Dan Golding Racing teammates Dan Harding and Kaiden Manders ran 1-2 on the opening night of the Mobil 1 Australian Speedcar Championship at the Perth Motorplex.
Harding would win both of his heat races to be the high points man after the preliminaries concluded. That set him up for a pole position start in the odds feature race. On the other hand, Manders’ win and a second-place result was enough to put him third in points, which allowed him to start alongside Harding in the odds feature.
Harding Goes From Front Row To Victory Lane
As the first preliminary race went green, Harding and Manders hit the line together. The duo was side by side until Manders was able to grab the lead while Harding came under pressure from Cody Nash.
Just as Nash dove to get past Harding, he suddenly slowed, forcing cars to turn hard to avoid him. Luckily everyone was able to avoid contact as he headed to the infield.
American visitor Jade Avedisian made the most of this and raced into third, with Nicholas Rowe chasing her.
Behind them, Michael Pickens was working to fight his way through the field after an earlier DNF in a heat race saw him drop down the starting order. He would engage in an epic battle with Alfonso Guadagnino, while up front, Manders, Harding and Avedisian would remain top three.
With three laps to go, Rob Golding would spin in turn two to bring out the caution.
Manders again broke away as the race resumed, but Avedisian was able to put the pressure on Harding, grabbing second with two laps to go. Harding fought back and retook the position, but Avedisian was too good, blasting back by and taking the position.
Meanwhile, Manders went on to win by just over one and a half seconds.
Payet Tops Second Prelim
The second preliminary feature saw Magic Man winner Logan Seavey and Tom Payet sharing the front row.
Payet would get the best of the initial start but Seavey glued himself to the bottom and raced into the lead, while Justin Grant was immediately into third after starting in position six.
He was followed by Alex Bright and Kaidon Brown, but the lead duo would pull away, with Seavey initially building up a lead before Payet began to peg it back over the next 10 laps or so.
Lapped traffic would allow Payet to close even more.
Coming to the final lap, Payet went for a hail Mary move. Seavey backed out of it to avoid contact, but it was enough to Payet to race away from Seavey and take the win in the dying stages.
Current Point Standings
Harding leads the points ahead of Manders while Seavey is just half a point further back in third.
Payet and Avedisian round out the top five.