After finishing fifth outright in the Dunlop Targa New Zealand in 2008, Tony Quinn has campaigned the VIP Petfoods Nissan GT-R across the pond in Australia to much success.

Second place in the Targa Wrest Point and first place in Rally Tasmania in February 09. First in Targa Tasmania 2009 in April and second in the Quit Targa West in August. It’s easy to see that Tony is going places in the GT-R.

The Dunlop Targa NZ kicked off today and at the end of the first day Tony is leading the pack in the GT-R making a determined effort to improve over last year.

The Targa NZ runs for 6 days, finally wrapping up on the 31st of this month. Good luck to Tony and the VIP Petfoods GT-R team.

リンク: Targa NZ ウェブサイト

モータースポーツ gt-r, gtr, nissan, quinn, r35, targa new zealand, targa nz, tarmac rally

An amazing result for the Nissan GT-R camp as Steve Jones and Ruari Souter-Dawson take the outright win for the 2009 Quit Targa West held over the weekend in Western Australia. Jones took the lead over rival Nissan GT-R pilot Tony Quinn during Leg 2 of racing and maintained it for the entire third day of racing. Quinn ended up finishing in second place overall for the event but was then excluded from the final results in post race inspection due to an exhaust “irregularity”.

Steve Jones was the youngest winner ever for the Quit Targa West in 2008 so to pull off back to back wins is a damn good effort. Congrats to the team!

In the Modern Challenge class, the GT-R also came away victorious as brothers Mark and Andrew Conacher beat out their next fastest competitor by over 3 and a half minutes.

Great work to all involved and again a great highlight that the GT-R is now the force to be reckoned with in the tarmac rally world.

リンク: Quit Targa West ウェブサイト
画像: Travis Barnes

Uncategorized gt-r, gtr, jones, nissan, quinn, targa west, tarmac rally

In some truly abysmal weather for tarmac rallying, Steve Jones has managed to not only make up the 13 seconds he trailed competing Nissan GT-R driver Tony Quinn, but also put another 22 seconds on top by the end of day two’s racing.

Coming around some corners there were what seemed like rivers of water across the road and you had to concentrate just to keep the car on the road. It’s difficult but I’m having so much fun out there it’s just awesome.”

Steve Jones

Tony Quinn is still in second place however and leaves almost a full minute behind to third place Dean Herridge in a Subaru STi.

In the Modern Challenge class, the Nissan GT-R of Mark and Andrew Conacher leads by 1:19 to the nearest competitor. So each Nissan GT-R entered is in a top spot after day two.

リンク: Quit Targa West ウェブサイト
リンク: Quit Targa West Live Updates
画像: Circlework

モータースポーツ gtr, jones, nissan, quinn, targa west, tarmac rally

After an exciting prologue event on Thursday, Steve Jones in his R35 Nissan GT-R got off to a great start in for Friday’s first competitive stage of the Quit Targa West 2009 in Western Australia. The prologue event consisted of two laps of the 3.4 km stage with Jones managing the best time in the LF Performance Nissan GT-R. Not far behind him in third place was Tony Quinn campaigning his VIP Petfoods Nissan GT-R entry.

Steve Jones is not a newcomer to the Quit Targa West, in fact he won outright in 2008 in the same Nissan GT-R so expectations are high for a solid performance.

Due to the reverse start order system this meant that Steve was last to start the first of seven stages for Leg 1 on Friday. After the third leg it looked like Jones was right on track to take a back to back win but in SS4 Tony Quinn in his GT-R was to snatch the lead and continue on to put 13 seconds distance between himself and Jones by the end of the day.

So the leadership goes from GT-R to GT-R at the end of Leg 1 on Friday. Reports of rain for Leg 2 on Saturday look like the GT-R’s AWD system might give the leaders an advantage indeed.

We’ll keep you updated but live results and updates can be found at the Quit Targa West website below.

リンク: Quit Targa West ウェブサイト
リンク: Quit Targa West Live Updates
画像: Circlework and Travis Barnes

モータースポーツ gt-r, gtr, jones, nissan, quinn, r35, targa west, tarmac rally, vip petfoods

In a dramatic conclusion to a nail biting Targa this year, Tony Quinn has finished in front by six minutes over nearest rivals Jason White in their Lamborghini Gallardo Superleggera and Jamie Vandenberg in their Evo 9. Kevin Weeks who was battling valiantly with the GT-R in his Lamborghini in second place had a serious accident on TS36. Kevin was airlifted to hospital with co-driver Bec Crunkhorn, injuries were reported thankfully to be non-life threatening. We wish them the very best.

In the morning stages Tony was pushing the GT-R to show why it is the wet weather favourite taking 11 seconds of Week’s day 4 lead to get in front.

Later in the day Jason White reported a brake issue in their Lamborghini and had to back off the pace to get the car over the line.

This victory is Tony Quinn’s first from 11 Targa Tasmania events and one he truly deserves.

“Our strategy was always to keep up with the others and if we got the wet weather over the last day or two, just to have a lunge for it.

“I’ve always been bridesmaid to Jim (Richards) or the Whites or somebody else, and we’re very pleased to finally win it. It hasn’t sunk in yet and it feels like it’s been the toughest and most competitive week there’s every been in Targa.

“The top five or six guys have just been going hard at it. The proof in that is that Jimmy (Richards), for the first time ever, had a crash.”

- Tony Quinn

The win for the Nissan further establishes it in the world of tarmac rallying. As it chalks up wins over established favourites such as the Evo, Lamborghini, and Porsche I can see it becoming a weapon of choice for more teams.

Targa Tasmania 2009 press release after the jump and stay tuned for our photo update soon…

リンク: Targa Tasmania 2009 ウェブサイト – Results
リンク: Targa Tasmania – News ウェブサイト
Photos: Joel Strickland (C) Joel Strickland Photographics

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Targa Tasmania（オーストラリア）, モータースポーツ gt-r, gtr, nissan, quinn, r35, targa tasmania, tarmac rally