INVERELL race car driver Mark Trees had been in the slow lane for a time. He had not had a run since October last year when he took out rounds two and three of the Queensland-NSW Challenge at Carnell Raceway in Stanthorpe.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
“Just various things popped up, I didn’t have the parts I needed,” Trees said.
“But anyway we went up to Oakey Streets Sprints two-day event, and because I hadn’t had a run for some time we decided to treat the Saturday as a practice session to get used to the car and the track.
“That went quite well, but just before I crossed the line on Saturday the alternator bracket broke and caused the car to cut out.”
Trees said that was when his pit crew, Richie Simpson, Tenneille Trees, Simon White and Pat Alliston went into action. He said they begged, borrowed or stole from every competitor in the paddock to get the car going.
“They worked late into the night so that by Sunday morning we were going again,” he said.
“We still pushed on reasonably hard to start with, but the car was missing due to a blown alternator fuse.”
Trees said with that repaired, he had only one round left for the day.
“By that stage we were down to a 1:30.0 heat and we thought we had missed out. But we were able to qualify, we were the last competitor to make the top 10 shootout by three one-hundredths of a second,” Trees said.
“At the end of the shootout I came in on a 1:28.09 and that put me third outright for the weekend.
Trees said he had been very pleased with the result and the trophy, and he thought the celebrations later on at the Oakey RSM Club were not too bad either.
