Lobb, Harrison set the pace

Whangarei drivers Caine Lobb and Scott Harrison both produced blistering results in the opening round of Motorsport New Zealand's Premier Race Championship Series at Pukekohe Park Raceway over the weekend.
The young racing stars are both 21 and learned their trade side by side as fellow karters in the early days of their careers. Now as accomplished drivers they have both made it into the top level of New Zealand motorsport.
Lobb is already well known as the 2009 champion of the ENZED V8 Ute Racing Series and over the weekend he made huge inroads on reclaiming the title from Palmerston North's Chris Pither with two race wins and a third place.
Going up against the current champion for the first time this season, Lobb moved from last on the randomly selected start grid in the opening race to claim an incredible third place by the chequered flag. From the front of the grid in race two he led from start to finish and followed that up in the most commanding way possible with yet another win on Sunday to claim the weekend as his own. Pither did not have such a good weekend, unable to make the podium until the final race where a showdown between him and Lobb caught the attention of the crowd.
With Lobb leading the race from the start and gaining a massive lead over the entire field, a controversial deployment of the safety car to clear debris from the track brought the field back in close together. At the resumption of racing Pither was able to move past Lobb, but when all seemed lost Lobb put in a cracker of a lap and managed to push his Mark Cromie Holden past the Ford down the pit straight to reclaim the lead.
With the spectators on the edge of their seats Pither threw everything he had at Lobb but although painfully close many times in the final laps, he was unable to get another pass to stick against the experienced Lobb and had to follow him over the finish line.
Last season Scott Harrison competed in the Suzuki Swift Sport Cup, finishing third overall. It was a development season for him with promise to move into better things with the Triple X Motorsport team.
He certainly must have impressed his bosses last season, moving up into the top level of the Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge this year. His teammates are none other than high class acts Daniel Gaunt, an accomplished racer in the series plus Toyotas and V8 Supercars, and Kiwi racing legend Craig Baird, who is looking for his seventh GT3 title in a row and is also the current BNT V8s champion.
Neither Harrison or his team owners could have expected such an impressive debut from the Whangarei driver. In his opening race on Saturday afternoon, a semi-enduro of 36 laps including a pitstop, he finished on the podium in third.
The series rookie followed that with a solid fifth place on Sunday morning in the shorter sprint race, but equalled his stunning opener with another third place in the afternoon's race three sprint.
Harrison finished his very first entry in the fastest category of the Premier Race Championship Series in an incredible fourth overall for the weekend, certainly a good indication of what is to come.
"It's really great having those two (Baird and Gaunt) as team mates and they help me a lot. I'm not quite on the same pace as them yet but I'm not too far off," he said.