You could sympathize with Christchurch Sprintcar Ace Jamie “Duffman” Duff , last season to put it bluntly was a nightmare, and with the effort Duff and his crew put into their racing you could sense the total frustration from Duff in his Facebook posts, at times thinking “this guy is that frustrated he could walk away from the sport”, certainly something his huge fan base would not want to see.

I put it down to the old wives tail, that you don’t paint a race car green, I go back to my old days of racing a midget, the only car I destroyed was green, so when Duff rolled out his 2023/24 race livery I was stoked to see he had reverted back to the red, white and black colour scheme that has served him so well for a number of seasons.

Duff has started the season well, and seems to have a real spring in his step, so far this season winning the Central Motor Speedway round of the Civil Construction Southern Sprintcar Series, The Central Otago Sprintcar Championship and the Sprintcar feature at Ruapuna’s opening meeting, not a bad comeback from a horror season in green the year prior.

Duff was not entered in the Southern Sprintcar Series for the first two rounds but has since joined the series, meaning he had some points to make up on the field, and the popular driver was a welcome addition to the field for Aotea Electric Riverside Speedways event, round three of the series.

It was a scorching spring day with temperatures in the late teens, early twenties, possibly too hot and not ideal as the track baked, the track crew simply could not keep enough water up to it, making the entire meeting a real juggling act.

Heat one of the Southern Sprintcar Series turned Riverside into an absolute dust bowl, both Duff and local driver Ross McKinnel had made the call to play the Joker Card which gives them double points for what they earn at this meeting. So far only series leader Caleb Baughan of Christchurch and Dean “The Thriller”  Miller of Cromwell have played this card.

Series leader Baughan got of to a solid start in this race but had a spin in turn two, mid race that would bring the race to a caution, Baughan would restart from the rear of the field but by this stage Duff was up front and really the only car with clear visibility.

Duff would power off from his rivals once more despite Cromwell’s Mathew Anderson giving chase while Baughan would pick up a few spots after his early spin. Duff would take the race win with Anderson second and current series Champion Adam Evans of Cromwell placing third.

Heat two started with a tangle up between both Duff and McKinnel on the main straight, both cars intertwining but managing to break free from each other in what could have been a big accident at the tail of the field. While this was all taking place John Sievwright of Cromwell would spin in the first corner bringing out a restart.

The race restarted only for a handful of laps later Sievwright would spin up again, this time in turn four. 

While all this was unfolding it was the second of the Duff’s who was out front dominating the race. Steve “The Gasman” Duff was looking fast, controlling the race from up front, putting on a faultless display to bag the heat win ahead of Anderson who placed second and local driver Jacob McIntyre in third place.

The final heat was a good clean race, no cautions, still very dust and slick with not a lot of passing options on offer, not unless you backed your talent and trusted the car enough to make a pass out wide. This is exactly what Evans did, the young driver sat in fourth place for the majority of this heat, out front Baughan was in full control with Miller chasing hard in second. Evans backed himself to fire his car out wide in the final lap and got the job done to bag some vital points going into the feature, jumping up to third and almost getting Miller in the process. 

Baughan would take the win from Miller with Evans third.

The final was dropped from the scheduled twenty five laps down to twenty due to track conditions and to all the drivers credit this was an entertaining race to watch, no cautions just good fast green to checkered racing which delighted the the purists in attendance. 

Jamie Duff and Anderson started on the front row and while Duff powered off it was Evans who got a ripping start from the second row to follow Duff through and challenge the former National Champion for a number of early laps.

Duff however would find his groove and pull away from his young rival, he chose his passes wisely, never panicked, just cool as a cucumber going about his business to claim round three of the series, and securing double points in the process.

Evans would bank some valuable series points getting home in second place to keep his series chances well and truly in tact, while Anderson was comfortably third.

Duff spoke at the presentation about how much he enjoyed the Riverside track, and felt a set of lights so the club could race at night would certainly do the place some favors so they didn’t have to contend with the intense baking sun, a project the club may need to look into in the coming seasons.

The first Southland Championship was also contested at this meeting, The Creativity Plus Production Saloons would have a bumper field of twenty six cars entered from Riverside, Beachlands and Central Motor Speedway all wanting to claim the championship.

To be fair, I expected total and utter carnage with this many cars entered, and the Production Saloons did not disappoint, dishing up the odd incident but to be full credit to all drivers on track, there was some pretty clean fast racing.

Heat one was going smoothly, Cromwell’s Gavin Hurring got off to a solid start and was holding a lead over clubmate Stephen “Socks” Nicholas with Alistair Green of Riverside holding third. The trio were racing into turn two when a lapped car in the form of Stephen Hills of Riverside spun up leaving all three cars with nowhere to go but nose to tail into each other, causing a stoppage and frontal damage to a number of cars.

Hurring and Nicholas managed to rejoin the race for the restart but Green was ordered to the infield and out of the race, Green would later find out that a miscommunication was the issue and that Speedway New Zealand officials actually didn’t order him to park up leaving Green even more frustrated.

From the restart Hurring would break away once more and manage to hold of Nicholas to claim the heat one win, Nicholas did enough for second while Kahu Moxham of Riverside would secure third place.

Heat two was fast, no stoppages just good battles right throughout the field. Riversides Blake Hamilton suffered an issue in heat one but definitely came back all guns blazing in heat two, controlling the race from the front, fighting hard to keep Dunedin’s Tyler Kelk and Riverside’s Aaron Reed behind him. Kelk looked to make a move on numerous occasions but couldn’t find a way past Hamilton who would take the race win, Kelk settled for second with Reed in third.

As Hamilton drove away on his victory lap he left a ball of burning material on the track, then by the time he made the lap the car was well alight with a fire in the rear of the car ending Hamilton’s Southland Championship hopes.

The Production Saloons would now head into the winner takes all feature final and this was an eventful race, going the distance without interruption right up until the very last lap.

Riverside Life Member Tony Jones got off to a flying start to lead early and pretty much gap the pack, he was chased hard by Hurring and Nicholas who were in a great battle themselves. As the white flag came out, the mayhem begun the first incident when Kelk’s car blew plumes of smoke right around turn three and his clubmate Cam Bower parked up on the main straight.

This would regroup the cars and give Nicholas and Hurring a chance to attack Jones. The green flag would drop and Nicholas missed the start allowing Jones to tear off to a commanding lead once more, again taking the white flag and almost a taste of the championship but Lucy Greer of Beachlands would park up on the back straight causing another restart.

Once Greer was clear the race restarted, this time Nicholas challenged Jones but Jones had pure speed down the straight, pulling a couple of car lengths from his rival, again the white flag came out, surely Jones would get home this time, but no, with the finish in site Blake Murdoch of Riverside would slap the wall at turn four very hard this time bringing out the red flag and the race being called off, Jones being crowned Southland Production Saloon Champion, Nicholas second with Hurring third.

The Harvey Tanks Youth Saloons were split into two random groups for the Best Pairs Championship, and with twenty four cars entered, a number of those drivers just competing in their first or second meeting, there was sure to be plenty of action across both grades.