Hamilton wins V8 street race
16 February 2006
By MARY ANNE GILL and MATTHEW TORBIT
Wellington's loss is Hamilton's gain, with the city tipped to host New Zealand's only V8 Supercar street race.
Hamilton City Council is expected to announce today that it has paid $7 million to secure New Zealand's biggest annual sports event from April 2008, ahead of Wellington and Auckland, which bowed out of the race to host the fixture last year.
The race will also come at the expense of Pukekohe, which has hosted the New Zealand leg of the series since 2001.
It is estimated it will attract more than 200,000 visitors to Hamilton and pump more than $150 million into the city's economy over seven years.
V8 Supercars New Zealand promoters, Capital Streetrace Management, refused to confirm the venue shake-up, but engineers were expected in Hamilton today to inspect the roads and put a works programme in place.
Wellington Mayor Kerry Prendergast said she admired Hamilton for deciding to host the event, as there were risks in the city obtaining resource consent. "I congratulate them on their gutsy decision and I wish them all the luck," she said.
Last April, Wellington City Council, citing resource consent problems, abandoned its bid to stage the race this year.
However, in July, the city put its hand up to host the event from 2008.
Race organiser Avesco spokesman Cole Hitchcock said he was excited to hear that a New Zealand venue was close to being announced.
Auckland had "missed out on a golden opportunity (to host the event) because of draconian resource consent laws", he said.
V8 Supercar Australia was on the brink of stopping the New Zealand race altogether last year tilltill Capital Streetrace Management agreed to pay the cost of air freighting the 32 racing teams to Auckland to keep the race at Pukekohe for two years.
However, the Australians made it clear they wanted to secure a seven-year deal for the race.
Frontrunners initially were Wellington and Auckland but resource consent issues hamstrung their bids.
Negotiations to stage the race in Hamilton began in the middle of last year.
Information obtained from Stuff.co.nz
My apologies if this has been posted previously but I haven't heard about Hamilton putting in a bid for the race after Auckland and Wellingtong turned it away.
I for one will be VERY happy if they get the deal!!
Not sure whether I'd want to go though, last time I saw the v8s it was boring a f*ck.
