The first supersprint of the year was at Oran Park GP on Sunday 15 March. Hot sunny weather and 110 entrants. Got my 7th gen entered in Class 1B (unmodified under 2.0L). There are two MX5's in my class and but only one was entered this round, as well as a noobie DC2.

Setup: Federal 595RS tyres, RB74 front pads and EBC green rear pads.

Result: Managed a best lap of 1:33.02, equal 2nd in JSCC club, 2nd in class 1B, 99th overall (out of 110)

Not a fast time but a fun and eventful weekend. Came off on the first session before the bridge into the gravel trap. The under panel plastics decided they preferred being dragged on the tarmac. Spent most of the time before session 2 cleaning mud and cable tying the plastic shields onto the front bar.

Came off again in session 4, this time at the bottom of the flip flop. Luckily ended up on the inside of the track and not near the Live On Milk wall (now A4 milk wall). The whole spin off was captured on camera by Trent Wallis Photography

Bottom of the flip flops


Front right tyre touches the grass


Lift off over steer


Got lift?


Got mud too


My plastic shield prefers tarmac dragging



Other cars:
A couple of GTR's, Toyo Tyres sponsored EVO's, B20 EG Civic (DynoDave sponsored), B18 EG Civic (TODA/MFactory sponsored)
The Civics were both in the top 20 overall, beating a few of the GTR's, EVO's, etc. Really good result for NA engined cars.

Awesome shots, looks like you had a fun time out on the track ...


Front end has got massive lift hahaha...

well done looks like fun

If you love fanging your car around, you'll love the track. Go to the next trackday or sprint... you know you want too

Drove down through some thick fog to Goulburn for the Round 3 supersprint at Wakefield on Sunday 3 May. It was so foggy you could only see about 3-4 car lengths in front! Weather cleared and it was a nice warn and sunny day. There were 90 entrants this round and all the cars in Class 1B (unmodified under 2.0L) were there (2 x NB Mazda MX5's and my 7th gen Celica).

Setup: Federal 595RS tyres, RB74 front pads and EBC green rear pads.

Result: Managed a best lap of 1:17.53, 3rd in class 1B (last!), but still currently 1st in class 1B championship points. Sounds impressive but I'm still not as quick as the others...

It's been a whole year since I last visited Wakefield. I could hardly remember any of the braking points, so reaching the turn 1 kink at 156 kph was interesting since I like to turn in early for turn 2 to carry speed up the hill. I let the car swing itself out to the ripple strips but went a touch too far, touching the dirt but I managed to get back onto the track unscathed. Laid down consecutive 1:17's in the first session, so I thought a new PB could be possible.

Sessions 2 & 3 resulted in consistent 1:18's and lots of understeer down the hill at turn 5 and 6. Turns out my tyre pressures were too high (44psi fr, 40psi rr) so I lowered them for the next session. Also tried to experiment with gear selection and earlier upshifts but the 7th gen simply has too little torque when going uphill (turns 3 and 4).

Lower tyre pressures for session 4 yielded low 1:18's and a 1:17. Unfortunately, my fuel light came on and I didn't have any spare fuel with me since I left my jerry can in Sydney. So I called it a day and headed back to Sydney.

A positive out of the day was that I discovered low 1:15's are possible with a stock/unmodified 7th gen on road tyres, according to the fastest sector times on my racechrono GPS laptimer. Can't wait to get out to Wakefield again to see if I can do it.

Other cars competing included: R35 GTR, 8 x EVO's, 2 x Civics tuned-to-beat-EVO's (2.0L VTEC, stripped out monsters), 9 x MX5's, clubmans, 3 x DC2's, DC5, Lotus Exige & Elise, Datto's, Porsche 993, and others. Heaps of photos by Matt Mead

Event: Eastern Creek held the latest round 4 NSW state supersprint. It was a nice warm and sunny day. There were 108 entrants this round. The 7th gen Celica SX is in Class 1B (unmodified under 2.0L) along with two 2nd-gen MX5's in semi slick tyres.

Setup: Celica SX, Federal 595RS tyres, RB74 front pads and EBC green rear pads.

Result: Managed a best lap of 2:06.1304, 3rd in class 1B (a.k.a. last), but still holding onto 1st in class 1B championship points due to the MX5's skipping one round each. Those MX5's own the track and literally do not use their brakes much!



It's been a whole year since I last visited Eastern Creek and probably my 4th or 5th time there. So I usual problem of remembering braking points and gear selection. This proved to be a big problem on lap 2 whilst going down corporate hill on turn 8. I hit the apex nicely but entered much too fast in 4th gear and the rear started to slide out on exit. The car did a 180deg spin into the foam 100-braking-marker and avoided the wall. R.I.P. foam braking marker. This followed with a stern word from the chief steward for rejoining the circuit unsafely, which was my mistake.



Eastern Creek is a great track because it's very fast - I hit 186 kph on the main straight according to the racechrono GPS lap timer. Also, success in most turns is dependent on the exit of the previous turn.

Although I was about 3sec off my PB, I managed to hit 2:06's consistently on most laps. I think my Federal's have gone through too many heat cycles (about 8 trackdays). When they were brand new I did 2:03 but could only manage 2:06 one year later on the same tyres.

There weren't many laps this round due to a few accidents. A WRX hit a wall earlier in the day, followed by a massive oil spill by a Holden V8 Commodore, followed by a Ford Falcon FPV hitting the wall, followed by an open wheeler losing oil and catching fire. Fortunately, no one was seriously injured.

I also had a bit of fun with a stock HSV Maloo V8 ute for one lap. I left pit lane in front of the ute but it caught up to me during the warm up lap and over took on the straight. The driver must be quite new to the track/car or was trying to mess around, as I caught up to it on turn 1 with some late braking. Then he sped off until turn 2 where I caught up again. This happened for basically all 12 corners until we reached the straight again where he began to get further ahead of me. The HSV's fastest lap was 1:58.3287

Ford Falcon FPV V8 5.4L and HSV Maloo Ute V8 6.2L


More photos JPM and MattMead

Great Stuff - Keep the reports coming

Chuck them up on JSCC if you like. I couldn't work out how to do it!