The Sporting Car Club of SA held its first major event in recent months, with more than 90 people taking part in the multi-club hill climb at Collingrove.
With each driver getting up to five runs at the iconic track on a day of four seasons, the competition was put to the ultimate test during the event’s difficult conditions.
However by the end of the event number one seed David Mahon eventually took out top honours with a sub 30 second time.
Like many of the competitors, it took Mahon a little while to settle in before he posted his three official times, all around the 30 second mark, before putting in his best display of 29.99 seconds on his last attempt.
“We had quite a few showers in the morning and some timing issues (because of the weather), but it was just good to be back after what has been a really long time between events,” Mahon said.
“I had done Rob Roy and two hill climbs at Bathurst earlier in the year before the virus came in and stopped anything so I was a bit lucky compared to others, but this was the first South Australian one and the most important.
“After the first couple of runs, I was in front, so I wasn’t too nervous. On the last run, I felt I was on track to go even quicker but there was some oil spilled right near the top so I had to ease off.
“I had done lots of work on the car during the lockdown and was patiently waiting for events to ramp up again. Then the weather was really good right up until the event when the rain started, but it didn’t matter because it was just good to be competing again.”
Like Mahon, Mitsubishi Evo driver Gavin Farley saved his best performance till last, pipping David Whiteside for second place by less than three tenths on the final run of the day.
Due to the first two runs being converting into practice runs thanks to uncertainty surrounding timing, both Farley and Whiteside were highly consistent in their attempts once the official timing began.
And while Whiteside posted his time of 33.69 seconds on his first run up the track, Farley just managed to surpass him with his runner-up pace of 33.42 seconds.
With the hill climb the first of the Sporting Car Club of SA’s events since the return of motorsport in South Australia last month, the club are making up for last time over the next few weeks.
It continues its revised calendar with the first round of the Motorsport Australia SA Motor Racing Championship Series at Mallala Raceway on 1-2 August, before heading back to Collingrove for the Winter Cup on 9 August.