Just under 190 drivers headed to the Portland District Kart Clubs Yarraman Park Race Way on the weekend December 6th to the 8th for 1 day of practice and 2 days of competitions at the 2024 Karting Victoria Victorian State Cup with the prestigious Black Plates on the line in Sundays winner takes all finals.
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TaG 125 Restricted Med – Grady Hutchesson would start out of pole and lead the final from start to finish but unfortunately suffered a dropdown penalty relegating him to third meaning Glenn Riddell was the winner and Jack Ryan 2nd putting in a strong drive to come through the pack.
1st Glenn Riddell, 2nd Jack Ryan, 3rd Grady Hutchesson
KA3 Senior Light – Max Walton was able to get out to the lead early, while a huge pack of drivers fought among themselves from 2nd to 10th, Walton suffering an unlucky failure towards the end of the final and Jack Steere broke free from the squabbling pack to go on and take the biggest win of his racing career so far ahead of Sam March and Amos Orr.
1st Jack Steere, 2nd Sam March, 3rd Amos Orr
KA3 Junior Heavy – Max Mangano would go on to back up his recent win from Tasmania with a strong victory with Mia Mifsud achieving one of her best results in a big meeting 2nd ahead of Levi Jones 3rd after a good battle with Chelsea Humphrey, Oliver Von Tunk, Mathew Basso.
1st Max Mangano, 2nd Mia Mifsud, 3rd Levi Jones
Vic Combined Masters – Steven Riddell would add another title to his cabinet taking a 2 second win ahead of Trev Whitby and Mark Heemskerk
1st Steven Riddell, 2nd Trev Whitby, 3rd Mark Heemskerk
Cadet 12 – A very entertaining final in Cadet 12 with places swapping throughout a tight field at the front for the majority with Red Plate winner Jensen Damaschino and last years Cadet 9 Black Plate champion and Cadet 12 graduate Jarvis Hindle fighting hard for 1st in the final laps, Jensen taking a defensive line into the final turn on the main straight that allowed Jarvis to use the slip stream and get a run and cross the line 1st by the narrowest of margins but later would take a penalty for a restart infringement after a caution along with Rossi Yau, handing 1st place back to Jensen Damaschino, Mason Martin backing up his state title win in 2nd and Kurtis Polkinghorne 3rd.
1st Jensen Damaschino, 2nd Mason Martin, 3rd Kurtis Polkinghorne
TaG 125 Light – Amos Orr would never be headed in a big 21 kart field of Tag 125 going on to take a 2 second win ahead of Max Walton and Matt Domaschenz with Hunter Salvatore close behind.
1st Amos Orr, 2nd Max Walton, 3rd Matt Domaschenz
TaG 125 Restricted Heavy – Red Plate winner Mason Baldi got out to a strong lead early in the final and went on to cross the line first but a louder than normal sound could be heard coming from the exhaust at certain parts of the track and a post race inspection would would relegate an unlucky Baldi meaning Trent Meadows would be 1st, Blair Van Ree 2nd and Jett Rendell 3rd in his first race in the class.
1st Trent Meadows, 2nd Blair Van Ree, 3rd Jett Rendell
KA3 Junior Light – Jai George backed up his Red Plate and VCS championship wins this year with a dominate performance in KA3 Junior Light leading from start to finish with a grab fight between Aiden Spector, Luca Portaro and Austin Mcpherson for the final steps on the podium.
1st Jai George, 2nd Aiden Spector, 3rd Luca Portaro
TaG Restricted Light
1st Ben Kilsby would lead the final from start to finish but not after having to defend from a fast finishing Red Plate champion Ethan Warren who had a unlucky issue in qualifying Kilsby winning by .163 of a second from Warren and Shane Moreland in 3rd after a good fight with Ben Bloomfield, Spiros Anagnostopoulos and Ryan Dealy.
1st Ben Kilsby, 2nd Ethan Warren, 3rd Shane Moreland
Cadet 9 – RJ Bellbowen and Zac Duynhoven were racing each other hard at the start of the final Duynhoven dropping a wheel on the dirt that allowed Bellbowen to break free and going on to take victory, Duynhoven in 2nd after a good fight with Luke Robinson 3rd.
1st RJ Bellbowen, 2nd Zac Duynhoven, 3rd Luke Robinson
KA3 Senior Medium
Taine Venables would make it back to back to back 3 consecutive Black Plate wins under a second ahead of Zach Findlay and Wayne Bourke in 3rd with Thomas Patching, Nicholas Trebilcock and Jarrod Bottomley not far behind.
1st Taine Venables, 2nd Zach Findlay, 3rd Wayne Bourke
TaG 125 Heavy
Portland local Scott King would take victory by 1.2seconds ahead of Jackson Souslin-Harlow 2nd and Ben Mouritz 3rd with Scotts brother Adam King 4th.
1st Scott King, 2nd Jackson Souslin-Harlow, 3rd Ben Mouritz
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It was close racing and great driving across all of the classes with no red flags and minimal stops across the meeting.
See the full results at speed hive
https://speedhive.mylaps.com/events/2886771
A big thank you to all the competitors racing at the event, members and everyone at the Portland District Kart Club for an amazingly presented track and hosting a great event, Andrew Hayes from AHR media for his usual fantastic commentary, Todd Chambers and the Portland members that helped run social karting practice Friday, all of the Karting Victoria officials and volunteers for all of their hard work running the meeting and all of the sponsors of the event including Canadian Rooster Portland / Hamilton, Royal Hotel Portland.
Karting Victoria hopes everyone enjoyed the meeting and looks forward to seeing everyone at next years Black Plate event taking place at the South West Kart Club at Cobden December 5th and 6th.
Photos by Tim Francis – tfdesign.com.au
