Today (Friday Sept 15) and tomorrow (Saturday, Sept 16) 75 teams consisting of four drivers or more, will line up at the start line of the full 3.33km ‘international’ circuit at Hampton Downs to contest novelty budget long distance motor racing entrepreneur’ Dr Jacob Simonsen’s latest endurance event, the NaZCAR Day/Night Lemons & Limes Enduro.
This time last year Simonsen and his crazy group of volunteers were putting the finishing touches to what turned out to be the largest participatory motorsport event ever to be run here in New Zealand, the 2022 NaZCAR Continuous 24 Hour.
Like the very first 24 Hours of Lemons event Dr Simonsen ran on the shorter (2.7 km) ‘national circuit at Hampton Downs back in 2016, this year’s Day/Night Enduro is run to full ‘Lemons spec,’ with each and every car and all 300+drivers expected to come up with a coherent car/team/driver/apparel theme, plus roving judges ready to receive ‘bribes’ and/or issue fines for real as well as imagined misdemeanours.
The big difference between last year’s record-setting, and this year’s new-look Lemons & Limes event is that the 2022 one was a genuine, ‘continuous’ 24-hour event.
This year’s event runs for approximately 20 hours of day and night driving split into a first stint of 7 hours and 30 minutes from (12.30pm to 8.00pm) today, then, after a maintenance period of 4 hours (from 8.00pm until midnight) and a recommended sleep break of another 8 (hours) a second, longer, stint of 12 full hours kicks off at 8.00 am tomorrow and continues until the chequered flag is unfurled ready for a ceremonial finish at 8.00pm.
Dr Simonsen admits that several of his regular 24-hour competitors were surprised over his decision not to continue with (at least) one of his events this year running to full ‘continuous 24-hour format. But he is unrepentant.
“For a start,” he said this week, “one of the key things we have learned over the past couple of years is that the events we do run are very popular with new-comers to our sport and that is again the case with this latest event. In fact, this event sold out within 12 hours of releasing registrations – testament to the fact that running a full, continuous 24-hour format might not be as important to competitors today as some traditionalists might think.
“What is important, particularly to our many newcomers, is plenty of seat-time for each of the four drivers during the day plus as night falls and on into the night; exactly what we set out to achieve with this two-day, 20- Hour format.
“What I especially want to do,” Dr Simonsen, went on to say, “is establish a pathway for someone young, old or in-between, to move from a safe, fun and incredibly cost-effective first step into our sport right up to the point where they might even want to drive professionally. This is one of the reasons why we set up our sanctioned NZ Championship NaZCAR Pro Series three years ago now. And why we set up our new Limes category this year – as the next step-up from Lemons racing.
“Both actions were about creating new pathways; for those already invested in our version of the sport, as well as those standing on the sidelines, keen to kick off their own journey but yet to take that all-important first step.”
Having spent most of the day yesterday at Hampton Downs supervising sign in, documentation and scrutineering, Dr Simonsen confirmed last night that ‘excitement levels were building nicely’ and he believed that they would be at – or at least very close to -‘fever pitch’ later this morning as all 75 teams entered gathered around their parked race cars along the start/finish straight for the popular group photograph opportunity ahead of the official single file rolling race start due at 12:30pm sharp.
Dr Simonsen was instrumental in setting up and trialling the 24 Hours of LeMons events in Australia from 2015 and brought the franchise with him on his permanent return home to New Zealand, where he ran his first (non-continuous) 24 Hours of LeMons at Hampton Downs in 2016.
He has since struck out on his own, establishing the NaZCAR organisation to run his more NZ-centric budget endurance events over various formats of 8, 12 Hour and 24-Hour races for an ever-expanding group of keen teams.
More information on upcoming NaZCAR events can be found on the NaZCAR page on Facebook at facebook.com/Nazcar24.
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