The 1995 street race in Wellington, New Zealand, is now unlikely to take
place. Organisers failed to secure enough entries for the feature races
for the Australian 5-litre V8 touring cars, and sponsor Mobil has
withdrawn as a consequence.

The Wellington race has been going since the mid-80s, initially as a Group
A event run over four hours. In 1987 it was a round of the world touring
car championship.

Last year Wellington switched to 2-litre supertouring cars, as a round of
the Asia-Pacific championship, but had a disappointingly small field. This
year the Asia-Pacific championship was cancelled because of poor entries,
whereupon Mobil and organising company Promo Marketing  decided to try the
Aussie V8s. Peter Brock came to Wellington to announce the decision, and
he and fellow Holden Racing Team member Tomas Mezera were the first
announced enntries.

In the end they were still the only two definite entries, although Tony
Longhurst was probably going to come too. Other teams were hindered by a
shortage of Dunlop racing tyres, and by the inclusion of a new event on
the Australian calendar, the Peter Brock Classic, a week before
Wellington.

The Motorsport Association of NZ is now seeing whether it can take over
the meeting from Promo -- which is now right out of the picture -- and
save it by switching back to the 2-litre cars, with most of the field to
come from Australia.

However the new Wellington Mayor, Mark Blumsky, says the most likely
outcome is that there will be no 1995 meeting, but he hopes the event will
be revived next year.

-- 
Bernard Carpinter

Four wheels good, two wheels better