This season's Execuline Shelby Can-Am championship is turning out to be a

thriller and a healthy entry at Kyalami kept fans on their toes.

 

With three events gone there's no clear favourite for the championship, but

at Kyalami on Saturday both Chris Hart and Rui Campos put themselves firmly

in contention for the title.

 

A typical highveld afternoon downpour left the track half wet (or half dry!)

and turned Friday's qualifying into a lottery. Surprisingly, it was the

younger drivers who emerged at the top of the timesheets.

 

Driving the Hi-Q Plettenberg Bay entry Chris Hart emerged with pole position

with Guy Botterill (Fragram Tools) second fastest ahead of Jennifer Murray

(Execuline) and Marco da Cunha (SAM Racing/Tubular Tech) as Sean Greve

(Vulcania Reinforcing) and Thomas Reib (Intertrans) rounded off the top six. 

 

Under clear skies Hart judged the start of the opening race to perfection

and put in a faultless performance as he led from the start to finish to win

by more than a second from Campos (Hugo Boss) who closed the gap quickly

towards the end. It was a storming drive from Campos considering he'd

started from ninth. An inspired Alan Eve (Hugo Boss) started 11th and

matched Campos to take a hard fought third just ahead of Murray.

 

Da Cunha looked set for second place until just after half distance when his

motor lost its edge and he dropped off the pace. He did well to limit the

damage and hang onto fifth just ahead of Greve.

 

An early casualty was Thomas Reib who slithered into the gravel at Wesbank

corner on the first lap and the safety car was deployed while his car was

removed. Then contact at the bowl on lap six between Colin Frost (Strocam)

and Craig Shorter (Execuline/Bravo Holdings) resulted in Frost taking no

further part in the day's activities.

 

As is the norm, the Execuline Shelby Can-Am field was combined with the

Altech Porsche Challenge for a thrilling second race.

 

Although the Nissan powered Shelby Can-Am cars are no match for ex Le Mans

Porsches there were only three Porsches ahead of the first Shelby Can Am.

 

With the race two grid based on lap times of top eight finishers in the

first race being reversed, Campos started from 11th place. After another

superb drive he took the lead on lap five to win the 12-lap race by 2.4

seconds from Hart, the pair being well clear of the rest.

 

Brian Algar did well to bring the Firedart entry home to third at the head

of a train comprising of Botterill and Dave Beattie (Dura) while Murray

completed the top six ahead of newcomer Bertil Hoffman (IOU Music). Poor da

Cunha saw his hopes of a good result disappear on lap four when a brake

problem saw him in the gravel at Wesbank and Bryant van der Merwe (Chemspec)

retired after an off road excursion two laps later while Eve disappeared

from the lap charts three laps from the end.

 

Round four of the Execuline Shelby Can-Am championship takes place in Cape

Town on 10 May.