New Zealand looks set to have two Aussie V8 meetings a year – one for Supercars and one for utes.

Hamilton’s surprise bid to run a street race looks likely to save New Zealand’s round of the Australian V8 Supercar championship; its future had been uncertain after the current contract with Pukekohe finishes next year.

Meanwhile Manfeild has just staged – very successfully – New Zealand’s first meeting for Australia’s Yokohama V8 Utes, and most probably will make that an annual event.

The V8 Supercars Australia company (formerly known as Avesco) has always wanted to run a street race in New Zealand. Street races cost a lot more to organise – all those concrete barriers, catch fences and temporary facilities – but the company believes it can make more money out of a street race because it will draw bigger crowds and more corporate hospitality. And corporate hospitality is where the real money is with these events.

Since no street race was available, the company signed a five-year deal with the Pukekohe circuit starting in 2001. Auckland tried to start a street race and then Wellington, but both bids collapsed because of difficulties gaining resource consents. So the contract with Pukekohe was extended for two more years, with the final race to be held in 2007, but after that it was far from clear whether New Zealand could continue to run a V8 Supercar meeting. Pukekohe is being turned more and more into a horse-racing facility and is likely to become unsuitable for big motor racing meetings.

The Hamilton announcement came as a bombshell. Even most of the councillors had been unaware of the negotiations till just before the news broke, but they supported it unanimously. Whereas there was strong local opposition to the Auckland and Wellington projects, the initial reaction in Hamilton was overwhelmingly positive. That will make it easier for the council to get the resource consent it will need. Promoters for the event are Capital Streetrace management (CSM), who earlier tried to get the Wellington street race going.

The four-kilometre circuit is on the edge of the central business district. It goes through the historic Frankton business district and past Waikato Stadium and the Seddon Park cricket ground. An underpass and an overbridge at different points will help pedestrian access.

NZV8 front-runner Kayne Scott, who lives in Hamilton and knows this area well, reckons it will be a good circuit. "It’s all right-angle corners, which should be good for passing, and Mill Street is a new street, very wide, and that should be a fast straight," he said.

Scott, who won the TraNZam championship five times in his younger days, raced V8 Supercars in the long-distance races at Sandown and Bathurst last year, and this season will contest the Fujitsu V8 Supercar development (second-division) series. Now he hopes to race a Supercar on his home track: "Perhaps the Mayor will help us get a wild card," he said. The meeting would also feature all or most of the main New Zealand championship classes.

"The V8 Supercar street race is a significant international event," he said. "The worldwide television audience is estimated at 600 million people and up to 200,000 spectators are likely to attend our street circuit during the three-day event.

"The economic benefits for Hamilton from this event through additional visitors and jobs are huge. The event provides an excellent platform for providing profile internationally for Hamilton as well as excitement and enjoyment for city residents. This is our entree to join a top-tier network of Asia Pacific host cities including Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide, Shanghai and Bahrain.

"An economic impact assessment for this race which was carried out for Wellington forecasted a return in the order of $175 million over seven years; there is no reason to believe the return for Hamilton would be any less," Mr Redman said. As yet there has been no public estimate of the cost of running the event, but the council is paying the V8 company $7 million for the rights.

Kiwi V8 Supercar drivers Greg Murphy and Jason Richards came out in favour of the Hamilton move. Street circuits present special difficulties for drivers but most enjoy them for exactly that reason – it’s more of a challenge.

"This is fantastic news for all involved – the teams, for Hamilton and, most importantly, the New Zealand fans," Murphy said. "While there are still processes to go through, Hamilton has taken the initiative and the council is 100 per cent behind the race, so they will reap the benefits the race will bring."

Murphy said he was planning to check the track out on a forthcoming visit to New Zealand. "I haven’t seen anything yet, but from the details I have heard it already sounds pretty exciting, so I can’t wait to have a look," he said.

V8 Utes

The Yokohama V8 Ute series has been quite popular in Australia, providing another form of Holden-Ford V8 rivalry. They have been getting some coverage on New Zealand TV, especially since young Palmerston North driver Chris Pither secured a drive in the series. The utes are not highly modified, which keeps costs down. They are not very fast, but they are certainly entertaining, precisely because they are not really racing machinery – they have little grip so they slip and slide around, and tend to lock up their brakes in big clouds of smoke.

