Darwin can expect the smell of burnt rubber when the V8 Ute Series arrives this weekend, and Electric Playground owner Wayne Wakefield will be happy to provide it.
Hidden Valley racecourse beckons the return of the Brisbane driver, who’s showing more passion for victory than ever before, after a bumpy performance coming out the recent Perth round.
“I’m looking forward to Darwin, it's a track I know well. That always helps ’cause you can have four cars in the same tenth of a second in qualifying, so you can lose like ten bridge positions in two-tenths of a second. And knowing a track is definitely an advantage when you're trying to find those last two-tenths.”
Wakefield was run off the track by competitor Kim Jane during the Perth meet, but the driver affectionately known as Wahoo says the incident occurred because of the similarity of both vehicles.
“It's just one of those things that happens when the cars are so evenly matched in performance, I mean they're totally identical running the same tyres and same suspension.”
After making a name for himself years ago with the V8 Supercars category, the club mogul decided to return to motorsport and ute racing to prove his ability behind the wheel was not lost.
“Switching to utes was probably the most economical thing that gets good television exposure, they get two live races televised at each meeting and then there's a one hour edited show the following week. It's only a fraction of the cost of V8 Supercars too.”
With Electric Playground having consumed his life for the last few years, Wayne’s confident he will be able to resume his role as one of the sport’s fiercest competitors.
“I've got unfinished business in the sport from when I had to step away from it to focus on the clubs, and now that they're pretty much functioning on their own it's given me enough headspace to go back and hopefully finish the job I was doing before I left. But none of this would be possible without the huge support of my sponsors: Versus Wheels, Bacardi Oakheart, Wiseman Lawyers, Bank of Queensland and Shot Energy.”
Highlights of Round 3 OF the V8 Ute Racing Series screen on Channel 7 June 22 at 1.30pm.
