Brent Ward and Mark Smith combined for a Wairarapa victory in the latest round of the national four wheel drive series, held in Whakatane. Ward, managing director of Wairarapa Diesel Services Ltd, and Smith, who works for him as an engineer, built their truck themselves at their workshop in Masterton. It hasan LS1 Holden V8 motor with auto gear box, landcruiser running gear with hydraulic lockers, air bag suspension, four-heel steering brakes and NOS fuel injection. The Whakatane event was the fourth event of nine in the national series and Ward and Smith placed first in the D class (super modified) and also first overall. It was a testing course with the soil becoming powdery and creating large holes. Having plenty of power was essential and the V8's did particularly well, taking out the first eight places. Normally at least some of the C class (four cylinder modified) trucks would be amongst the top five placegetters. Competitors in the national series can enter as many of the nine events as they like with their best five performances counting towards the championship. The next race is in Auckland and then it will be off to the South Island in March for races in Nelson, Christchurch and Dunedin. The final is scheduled for New Plymouth over Easter weekend. Their Whakatane success has Ward and Smith well in the reckoning for the national title as so far in the current series no one driver has won more than one event. Other Wairarapa competitors this year have been D graders Kevin Galbraith (driver) and Mike Fitzgerald (co-driver), Sandra Jackson (driver) and Barry Larsen (co-driver) and Greg Mason (driver) and Chris Mason (co-driver) while competing in the F class have been Russell Hall (driver) and Glenn Hall (co-driver).
