Vos and Pitchford win Sun City 400 in class SP Nissan Navara

Vos and Pitchford win Sun City 400 and extend championship lead
Wednesday, July 29, 2009 Posted by: Matt

North West Province, July 25 – Reigning champion Duncan Vos and co-driver Ralph Pitchford won the Sun City 400 in North West Province on Saturday when they brought their class SP Nissan Navara home.

It was the pair’s fourth victory in the first five rounds of this year’s South Africa Off Road Championship (SAOC) and extends their championship lead to 60 points over South Africa Nissan team-mates Ivar Erik Tollefsen and Quin Evans with three rounds remaining. The win also extends Nissan’s winning streak to 11 since the Eastern Cape 400 in April last year.

Nissan scored a clean sweep of the three production vehicle classes, with privateers Coetzee Labuscagne and Johan Gerber taking the class D honors in their Nissan Hardbody and Leeroy Poulter and Rob Howie earning an impressive debut class E win in their South Africa Nissan Motorsport-prepared Nissan Hardbody.

Vos and Pitchford showed their class once again with another come from behind performance. They started Saturday’s race in seventh place among the production vehicles after a disappointing prologue, but reached the halfway compulsory service stop in the lead.

“We struggled in the dust in the early stages and were slowed with a puncture,” said Vos. “But we pushed hard and took advantage of the fact that many of our rivals ran into problems. Apart from another puncture early in the second loop, we had a clean run throughout the rest of the race.”Contact Info: Matt