QCSC had a relatively short season in 2022/23, with several meetings washed out. However, the drivers put on good shows when we did race and there was also the Qld Title and Australian Title hosted in Qld this season too. The title weekends aren’t included in Club Championship points.
Below is the final points standings in the RJR Kitchens Club Championship.
1. Andrew Parkes 683
2. Matt O'Neill 538
3. Richard Treanor 494 (B)
4. David Collins 339
5. Mitchell Rooke 328
6. Luke Williams 312 (B)
7. Trent Usher 294
8. Bodie Smith 280
9. Jeremy Ennever 275 (B)
10. Harry Stewart 238
11. Andrew Rooke 229 (B)
12. Brock Byrne 195 (B)
13. Chris Serle-thrussell 144
14 Ron Williams 120 (B)
15. Arren Heeley 119 (B)
16. Dion Wilson 117 (B)
17. Shaun Robinson 85
18. Robert Stewart 69
19. Gavin McDowell 55 (B)
20. Mick Hunter 45 (B)
21. Richard Rooke 29 (B)
22. Byron Schmoll 5 (B)
23. Garry Thorne 0 (B)
24. Steve Smith 0 (B)
Winning the RJR Kitchens QCSC Championship is the pinnacle of the season for all of the teams. The John McFarlane Memorial Trophy is the perpetual trophy and the biggest reward for the teams who travel all around South East Queensland and into Northern NSW over the season. As a driver and team, you can win races, but to get this trophy, you also need to be consistent throughout the whole year. This year’s winner, Andrew Parkes has had a fantastic season. He not only won the Qld title, but was also winning or on the podium regularly. Parkes was 2nd in the championship last year and it’s a well deserved result in winning this year. 2nd place in the RJR Kitchens Championship, Matt O’Neill also had a fantastic season. Matt won it last year and some would say he’d had an even better season this year, but he was just short of going back to back with the championship. 3rd place in the overall championship, Richard Treanor is also the winner of the Mike Vine Trophy. Well done to all of the trophy recipients. They are popular winners and have proven to be great ambassadors for the club when travelling to interstate titles.
It’s a fact that drivers have a different outlook on life and tend to be extremely self centred when it comes to putting on the helmet. You have to be like that to win races, but that’s not to say you aren’t respectful of other cars and drivers while you’re trying to win. It’s definitely a fine line, but those who tread it well become widely respected in the pits. This year’s Driver’s Driver, Andrew Parkes, is one who has learned to do it well while having his best season to date. He’s won some big races this season and stayed out of any controversy by just going about his racing with minimal fuss. It’s definitely a fitting honour for him to have been awarded this by his peers.
Every driver heads into the season with one goal in mind……win a race! Once you get a win or podium place, you strive for the next and the next. Before you know it, you’ve reached the end of the season and most, if not all gauge their success through that season by how many “W”s they have. While the win is important, you also need to bank club points throughout the year to be in the running for perpetual trophies that cement you into the club’s history. The first one of these awarded on Saturday night was the Mike Vine “B” Grade Championship. This year’s winner was Richard Treanor. While the feature wins weren’t quite there, Richard was on the podium or thereabouts in just about every meeting and was also 3rd in the Qld title and inside the top 10 at the Australian title. That’s a great season in anyone’s books and the reward of taking home the B Grade championship adds to it. This year’s runner up in “B” grade is, young Luke Williams. As mentioned in the earlier post, he’s been knocking on the door for his maiden feature win in the second half of this season, and had a fantastic Australian title run with a 6th place finish. 3rd place in “B” grade goes to Rookie of the Year, Jeremy Ennever. He’s also had a great first season and was top 15 at the Australian title. All 3 of our trophy winners for the Mike Vine Trophy were also in the top 10 overall points for the club championship. Congratulations to them all.
It’s important for clubs to remember key events in their history, whether they be good or bad. QCSC remembers one of their own, Paul Messer, who travelled to attend a title and was tragically taken due to an incident on track. Many of the drivers racing today weren’t in the club, as the incident occurred 20 years ago, but the importance of the event isn’t lost on any of them. This memorial meeting holds an important place in the calendar and it was fantastic that some of Paul’s family were able to attend and come and meet many of the current drivers after the race. The 2022/23 winner, Matt O’Neill is back to back winner of this event and it added to his wins of blue ribbon events for the season. Runner up was Richard Treanor, who also had a stellar season. In one of his only appearances in the Compact, Robert Stewart showed that he hasn’t lost any speed by rounding out the podium.
Every club needs a core group of people that do all of the important, background work that helps it function. QCSC has had a stable group doing this work for the last several seasons and we’re starting to see the fruits of this work present positives for the growth of the class in Queensland. This year’s “Club Person of the Year”, Nick Gannon, is the club’s treasurer and been on the committee in different capacities for the last 7 years, has been one of the Qld reps on the Australian Compact Speedcar Association for the last several years, and also does all of the club’s social media (Facebook and Instagram) promotions and graphics.
Everyone’s racing journey starts in a similar way, and one of the early rewards in that journey is to be crowned as top of the class. This year’s “Rookie of the Year”, Jeremy Ennever, has not only managed to attend every meeting for the year, but he also finished 3rd in the “B” grade championship and 9th overall. When he gets a chance to look back on the first season, he’ll be able to recognise what an achievement that really is.
Every season there is someone, who’s usually fairly new to racing Compacts and has “jumped in boots and all” from a totally unrelated racing area, or just a different background to your usual open wheel racer. It’s tricky to explain just how different Compacts are to drive than many other forms of motorsport and if you’ve started in them without any prior racing experience, you are going to skip the unenviable task of trying to forget most of the disciplines that worked in your previous division. Hence, the Encouragement Award. This year’s recipient has plenty of experience in racing sedans on bitumen and other than knowing how to put his helmet on, all of the rest of his race knowledge is useless to him. To his credit, Arren Heeley has stuck to the task and has managed to stop doing what comes naturally in a race car and learn a totally new set of skills that will help him master his compact.
The Best Presented Car Award is becoming a really difficult award to choose a winner each year. The standard of maintenance and care put into most of the cars would put some professional motorsport divisions to shame. It’s not just the shiny, colourful signage and wraps that are on the cars either. The level of detail that a lot of cars go to when fitting electrical components, the panels, the working suspension, the wheels and tyres is meticulous. All of this worked, combined, adds speed as well as reliability to the cars. This year’s winner, Dion Wilson, and his team, have always arrived at the race track with a car, that not only looks good on the outside, but has all of the above details under the panels that give them the best chance of having a successful night of racing. Well done to the team that works on #Q98.
Since starting with QCSC part of the way through last season, Luke Williams has tested the limits of himself and the car. It’s great to see a young driver with the confidence to do that, especially when you consider the limited seat time that he’s had. Every time that he has crossed the limits, he has learned from them and adjust to reduce the possibility of repeating the same mistake. I know it’s a saying that is probably over used, but Luke has been like a sponge when it comes to taking advice and listening to the experiences of drivers who have been around for longer, and he’s but that extra knowledge into practice. With only a dozen or so complete race meetings under his belt, Williams is close to cracking that maiden win and was only one position short of capturing it in the last race meeting of this season. For all of those reasons, Luke Williams is a worthy winner of the Most Improved award for 2022/23.
The last “Away Series” (for the foreseeable future) was a little bit of a stop start affair throughout the season with rain affecting early rounds. Despite the interruptions, Andrew Parkes would prove his versatility on the different track and emerge as the winner by out pointing Bodie Smith, 2nd and Matt O’Neill in 3rd.
