Jamie Lonergan has claimed a dramatic victory in the Club Motori Italia’s CMI Domain Hillclimb on the weekend with the Nissan Skyline driver winning by the smallest of margins.
With a record breaking 50 entries taking part in the Tasmanian club’s first event since March, there was no shortage of entertainment throughout the hill climb, which saw less than one second separate the top four drivers.
Sitting in third place ahead of his fifth run of the day, Lonergan finally found his groove on the run and guided his Skyline up the Queens Domain hill climb to post an event winning time of 46.31 seconds, pipping Rod Bender and Damien Moore in the process.
It was a bitter pill to swallow for Bender, who had been leading the competition all day until he was beaten by just five hundredths of a second. Despite one last attempt, he was unable to match Lonergan's time in the final run of the day.
Lonergan also managed to leapfrog the second placed driver in Moore, whose fastest time of 46.52 had him ultimately settle for third after the fourth placed John Ralph was unable to get any closer when he posted his best time of 47.18 seconds on his final run of the day.
Rounding out the top five more than one and half seconds slower than Moore was Vaughan Barton-Johnson with a time of 48.85.
Following on from his last-gasp victory, Lonergan admitted he was late to the party but was always confident knowing he had the pace to win his first event in 2020.
“It took four runs to blow the cobwebs off and I left it until very late, but it only takes one run to win a hill climb, so I am pretty stoked. It was a good fun day,” Lonergan said.
“I was a little surprised I won but I was always confident I would at least get close. I made a couple of little mistakes during the day and didn’t have a smooth run until the last one. Then I turned the boost up and sent it.
“After I got that run, I didn’t bother to do a sixth because I knew it would have been slower and I was sure that fifth run was the most I could get out of the car. The only thing I could do was sit back and see if Rod could beat me and thankfully, he didn’t.
“I needed to make up 1.4 seconds in that final run and I was confident I could make up the time and as long as I was smooth and hit my markers and that is exactly what I did.
“It was another great event run by Club Motori Italia, so a big thanks to them, as well as the Hobart City Council for letting us borrow Queens Domain for the year again.”
Class wins
Class A Stephen Turner
Class B Jordan Howlett
Class C Scott Wyman
Class D Damien Moore
Class E Mike Larkin
Class F Jamie Lonergan
Italian A Andrew Johnstone
Italian B - Pat Cullinane
Best Presented - Gary Lucas
Driver of the Day - Tristan Roberts