Scoullar Looking to rebound at Ruapuna

Wellington teenager Regan Scoullar is looking to bounce back after a tough weekend at round two of the Summerset GT New Zealand at Manfeild last month.

Despite showing great race craft and car speed early on in the weekend which earned him a third placing in the 1-hour race on Saturday, before a mechanical issue curtailed his weekend.

Looking ahead to Ruapuna this weekend for round three of the championship, Scoullar is determined to put the misfortune behind him, and continue his march up the field and get more good results.

“The car is a dream to drive and I have really enjoyed the racing at both Taupo and Manfeild. Unfortunately with the clutch issue we had at Manfeild, we didn’t quite get to see what we could do but that’s made me and the team more hungry to get some results this weekend. I feel confident we can be competitive and push for a podium,” said Scoullar.

“I have had very limited testing but I’m starting to get more confident in the car and the team have done a great job at setting the car up to suit me,” said Scoullar.

In-between Manfeild and Ruapuna, Scoullar has taken advantage of a free weekend, and entered the Porsche Championship round at Hampton Downs, where he won all three races.

“The seat time and results that we achieved at Hampton Downs was amazing for me and the team. We qualified on pole and won all 3 races. Most important though was we had good pace and I was able to put the car on pole by close to two seconds ahead of the second placed car. It definitely has given us some momentum going into the next two rounds down south and the seat time is really valuable.”

Scoullar has had limited running at Ruapuna in the last year, but says it’s a track he enjoys and should suit his Porsche 991.2 Cup Car, and is looking forward to another battle with the two Mercedes AMG GT2 cars of Paul Pedersen and Joel Giddy that have recently arrived in the Championship, and also battling with four of the new generation Porsche 992 Cup Cars also in the field.

“I raced at Ruapuna once last year in the Pirelli Porsche Race Series, I really liked how the track flows as you can just set the car up for the corners. I think we’ll be strong under brakes and through some of the faster corners.

“From what I could see against those two AMG cars at Manfeild, we gained heaps of time under braking and through the mid corner and corner exits. The AMG’s had exceptional straight line speed but our corner exit speed was able to mitigate some of the impacts of this.”

“But I think the big factor for us being able to battle with the faster cars was that the team gave me a really strong setup for the car and as a result of that we were really consistent throughout the whole of the race.

With nine more races still to play out across the rest of the season, Scoullar says there are still plenty of opportunities to get good results.

“Definitely myself and the team work are consistently working together to keep improving and I think it really showed at both the Manfeild and at Hampton Downs in the other car. I think that any given weekend, if we put it all together we have just as much chance as everyone else.

The Summerset GT New Zealand Championship have three races over the weekend at Ruapuna. Track action kicks off on Friday.