Manfeild came up with an unusual format for the meeting -- each of the 21 utes was shared by one Aussie and one Kiwi. Each driver got two races in the four preliminary heats, and then in the long final race each team had to stop for a driver change. So the New Zealand-Australia rivalry was added to the Ford-Holden one.

The Aussie ute drivers are not that well known over here so Manfeild organised some high-profile Kiwis to join in the fun – V8 Supercar drivers Jason Richards and Simon Wills, former superbike star Aaron Slight, leading NZV8 drivers Wade Henshaw, Dean Perkins, Andrew Fawcet and Nick Ross. The Kiwis were very quick to get the hang of driving the utes, which they said were quite different from any other sort of racing car. Overall in the meeting the Kiwis outscored the Aussies, in spite of their lack of experience.

Wills and his Australian partner Charlie "Handlebars" Kovacs won the meeting overall and in convincing style too, with two wins and three second placings from the five races. Richards won his first race but that meant he had to start from 10th on the reversed grid for his second heat. Henshaw also won a race, but Pither had a hard time – he took a lot of hits in his first race – on his way to third equal overall. Kiwi Rhys McKay and Aussie Kim Jane were second overall, while the other team in equal third was Perkins and Aussie champion Damien "Ice" White.

A good idea and good promotion attracted what Manfeild said was a record crowd for a car meeting, nearly 8000 on the Sunday and a lot of the Saturday too. The spectators certainly seemed to enjoy the meeting – they got quite vocal at times – and Manfeild says it will probably become an annual event. And nine of the utes have been sold to Kiwi teams, so expect to see them on the track before long.

Racing utes is a bit silly, really – but then that’s part of the appeal.

The Aussie V8 Utes, on their first appearance in New Zealand, certainly appealed to the crowd at Manfeild last weekend. The Sunday crowd of nearly 8000 was the biggest for at least a decade, and they certainly seemed to enjoy the utes.

The Commodore and Falcon V8 utes were not very fast – their best lap times were around one minute 22 seconds, while Carl Hansen scorched his hot TVR around the track 15 seconds faster than that in the SuperGT support races.

But the ungainly-looking utes were spectacular, simply because they are such poor racing machines. Their grip levels were low so they lurched and skidded all over the place, often sliding sideways like racing cars did in the old days before wings and downforce changed driving styles.

The crowd liked that and they liked the frequent contact – "biffo", the Aussies call it. It was clear to see but somehow the drivers stopped just short of mayhem and there was only one driver penalised – Aussie league great Jack Elsegood, for bumping local hero Chris Pither.

Spectators also enjoyed Kiwi successes – New Zealanders won three of the four heat races, and overall the locals outscored the Aussies, who of course are regular ute drivers while Pither was the only Kiwi to have raced them before.

That says a lot for the standard of driving in New Zealand. The Kiwis learned quickly even though everyone said the utes were quite different from any other form of racing car.

V8 Supercar driver Jason Richards said they were more like driving a road car than a racing car. The key to the technique, he said, was to do everything – braking, steering, accelerating – as slowly and smoothly as possible to avoid overworking the stressed tyres.

The unusual format, with each ute being run by a team of one Kiwi and one Aussie driver, also worked well and there seemed to be plenty of camaraderie in the paddock. Amazingly, no vehicles were badly damaged during the weekend.

At least the utes are not as silly as racing trucks, which were also on the programme. The popularity of the trucks seems to be waning; perhaps the novelty has worn off, and they are not popular with other competitors because they tend to damage the track surface.

Manfeild presumably came up with the utes idea after their efforts to get a V8 Supercar round fell through. The utes were a good idea for a provincial region where many people drive such vehicles, and the circuit was rewarded for its enterprise.

And it has to be said that Manfeild was looking good. The new building with garages and hospitality suites was in operation, new stands were up, the pits area has been cleared up and sealed – the circuit should stand a good chance of achieving is ambition of taking over the New Zealand Grand Prix.

The Aussie utes will probably come back next season, given the success of this inaugural meeting and the enthusiasm of the Aussie teams.

And some of the utes are actually staying in New Zealand. The Falcons are not eligible for the Australian series this year, as Ford runners must move to the latest-model utes, so owners were offering them for sale at prices around the $25,000-$35,000 mark.

Some did sell, but at this stage it is not clear where the Kiwi owners will race them.