“With the goal for the weekend to reset a personal best lap time, Tony Satherley of Team 666 Racing wasn’t going to hold back at the third Prowear NZ Superlap Series round”
When you’ve got your home circuit, over 600kW of power on tap, a talented behind the scenes team, and the right conditions, it’s going to be a good time. Tony Satherley and Team 666 Racing had waited a long time since round two of the Prowear NZ Superlap Series and the time had come to attempt a new personal best for Tony Satherley at Manfeild Autocourse.
“Sunday morning we were greeted with a wet track due to the overnight rain, but we were still hopeful that the drifters would dry this up a bit for us as they were first out on track,” Tony told us. Thankfully, the Superlap groups also went out in a reverse session order, so Tony would be up last on a dryer circuit.
“I went out for the first session and did my warm up. I noted that there were still a few damp patches around, but overall it didn’t look too bad so I decided to give it a decent shot,” Tony explained. According to Tony, it was still a little slippery, but nothing major. Even still, Tony came in to find out he had smashed his previous personal best with a 1:07.5-second lap time.
“I was super stoked do that on such an average lap, so this definitely made me think we could drop the lap times even lower.” With a dry session next time out, times would most certainly tumble…
During the second session, Tony pushed the Team 666 Racing Evo a bit harder, tidied up his lines, and came into the pits to find out how his efforts had paid off. Another second had been shaved this time ut, with Tony netting yet another personal best with a 1:06.6-second lap time. “Unbelievable — goal achieved,” Tony told us.
“Dave then tells me the car isn’t even running at full boost/timing yet, so it had a bit more in reserve should I need it. I declined, as the car was all good and it was just me holding it back. We did consider putting the Evo back on the trailer after this, as I had already beaten my personal best, but figured since we were here, why not have another crack and see if I can go a bit quicker.”
After making a few slight changes to the rear shocks and running a 1:06.7 in the third session, Tony decided to go out once more in the fourth session of the day to give it everything he had. After an incredibly fast lap, Tony made a mistake on Manfeild’s final turn, costing him huge exit speed and 0.3-seconds off his best lap, which looking at the Motec data, would have been a 1:05.8-second lap time. “I will be kicking myself for a while over that mistake! Sorry Scott,” Tony said.
Based on the data collected from the Motec the Team 666 Racing Evo is capable of a 1:05-lap time based on fastest sector times on its current power level.
“All in all it was a great weekend and I was really pleased with how we got on. To drop my PB by over two-seconds was a great achievement. The intercooler mods we had done to the car prior to the event proved their worth too, and Dave noted the intake temps are probably the lowest he has seen from the car. All the intercooler pipes stayed secure and I had zero issues. In fact, all I had to do on the car was check tyre pressures and top of the fuel!”
There are only 10 more days until the next NZ Superlap round, so we will be seeing this machine in action again very soon.