Joel Heinrich starts title defence in perfect fashion
Defending Battery World Aussie Racing Cars Series presented by TFH champion Joel Heinrich has got his 2025 season off to the perfect start by taking a start-to-finish victory at Sydney Motorsport Park.
Heinrich led MTA NSW’s Kody Garland by 0.466s as Corish Motorsports’ Mason Harvey continued his practice form to round out the podium.
The top four completed by Motorsport25/Racer Industries driver Reece Chapman all went under the lap record, but Harvey on a 1m 41.398s achieved the honour.
It was a superb jump by Heinrich to easily lead Garland into Turn 1, with the latter having to worry about Harvey enabling the reigning series winner to skip away.
An early safety car closed the margin up totally, but Heinrich again was able to fend off the advances of Garland, Heinrich and Chapman.
A superb effort from Jack Boyd in qualifying set up a top five position for Johnston Craill Racing Enterprises, but the same fortunes didn’t afford his teammate Asher Johnston after he entered the race late following his engine dropping to three cylinders during the previous session.
Caleb Paterson continuing his dominant form in Rookie Cup until he pulled off during the mid-stages of the race in the Norganic Proteins entry.
Another leading contender in TFH Racing’s Brandon Madden also dropped out to engine maladies, while Corish Motorsports’ driver Josh Andersen did likewise late in the race.
At the end of the chaotic opening race of the season, Scott Dornan secured Gold Cup in the Action Line Marking entry by scoring sixth from the Masters Cup winner in Cody Mckay.
City Sweep’s Chris Mercer, Osborn’s Transport driver Bret Osborn and Andrew Corish completed the top 10 for Corish Motorsport.
Dornan was an easy winner in Gold Cup from Denis Butler and Fight MND’s Jeff Watters.
It was a close finish in Masters Cup between Mckay and Osborn as the latter climbing 10 positions in the opening race. Matt Gooding held off Scott O’Keefe to complete the class podium.
Hayden Nissen also sythed his way through the field to win Rookie Cup from Kyle Lovering after Paterson failed to finish.
Race 2 of the opening weekend at Sydney Motorsport Park is at 3:35pm AEDT broadcast through BlendlineTV.