Kiwi Caughey leads in jetsprint World's title battle
Monday 23 November 2009, 9:32AM
By Jetpro
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Defending UIM World Jetsprint Champions Peter Caughey and navigator Karen Marshall of Christchurch have won the first of two rounds for the coveted 2009 title, comfortably beating Australian opposition at the New South Wales venue of Temora in the weekend.
Sweltering in heat-wave like conditions, the ten New Zealand teams contesting the two-in-two weekend’s world championship again dominated the top standings. Caughey in the Total oil supported super boat, set a time of 38.950 seconds to be the only team breaking in to the 38 second bracket.
“I predicted a sub 38 but the conditions weren’t there,” described Caughey after his table topping final run. “Nathan (Pretty) got close but I’d been working on different places on the track where I could gain time with each session knowing I could string them together if I had to, and I had to!”
Second, former Australian V8 Supercar driver Nathan Pretty was the only contender to pressure Caughey in to the top-two shoot-out; Kiwi Daryl Hutton finishing third for the weekend after his engine stopped during the final run.
Australian Slade Stanley holds the advantage in the international Group A category for smaller capacity boats, with Taupo’s Reg Smith the best of the rest, finishing second.
Smith, who organised transport for New Zealand representatives to contest the world title, is the only competitor to have attended every event since its inception.
While many teams struggled with navigating the course correctly, New Zealand’s super boat champion and outside World’s title runner Richard Burt was relegated to the sidelines for the Saturday practise and first qualifying runs. Managing track-time on the Sunday, he finished down the order in the Australian team Taser X3 boat.
Using the week to travel to the second and final round of the world championship title, the teams repeat the two-day format at the Melton jet sprint track – 35 kilometres west of Melbourne on 28-29 November. The New Zealand six-round series begins on 27 December.