Welkom to host next round of African Endurance Series

With organisers allowing one driver per car this time around, not only will the pace be scintillating, but victory may also just depend on whether a car will be able to run the full 90 minutes non-stop and flat out, or not.

One of the three drivers in the shared championship lead, Nick Adcock will leave driving duties of the Harp Motorsport Juno SS3 that has won the last two rounds on the trot and the ability to score another ten maximum points to his regular co-driver, Francis Carruthers this time around.

The third driver to share that championship lead, Mike Verrier has already thrown the bones by splitting driving duties within their Black Chrome VSP with his early season team mate Mark Lauth; so choosing who would drive that one was an easier task, with Verrier doing duty in Welkom.

No clear-cut case

But it is by no means a clear-cut case that either of those two will win on Saturday, with several rivals out for Carruthers' scalp, including the similar Ecurie Zoo Juno likely to be pedalled by Dezzi 2-hour winner Duncan Vos, who sits tied second in the title race with brother Graham. Meanwhile whomever of Johan Erasmus or Steve Humble drives the second, Phakisa 6-hour winning Harp Juno, is also a definite contender for overall honours.

Don't forget any of a broad variety of other challengers for that overall win, including the glorious Frost-di Matteo Bailey LMP2, Colin Pitt's Juno and a couple of Pilbems, never mind Josh Broome's Radical, Steve Pickering in a Porsche 910, the Eric Salomon/John Amm Elf 506, Craig Harper and his little Harper and Rod Schafer and Index championship protagonist Jeff Gable in Lotus Sevens.

There will of course be several GT entries looking for overall honours too, including Fred de Kok and Sun Moodley's Porsches, Willem van der Westhuizen's Ferrari F430 and the Craig Jarvis Dodge Viper, plus the possibility of Charl Aranges' GT3 Lamborghini Gallardo.

Saloon cars

An African Endurance race is not an African Endurance race without a healthy smattering of saloon racing cars on the grid and Welkom will see several teams out to secure tin-top honours, but as always in this form of racing, will it be the tortoise or the hare that succeeds in the end?

A tortoise and a hare sharing the African Endurance Series Index of Performance championship lead will further compound that conundrum - Martin Botha's quick Alfa Romeo GT is tied on 20 points with steady VW CitiGolf driver Deon Crous, while another VW driver Ronald van Rensburg sits third, just two points adrift on that all important Index log.

Other entries to look out for include Gary Fourie's BMW, Justin Mathie in a Nissan 370Z, Terence Ehlers' VW Golf and Mickey Schmidt driving his Toyota Corolla.