The 2014 Bridgestone Production Cars Season was one to remember for the Williams Hunt Chevrolet Race team and Michael Van Rooyen who ďŹ nished 3rd in the Championship behind Gary Formato and Greame Nathan.
Qualy was a very close affair and Van Rooyen just missed out on pole. Race 1 was still dry conditions and Van Rooyen slotted in behind Nathan and stayed in 2nd until the flag. Race 2 was extremely wet with a huge down pour just before the start of the race. Starting from the back Van Rooyen quickly made his way through the field, but with contact in turn 3 saw a high speed spin by Van Rooyen rejoining last, but fought his way back to 3rd, unfortunately the race ended just as Van Rooyen caught the leaders. Getting 1 point for fastest lap as well.
Qualifying – 2nd Race 1 - 2nd Race 2 – 3rd
Coming into Round 2 Van Rooyen was lying 2nd in the championship, behind Nathan. Van Rooyen qualified 2nd, only 25 thousands of a second behind the Mini of Thompson. Race 1 Van Rooyen was fighting for the lead with Thompson when Nathan tried a do or die manoevre on the last lap and drove Van Rooyen off the circuit who ended up in 3rd. Race 2 saw Van Rooyen and Nathan struggling to pass a very wide Duminy. Van Rooyen managed to finished 3rd behind Thompson and Smalberger. Van Rooyen still lying 2nd in the championship, heads to aldo scribante in the eastern cape.
Qualifying – 2nd Race 1 - 3rd Race 2 – 3rd
On Thursday van Rooyen joined Guy Mcdonald live on air on Good Hope FM to chat about the super series taking place at Killarney. Guy Mcdonald was also treated with a ride in the passsenger seat next to Van Rooyen on a hot lap around the Killarney circuit, with video cameras capturing all the excitement, Guy’s expressions in and outside of the car was a huge hit on facebook and twitter.
Van Rooyen appeared on the front pages of both Beeld and Die Burger newspapers
Race 1 led from early until the last corner of the last lap. Class A had huge accident just in front of me and spilled oil on the circuit and I went wide and lost 3 positions. Race 2 had to come from 2nd last and fought through the field to finish 4th
Qualifying – 2nd Race 1 - 4th Race 2 – 4th
Independence day car matching the occasion
After qualifying on pole, Van Rooyen had a huge accident with Groenewald's Audi on lap 1, when Groenwald spun in turn 2. This corner is taken flat out and at a speed of over 230km/h. After a huge effort by the team Van Rooyen's car was repaired and ready for race 2. Coming from the back of the field and with a car lacking balance, Van Rooyen still sliced through the field up to 2nd place. Nathan rolled his car with 1 lap to go which brought out and the red flag. This meant the results were taken 1 lap back when Van Rooyen was still in 3rd place. Unfortunately for Van Rooyen's championship, Nathan still won the race although his car was on its roof!!
Qualifying – 1st Race 1 - DNF Race 2 – 3rd
Yet another frontpage in The Citizen newspaper
Going into the weekend lying a close second in the championship.
The chevrolet team with the winners of the foozeball competition
Unfortunately the team could not figure out why the car was more than a second off the pace in phakisa, and only when testing at zwartkops again the team realised it was an abs pump issue. This cost the team a lot of points and were now about 20 points behind nathan in the championship.
Qualifying – 3rd Race 1 - 7th Race 2 – 5th
To catch Nathan we had to finish in front of Nathan in both races, but unfortunately we never had the pace of the golf and finished behind Nathan and Formato in both races, falling down to 3rd in the championship.
Articles in magazines
Qualifying – 2nd Race 1 - 3rd Race 2 – 3rd
Drawings from fans
Van Rooyen qualified a close second behind Nathan, and were in good spirits for the weekend, as a good result looked very possible. In race 1 lap 1 turn 1 however fortunes changed as Van Rooyen was hit into a spin by Smalberger and then hit by the unlucky Thompson The team frantically repaired the car for race 2. Starting from 3rd last, Van Rooyen went up to second but on lap 3 damage from the earlier incident meant that Van Rooyen had to retire from the race.
Qualifying – 2nd Race 1 - DNF Race 2 – DNF
A young fan who framed an action photo for the team.
All the cars were very closely matched during the weekend, but Van Rooyen put in a great lap on Saturday morning to secure pole position for race 1 In race 1 nathan jumped the start but Van Rooyen got the lead back on lap 3 and held it to the flag, with Formato following very closely in second. Race 2 was again reverse grid, Van Rooyen was stuck behind Nathan and Duminy till lap 4 and when he eventually passed both Smalberger and Formato had dissapeared in the distance, Van Rooyen eventually finished in 3rd.
Qualifying – 1st Race 1 - 1st Race 2 – 3rd
"I would like to take this opportunity to thank each and every sponsor, without your contributions and assistance this race team would not exist. Its been 5 wonderful years with ups and downs, some great achievements and some dissapointments! I know that we have become better every year in every aspect of the team, and we strive not only to win the championship but to be great ambassadors to our sponsors! You all deserve a production car championship title, and hopefully 2015 will be the one!" Michael Van Rooyen