The past weekend’s (7-9 June) Dunlop Winter Extreme Festival, held at Zwartkops Raceway outside Pretoria, saw Victron Energy South Africa’s motorsport brand ambassadors start the mid-season break in solid form.
Authorised Victron Energy South Africa distributor and product installer GreenHouse had the father and son pair of Craig and Nicholas Herbst compete in the fifth round of the BMW ///M Performance Parts Race Series.
Nicholas finished the weekend on top of the Series’ points table to back up the position that he has held in Class D since the second round. Both races saw him finish on the podium, with third place in the first and runner-up in the second. Both races saw him jostle for position with Cobus Bohmer, who finished the day as runner-up in the overall results, for this category based primarily on points scored and with accumulated race times as a tie-breaker. Herbst’s third place was enough to see him take a three-point lead heading into the winter break.
Craig Herbst finished the first race in fourth place but retired early in the second. Nonetheless, his five points in the morning saw him classified in sixth place for the day. He finished Round 5 ranked fifth in Class D on the points table.
The DOE Formula Vee Partnered with CIM Lubricants sees all competitors relying on Victron Energy’s Blue Smart IP65 chargers to keep components charged in the single-seater series. These chargers are courtesy of authorised Victron Energy automotive product distributor National Energy Solutions.
The first race of the fourth round saw Peter Hills claim a closely contested wit from points leader Lendl Jansen. Shaun van der Linde completed the podium, with Brandon Hills and Richard Carr in tow. The second race saw Brandon Hills take the win, with Peter Hills, Jansen, Van der Linde, and Theodore Vermaak crossing the finish line with three seconds between them. With the overall results for this category solely based on accumulated full-distance race times, Peter and Brandon Hills topped the podium from Jansen.
This series also sees no less than three Victron Energy South Africa brand ambassadors competing. Their efforts were headed up by TC Racing’s Tjaden Tromp, son of South African Sales Manager Gerrit Tromp, who finished 10th and 12th to take an overall 11th place. Chloe Stuart, daughter of National Energy Solutions’ Barry Stuart, retired from the first race due to a clutch failure but bounced back in the second to record a 14th place.
Victron Energy South Africa Product Specialist CJ de Beer also debuted in the series this past weekend, having previously assisted the team on race weekends. His first two outings, in a car he drove for the first time during Friday’s practice sessions, saw him finish 17th and 20th, with an overall classification of 17th.
Formula Vee South Africa utilises a two-championship format. The first is the Motorsport South Africa championship, led by Jansen, with Tromp and Stuart placing 11th and 17th, respectively. In the Formula Vee South Africa Association Championship, led by Marcel Blignaut, Tromp occupies third place, with Stuart eighth. After his maiden outing, De Beer occupies 18th place. Tromp also leads the Rookie Class from Stuart, with De Beer fourth.
The next outing for all these drivers and categories will be the Regional Extreme Festival’s fly-away round in Cape Town on 9-10 August.
Issued by Brandsponential on behalf of Victron Energy South Africa
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