Covid? Meh. The VIP wildcards are coming.

Picfest!


Ken Smith is going for his 50th GP start. He was the first entry announced.

Shane van Gisbergen is back, all aglow from that Bathurst win and chasing the one that got away.

 

Now Chris van der Drift (below) lobs in an entry.


The VIP Wildcard entries for the 2021 New Zealand Grand Prix outnumber the young hopefuls at the moment.

Rumours about who else will put their hands up are flying thick and fast, and here's the most likely of them. 


Dan Gaunt has two series wins to his name and two GP victories - Teretonga and Manfeild - to go with them. 

He has done more laps of Hampton Downs than the other three VIP entries put together. 

He's working as a driver coach and mentor (maybe I could get some tips...).

He has also been doing great things in endurance racing here and overseas. In fact, he shared an LMP2 car with The Giz and Nick Cassidy in the Asian Le Mans Series not too long ago. He has driven every iteration of the TRS cars: FT40, FT50 and FT60.

Who else is on the shopping list? Murph of course. Doesn't take a lot of imagination to work THAT one out. 

Liam Lawson, currently working on financing his first year in F2? Possibly.

 

It would be cool to see Nick Cassidy come back too, and he could have a shot at becoming the only Kiwi to ever win four NZGP titles. Nick's a racer's racer; he will come if a deal can be brought together.

On the unlikely side of the ledger: Mitch Evans, Brendon Hartley are 'nice to haves' but I hear they are spending Christmas in Monaco, which would leave precious little time to get down here, acclimatise, race and get back.

Andy Knight, Mitch Cunningham, Ben Harford, all handy behind the wheel but not on the 'likely' list. Brendon or Damon Leitch? Hmmm...

The government has agreed to an exemption for international drivers, but it's late in the piece for 'real' internationals to come down. Having said that, Macau switching to F4 took the heat out of that event as a place to be noticed, so perhaps we will get a few enquiries. There are a few international movers and shakers working on deals so we will have to wait and see.

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