Sport
10 July, 2023
Davis sprints to title glory
WHAT was described as the “Show of the Decade”, the two night Prosprints Queensland Title saw drivers from all around the country make the trek to Mareeba Speedway over the weekend.
WHAT was described as the “Show of the Decade”, the two night Prosprints Queensland Title saw drivers from all around the country make the trek to Mareeba Speedway over the weekend.
The action-packed weekend saw two titles be crowned – the North Queensland Super Street Sedan Title and The Pinnacle 2023 Pro-Sprintcar Queensland Title – which brought out a near packed house to the Mareeba Speedway.
Formula 500’s were also out in force as a support class for the title events which saw Ash Ewing in the NQ99 take home the feature race win on Night 1 and young gun out of Cairns Brodie Duncan in the NQ48 wrap up Night 2.
The 2023 North Queensland Super Street Sedan Title “wowed” the crowd as Jay Naylor NQ18 dominate all three heat races, giving him a front row start in the Feature.
Naylor led the entire race before spinning on the last corner of the last lap, allowing Andrew McCeath NQ87 to catch up right onto the rear bumper of Naylor with only one straight away remaining.
It was a drag race across the finishing getting the crowd onto their feet and it was ultimately Jay Naylor taking home the North Queensland Title.
After passing the checkered flag at full speed, Naylor lost control of the NQ18 seeing him spin onto the infield and rolling his VL Commodore onto its roof.
The headline event of the weekend was the 2023 ProSprintcar Title which was contested by some of Australia’s best including Domain Ramsay out of Victoria and the ex-Australian Champion Ryan Farrell from Western Australia.
The action kicked off on Friday evening with Qualifying which saw Mareeba’s young gun Brodie Davis top the grid only being just over a tenth of a second of the lap record time.
Davis would then go onto win Night 1 of the Queensland Title which included a preliminary feature final.
Onto Saturday night the game faces were on in every car. The intensity around the pits including crews and drivers was something the small country town speedway had never seen according to speedway president Scott Davis.
“The heat races flew through and were won by Brodie Davis, Wes Jenkins, Kinser Claridge and Cameron King leaving us only with a feature race left to decide the 2023 Queensland Title,” he said.
The action packed 30-lap feature race saw “thrills and spills” with a big wreck from two-time NQ Champ Brian Walsh while running second.
With 18 laps remaining after Walsh’s crash, no one had yet to challenge race leader Brodie Davis until halfway through the main where Victorian Domain Ramsay would clinch onto the back of Davis while in heavy lapped traffic.
It wasn’t long before we saw two caution flags and Davis was lights out on the restarts, leaving the field behind and claiming the biggest win of the 19-yearold’s racing career, the 2023 Pro-Sprintcar Queensland Title.
