Ballito’s Reghard Roets set a personal record at the recent Simola Hillclimb on his way to a win in the B5 class.

The speedster raced in a Nissan GT-R, taking on the famous all-out 1.8km sprint event in Knysna as part of the BB motorsport team.

A former overall winner of the race, Roets has competed regularly over the years, with dozens of attempts logged on one of South African motorsport’s most iconic stretches of tarmac.

Putting pedal to the metal in the Sunday afternoon session, he blitzed to a time of 37.958 seconds, good for first in class and second overall in the King of the Hill event.

For comparison, Roets’ 2017 overall win was achieved with a time of 44.7 seconds, highlighting not only his personal growth as a racer but also advances in racing technology.

“We are very happy with our class win. Although we would have liked to claim the overall King of the Hill victory, our first objective was to keep the car in one piece,” said Roets.

“The car was also very reliable, which has been a big hurdle for us in the past as we battled mechanical issues. Most of our development work in the last year was focused on sorting that out.”

The overall King of the Hill title was won by Roets’ regular rival, Pieter Zeelie, who recorded a time of 37.090 seconds.

“Well done to all the competitors especially Pieter who won overall and gave us a new benchmark to chase,” he said.

“In this sport the development never stops and the goalposts have been moved once more. Fortunately, the BB Motorsport team is up for the challenge and we already have some plans up our sleeve.”

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