| Fri, Jul 30 5:40AM (NZ) |
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This website is now dedicated to covering the Black Bullets. Current Black Bullets news is now provided on iSportz » with past news archived here for your continued reference.
The New Zealand drivers who competed at this year's Rotax Max Challenge Grand Finals meeting at the La Conca circuit in Italy last weekend are on their way home after three heady days of ups and downs.
A heat win for Auckland's Ryan Urban in the DD2 class augured well early on but come the Finals on Sunday Palmerston North's Josh Hart ended up the best finisher with 10th place in the Senior race, followed by Nick Cassidy (11th in the Junior class), Ryan Urban (15th in DD2) and Scott McLaughlin (19th in the Juniors).
Earlier in the weekend the other Senior representative, Hamilton's Ethan de Jong, was eliminated in the last-chance Senior repercharge race.
Having finished third in the Pre-Final (the race which determines the grid for the Pre-Final) earlier in the day, DD2 class driver Ryan Urban started the Final from third place but before he could even contemplate moving further forward he was punted unceremoniously off the track by eventual race and title winner Leeroy Poulter from South Africa and did well to work his way back up through the field from last place to 15th at the flag.
That left former New Zealand representative Josh Hart (who earned a place at the Grand Final courtesy of his third place finish in the European Challenge this year) as the best of the New Zealanders after a sixth place finish in the Senior Pre-Final and a tenth in the Final.
 Juniors Nick Cassidy from Auckland and Scott McLaughlin formerly from Hamilton but now living across the Tasman also performed well in their Pre-Final, Cassidy finishing fourth, McLaughlan sixth - with McLaughlan spending the early part of the race disputing first place with some of the top European Juniors.
However come the Final neither was able to make a clean break with McLaughlin twice bundled to the back of the grid and twice fighting his way back, eventually crossing the start/finish line in 19th place.
Cassidy found the racing around him just as physical but ended up crossing the line in 11th place.
New Zealand has a strong and consistent record of achievement at Rotax Max Grand Final meetings having fielded a team since the very first one in Puerto Rico in 2000 with a best finish of third in the Junior class for Earl Bamber (now one of the brightest young prospects on the world single-seater motor racing scene) at Lanzarote in the Canary Islands in 2004.
This year's Grand Finals meeting has attracted over 216 drivers representing a total of 55 countries with the DD2 win going to South African Leeroy Poulter, the Senior to Ben Cooper from the UK and the Junior to Facundo Chapur from Argentina.
The Nations Cup went to the United Kingdom from the Netherlands and Hungary.
2008 Rotax Max Challenge Grand Finals La Conca International Circuit Italy Thurs-Sat Nov 27-30
DD2
1. Leeroy Poulter (Sth Africa) 19.43.241
2. Pier-Luc Oulette (Canada) +0.271
3. Stuart Marsell (USA) +7.145
4. Dominik Kraihammer (Austria) +7.276
5. Ralph Odendaal (Sth Africa) +8.733
6. Patrick Pearce (UK) +9.282
7. Christophe Boisclair (Canada) +9.347
8. Michael Kent (UK) +9.469
9. Mirco Rossi (Italy) +9.507
10. Henrijs Grube (Latvia) +10.587
aso
15. Ryan Urban (NZ) +16.149
Senior
1. Ben Cooper (UK) 20.04.192
2. Chris Lock (UK) +3.106
3. Martin Pierce (Ireland) +5.017
4. Hannes Van Asseldonk (Netherlands) +5.098
5. Ricky De Donno (Italy) +6.635
6. Michael Andersson (Sweden) +10.808
7. Joey Van Splunteren (Netherlands) +10.963
8. Jesper Rossler (Sweden) +11.961
9. Troy Woolston (Australia) +13.511
10. Josh Hart (NZ) +14.152
Junior
1. Facundo Chapur (Argentina) 17.32.642
2. Kevin Korjus (Estonia) +0.387
3. Paul Fourquemin (France) +1.286
4. Rio Haryanto (Indonesia) +1.451
5. Shoya Kose (Japan) +1.529
6. Jo Riley (UK) +0.161
7. Ferenc Kancsar (Hungary) +2.049
8. Edward Jones (UAE) +2.609
9. Keishi Ishikawa (Japan) +2.822
10. Chris Hays (Australia) +6.464
also
11. Nick Cassidy (NZ) +6.640
19. Scott McLaughlin (NZ) +11.374
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