Car Care Clinic, the rapidly expanding vehicle service franchise, has joined the SuperHatch series as the naming rights sponsor for 2019. The opening round of the rebranded championship gets underway at Zwartkops Raceway on Saturday, 9 March.
Last year Brett Garland (autObarn/Incco/Sabat Honda Civic) and Jonathan du Toit (Trans Africa Racing Honda Civic) battled it out for honours at the front of the Class A field, with some competition coming from Tyler Scott in his Episerve/Jestik/Lopec Opel Kadett TS in the latter part of the season. In 2019 they will be joined by the reigning champion Louis Scholtz (Car Care Clinic Honda Civic), who has made the set up from Class B. Andre Dannhauser (Pro Auto Rubber/Jestik Opel Corsa) has done a lot of preparatory work on his car and is confident that he will be able to run with the leaders this year while Andre de Lange will also be looking for a good haul of points in his Roofsure Audi A3.
Almost a dozen cars will line up in Class B with Zane van Zyl (Credit Guarantee VW Golf), Wouter Roos (Nathan’s Motorsport VW Polo), Nic Martin (Rex Diff & Gearbox Peugeot 207) and Mel Spurr (iTre Cugini/ATT VW Polo) likely to be among the front runners. Matt Cohen (VW/Dunlop/BHIT Polo) and Ishmael Baloyi (Honda Civic) could also be up there.
Picking a winner in Class C is not for the faint of heart. Robert Stoltz (Jestik/Episerve/EBC Opel Kadett), Freddy Watkins (VW Polo), Craig Priestley (Tactical Fluid Ford Laser) and Juan van der Walt (Building Code Consultants Ford Fiesta) all stood on the podium at some stage last year but will face challenges from a host of newcomers to the class.
Practice sessions are scheduled for Friday before the serious business of qualifying and racing gets underway on Saturday. The 20-minute qualifying session gets underway at 10h30 with the opening 8-lap race scheduled to get underway at 13h55. Race 2 is the final race of the day and should start at 17h00.