Asset Finance team head for iconic adventure at Taupo 1000

It's a race as long as the legendary Baja 1000 - and it's actually faster.

Blasting along under mature pine forest, speedo nudging 200 km/h is common for the top teams in the spectacular ThunderTruck class.

Likewise in the top buggy class, the Asset Finance Taupo 1000 is the most challenging event in the sport anywhere in New Zealand.

This is the only international event in New Zealand offroad racing. It’s also the only international race held in New Zealand in September. It’s the only such event that builds its own temporary city – complete with restaurant, accommodation areas and heliport – deep in the massive pine forest of the central plateau of New Zealand’s North Island.

To paraphrase rugby great Sean Fitzpatrick in just about every post-match TV interview he ever gave, it's a race of two halves. Simply finishing the first day's 500+ km in the top three is no guarantee you will be on the podium the following day.

Strategy, speed and often luck play huge parts in whether a driver or team finds their way to the sharp end of the second day of racing.

The challenges of the Taupo 1000 are well known to the drivers racing for Asset Finance, the company that also sponsors the race itself. Gary Baker of Otakiri and Clive Thornton of Whakatane both have many Taupo races behind them, and both know just how hard it is to finish, much less finish in the top ten or on the podium.

They head south today drawn once more by the adrenalin-fest that is the Taupo 1000, the longest offroad race in the southern hemisphere.

Baker drives the mighty Nissan Navara V8 he has built and campaigned over past seasons, taking multiple North island and New Zealand championship class titles in the process.

Thornton will run his two-seater Southern Cross race car with GM V6 power, a refined specification of the format he ran to victory in last year's Woodhill 100.

The two teams pit together at the event, adding a bright blue presence to the temporary city that springs up in the middle of the Kaingaroa forests every time the Taupo 1000 is staged.

Set in the massive production pine forests east of Taupo, the race track is based at an all-new pit complex on the Te Awa forestry airstrip, and the roads used in the 53 km lap are significantly different from the course used for the previous race. Teams will drive ten laps on Saturday and nine on Sunday.

Organiser Tony Saelman says this means there will be little “home town” advantage for Kiwi racers or teams that have entered the classic race before.

“The great thing about this massive forest as that we can plot a course that is instantly recognisable as a Taupo track, but presents teams with a new challenge that will test them at every turn. From the big all—out forest straights to the narrow skid tracks where tree branches swat the side of your car to gnarly pumice firebreaks, the Taupo has something to challenge every driver.”

Mr Saelman says the Taupo 1000 is a race that rewards good preparation and mental toughness. Drivers have to treat each day as a separate race and have to run to a strategy that evolves as they go.

“This race asks teams to complete the distance of an entire Bathurst 1000 track race without once driving on tarmac, doing 500 km per day,” he says.

The race weekend begins on Friday September 11 with qualifying sprints for the start grid; racing starts at 8.00 am on Saturday and Sunday and the finish each day is expected to be in the early afternoon.

Mr Saelman says if racers average high lap speeds then the single-day distance of 500 km could be completed by 2.00 pm.

“We won’t know how fast the race goes until we see the pace of the leaders on the first day. If the front-runners are fast and have no problems the race could finish earlier because it’s based on the race distance, the first driver across the line who completes that distance finishes the racing for the day.”