Donna Collins
The Namibian Motorsport Federation (NMSF) crowned the well deserved 2017 national champions, which represented the four different motorsport codes, during a formal prize giving held at the Tony Rust Raceway last Saturday.
Over 45 trophies were awarded to the top three podium winners in the various classes of Circuit Racing, Dirt Oval racing, Karting and Drag Racing.
And whilst everyone was considered a winner, the name that stood out was Walvis Bay’s Allan Martin who floored last year’s circuit racing in the Clubman’s A Class, as well as the dirt oval track season, to emerge as the victor with a double crowning.
Martin kept true to his promise of clinching the title in both disciplines which he’d worked so hard to achieve, and even though the rally circuit didn’t fall under the championship standings this year, he claimed a leading spot.
Championship title winners in the various classes also saw Martin’s son Zachary Martin scooping a circuit racing win in the Clubman’s Class B with Robbie Reschke being awarded a trophy for Class C and Jaco Nel emerging the Class D winner.
A big applause went out to young school girl Chané Havenga who emerged as the Clubman’s Class E winner with Danelle Viviers scooping the E Class trophy. The Dirt Ovals saw some competitive racing last year with Martin dominating the 4-cylinder 16-valve class. Michael Behnke took the win in the 4-cylinder 8-valve class, Gino Meyer in 6/8-cylinder class, with Raymond du Plessis taking the trophy for the quad category.
The drag racing championships went to Frank de Reveira, Bennie Booysen and Michael van Zyl in their classes. The Karting races saw Christiaan Liebenberg, Richard Slamet Jnr and Ivan Voster walking off with national trophies.
In addition to the championship prize giving, the NMSF committee held their AGM for the year to refresh their members, discuss future plans and confirm the busy 2018 motorsport calendar.
According to Derek Jacobs the recently appointed (NMSF Administrator) who has set up a permanent office in Kleine Kuppe, he stated that there is a newfound energy that is going to give motorsport momentum this year.
He said they are busy with a development strategy on the table with plans to incorporate Spinning as a national championship code, as the sport is the fastest growing in the country.
“The spinning clubs have already set 24 dates, with events being held country,” he said. “The NMSF is working on incorporating some of these slots as championship events where we’ll display some of our rally and racing cars as crowd pullers.
“We have a full year ahead on the 2018 motorsport calendar, with the first national drag races being held at Tony Rust this coming Friday, where we are hoping to draw a large entry.”