The Castrol Toyota Racing Series has created history and set new records across New Zealand’s leading race circuits.
A switch to Pirelli tyres shaved up to three seconds off race lap records at all five circuits; rising British racer Arvin Lindblad won feature races at four of the five circuits; Australian V8 Supercar racer Will Brown won the New Zealand Grand Prix and the championship was contested by the highest number of Red Bull-affiliated drivers ever.
By the time the 17-strong field gridded up for the 69th New Zealand Grand Prix at Highland Park, Arvin Lindblad had done all the Red Bull organisation asked of him: winning the championship and securing Superlicence points that open the door to F1. He is very clearly destined to follow New Zealand’s Liam Lawson into F1.
The sharp end of the Grand Prix weekend was an all-Australian affair. The high-pressure qualifying environment of Supercars qualifying brought out the best in ring-in Broc Feeney and Will Brown at Highland Park, Feeney taking a surprise pole position ahead of his Triple Eight team mate Brown. Third was another Aussie, Patrick Heuzenroeder.
With Australians 1-2-3 on the grid and Kiwi Zack Scoular fourth, the Grand Prix on Sunday 9 February promised an enthralling finale to the championship. Championship leader Arvid Lindblad could only qualify fifth for M2 Competition, with the team not matching the overall pace of both mtec Motorsport and Giles Motorsport.
Brown put his name in the record books with a fine victory, becoming the first Australian since Warwick Brown in 1975 to win the New Zealand Grand Prix, steering his Giles Motorsport Toyota FT60 to a two second victory ahead of the first Kiwi – and Rookie champion for the 2025 Castrol Toyota FR Oceania Championship – Zack Scoular.
Lindblad – carrying number one on his FT60 for the Grand Prix – fought through to third at the finish.
At the start it was Brown who made the best getaway and took the lead.
Feeney, in a one-off single seater appearance, got a bad start and ended up third behind Scoular, who also made a blinder of a start. Shawn Rashid for mtec Motorsport was fourth, while champion Lindblad was fifth over the first few corners of lap one.
Heuzenroeder – starting sixth after a three-place grid penalty for his involvement in the Race two incident in the morning – was sixth.
Brown said he had to battle from the start.
“I was nervous about the start and I knew if I could beat Broc away off the line I had a chance to get ahead and control the race. The first ten laps were really hard and I was quite stressed in the car trying not to make mistakes. I had a few loose moments and I had to calm down, breathe and get it back together. After that I pushed on and we started to set some really fast laps.”
Zack Scoular was always in Brown’s mirrors.
On the second lap, M2 Competition’s Enzo Yeh spun and returned to the track far too early, collecting James Lawley and putting both out. That brought out the Safety Car and it was lap six before the action resumed.
As racing restarted Brown and Scoular got the jump on Rashid. Further back Lindblad challenging Feeney. On lap seven Rashid went fastest, closing on his team-mate Scoular.
Lindblad tried to overtake Feeney mid-way through lap eight but there was no way round. Feeney in turn was attacking Rashid.
Heuzenroeder was forced to pit at the end of lap nine and retire with damage to his rear suspension after light contact with the wall. That elevated Michael Shin to sixth, Jett Bowling to seventh, Nikita Johnson to eighth, Matias Zagazeta to ninth and Kiwi Sebastian Manson into the top ten.
At half distance, Brown had stretched his lead over Scoular marginally.
Rashid was a further second back, with Feeney and Lindblad nose to tail a few car lengths behind him.
The race settled into a battle for the lead between Brown and Scoular and a battle for third between Rashid, Feeney and Lindblad.
On lap 15 Feeney made it past Rashid; Lindblad was quickly on Rashid’s tail and when Feeney made a big mistake at the forest hairpin, it allowed both Rashid and Lindblad by. Worse still for Feeney, Michael Shin also found a way past. Further back Zagazeta was forced into the pits with a drive through penalty for exceeding track limits, dropping out of the top ten and to the back of the field, a disappointing end to a season that promised so much.
Brown remained in control at the front even though it was Lindblad who was the man on the move as the race entered its final ten laps. He passed Rashid on lap 17 and that put him up to third, five seconds down on Scoular.
With seven laps to go Brown stretched his lead to 1.3 seconds.
The gap between the top two reduced on lap 23 and as they sped into lap 24 – with three to go – it was down to a second. Brown responded with his fastest lap of the race on lap 24.
He took the flag to become the eighth Australian to win New Zealand’s biggest single seater race.
