenge of Willem behind me, I felt somehow at ease and not as nervous as with previous races as we headed off on the warm-up lap

Race 1

Bunching two-by-two, I stayed as close as possible to the dealer-driven NMI Yaris of Theo Brits in front, but with a sizeable air gap should matters go wrong.

With Lawrence next to me, Willem behind and the TimesLive GR Yaris of Phuti Mpyane next to Brits, the start proved clean.

By turn two, Castrol, I had managed to keep the pink IOL no. 60 behind me and with no morse code exerted on the green AutoTrader no. 17 in front.

Lap after lap, I found myself stuck behind Lawrence and unable to get past. With Phuti pulling away, and despite being brave on the brakes and showing my nose, the AutoTrader man kept his composure.

By lap four, a beauty of a move by the TimesLive car saw Phuti move past Brits, which neither Lawrence nor I could replicate.

Despite us having the power advantage and luxury of the DAT ‘box over Brits, the NMI man wasn’t having any of it and proceeded to make it as wide as possible.

Having sensed my chance and come close to biffing Lawrence, who had to hit the anchors to avoid impacting an earlier-than-normal braking Brits, I still couldn’t get past.

Crossing the line in fifth, I was left frustrated at not being able to pull off an overtake. And while Kyle took his first win ahead of Nabil and Phuti, I was left to rue what could have been despite it having been a fantastic battle.

Race 2

In much cooler but also windier conditions, the objective for race two hadn’t changed.

Again, next to Lawrence and behind Brits, I got off to a solid start and managed another clean exit up to Castrol, while fending off the Malalane GR Yaris of Werner Horn.

As is often the case in the second race though, the script flipped as Phuti was forced off the track coming out of turn one.

Taking avoiding action, both Lawrence and I passed him going into the Castrol, which resulted in us, once again, being behind Brits.

In fact, it became harder in race one as apart from Lawrence, I now had to contend with the TimesLive car doing exactly to me what I was trying to do with the AutoTrader car.

Not helped by Brits being slightly slower through the Sabat sweep and then into the final Cape Town corner, a concertina effect was starting to develop as neither of us could overtake the no. 5 Purple Panther Yaris.

For four laps, this was the pattern until Mpyane pulled a blinder on me into turn one.

The following lap, he did the same with Lawrence, which proved too good an opportunity not to miss.

Having committed to following him, as I hit the brakes, the pedal again went soft. Realising that contact was certain, I managed to scrub off enough speed by using the inside curb.

Still, I had drifted a bit and light contact with Lawrence happened. Yet, we both kept it on the island, me now ahead of him.

Heading down into the corner previously known as Volkswagen and into the sweep, the pendulum swung the other way.

Touching the brakes for the first part of Sabat, the back became light and started to oversteer.

Using all of my skill to avoid a massive spin, I managed to catch the slide and remain in control.

Behind though, Lawrence, sensing I was about to lose it and then ramming me, took avoiding action across the grass before being hit by a close following Horn.

I eventually crossed the line fourth in class behind Phuti, whose podium finish had been made easier on the penultimate lap when I, upset about the incident, lost focus and went farming into Sabat.

Next..

While I didn’t lose a place, a fantastic second race ended on a sour note on a day when I had shown dramatic improvements since the first race.

As is stands, I am still fifth in the championship, and almost assured as Willem placed sixth and fifth.

However, with Kyle and Phuti having swapped places for second and my gap to Lawrence still to be settled, the season finale at Zwartkops on 25 October promises to be an intense one.

NOW READ: From zero to almost podium hero in Toyota GR Cup stunner