The Citizen finishes Toyota GR Cup season on a high at Zwartkops

It’s quite a sobering reality that after eight months of being an official factory racing driver, you become a former racing driver overnight.

It was with huge smiles but heavy hearts that the six media drivers got out of their GR Corollas for a photo op in front of the Toyota Gazoo Racing racing headquarters at Zwartkops Raceway on Saturday. Seven rounds of the GR Cup Media Challenge had come and gone in an instant.

In the process, Toyota afforded us the rare privilege to compete in 14 races at Kyalami, Killarney, Port Elizabeth, East London and Zwartkops. We racked up almost 12 hours of seat time and made memories that will last a lifetime.

Nurse GR Cup champ by a landslide

Sean Nurse (AutoTrader), who had wrapped up the championship during the previous round at Killarney already, completed his sixth double of the season to finish on a staggering 91 points. Overheating issues on the day for both Alex Shahini (Carmag) and Hannes Visser (La’t Wiel), who had already ensured their spot on the title race podium before the final round, meant Nurse’s lead on paper was as big as it was on track.

Our beloved Biltong Italian and the TV man only earned one point apiece which saw Shahini finish on 54 points and Visser on 40.

A solid day by The Citizen Motoring saw us holding off Kumbi Mtshakazi (Kumbi-M on Cars) to finish fourth in the GR Cup championship on 36 points, three ahead of Mtshakazi (33). His improvement during the season was very impressive. I’m super happy for the way he chased me down towards the end of the season, making sure the fight goes down to the wire.

Two great races at Zwartkops weren’t enough for Bernie Hellberg (Driven) to improve on his sixth position. But at least he could bow out on a high with 25 points behind his name.

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Losing it on the final corner

After showing good pace in hot and difficult track conditions on Friday, I was quite miffed to stuff up my best lap during qualifying on Saturday morning. Quite ironically, after coming out wide out of turn eight and running on the grass alongside the main straight, the lap was still my best during quali. But, what should have been third on the GR Cup Media Challenge grid for the first race, barring the mishap, turned into fifth with the only positive to take out of it starting ahead of Mtshakazi.

I managed to stay ahead of my rival at the start and increased the gap ever so slightly as the laps went by. I gained on Hellberg, but he held his nerve in searing hot temperature for what turned into third place – 1.2 seconds ahead of me over the line – after Shanini and Visser’s challenge saw them fade down the field.

Nurse and Toyota GR boss Riaan Esterhuysen were in a league of their own out front, with the latter keeping our champion-elect honest.

ALSO READ: The Citizen ready to burn rubber in the Toyota GR Cup again

I felt vindicated by setting the third fastest lap during race one, which meant I could start race two in the position I so badly craved in the morning before going farming. I managed to hold onto third place behind Nurse and Esterhuysen – albeit by some distance and with a lot of dealer-piloted GR Yarises in between.

Visser loomed large in my rearview mirror initially, but had to abort his challenge due to his Toyota GR Corolla going into limp mode.

Some lows, many highs

Hellberg finished just under two seconds behind me, which meant I edged him for third place on the day by less than a second.

It wasn’t the door-to-door fight I was anticipating against Mtshakazi, but it was a thrilling day’s racing nonetheless. Finishing on the podium was a special way to end the GR Cup season after I started my quasi racing career tail between the legs in the Clerk of the Course‘s office at Killarney. The man was not impressed with me for keeping a car with a flat wheel on the track.

But that incident now dwarfs against some of the other low points we encountered. Let’s put it this way, there was a lot more scolding to follow. Lots of panel work and three rebuilt cars were not part of the original script.

So parking the GR Corollas all in one piece in front of these bosses at the GR HQ was therefore quite important for the racing drivers. Sorry, former racing drivers.