Peter’s Mini Challenge debut
LEONGATHA’s Peter McNiven and team brought home the third place trophy for the Mini Challenge at the Clipsal 500 in Adelaide on the weekend.
The team only completed one test day prior to the event.
It was Peter’s first event in a Mini Challenge car.
“If you had said to me that we could bring home a podium last week I wouldn’t have believed you. We are all rapt,” he said.
“With a lot of damaged cars throughout the weekend, as on all street courses, keeping a cool head and a clean car is critical.
“This ultimately gave us the opportunity to bring home third.”
Over the weekend Peter had two sixth places and a win.
In race two Peter claimed his first Mini victory in a final turn hair-raiser with V8 Supercar veteran Dean Canto.
An action-packed opening lap of thrills and spills allowed both drivers to scream away from the rest of the pack as they avoided several incidents and set off to battle it out over eight hotly contested laps.
Coming into the final turn of the race bumper-to-bumper, Canto had the advantage only to see McNiven dart inside and take victory by a slim 0.83 seconds.
“Looking at our speed over the weekend the car went really well,” Peter said.
“Obviously there’s always room for improvement, so we will be looking at a few things over the next couple of weeks.”
The Mini Challenge is a national series that follows the V8 Supercars.
Their next round is at the Formula 1 Grand Prix in Melbourne in two weeks.
Peter thanks his sponsors Supercharge Batteries and Nulon, also friends and family, as well as the Gippsland car club for all their support.
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