Olholm On Top Early at Silver City


The Silver City 1000 kicked off tonight under lights with a short and sweet prologue at the Broken Hill Racecourse in extremely windy and dusty conditions. The 2.7km course incorporated many of the whoops and bumps created a few years ago for the Outback Extreme, giving the drivers something to test out their suspension, while a big long sweeper around the outside of the complex let them stretch the legs of their trucks before hitting the first of the Special Stages tomorrow morning. Each driver was given the opportunity to have two runs at the course, with the quickest time to count. However Reg Owen and Des Harrington were the only two to take up the offer, after Owen put his Patrol into a huge ditch on his first attempt after losing his way in the dust, while Harrington failed to finish his first lap with drivetrain issues. When the clocks stopped it was #10 Geoff Olholm and Gordon Trigg who were the quickest, pedalling their Dakar fresh Overdrive Hilux, which had been a show stopper at scrutiny this afternoon, around in 3min 05.41sec. The #18 V8 Patrol Ute of #18 Dunn & Edwards were the first to hit the track in anger and produced the second quickest time 3:12.40, with the #11 Short Wheel Base Pajero of Riley & Doble just over half a second behind with 3:12.94.