Christchurch’s St Thomas of Canterbury College and Dunedin’s Balmacewen Intermediate have joined KartSport New Zealand’s National Schools’ Championship honours board after student success at this year’s Automec Air-sponsored event in Dunedin over the weekend.

Schools from Invercargill in the south to Auckland in the north were represented at the 13th annual National Schools’ event, hosted this year by Otago club KartSport Dunedin at its Silverstream Raceway near Mosgiel.

Just over 60 students from over 40 schools contested the event in cool, dry conditions and convenor Neil Shearer says he is ‘very happy’ with the way everything panned out.

In the days leading up to the event the surrounding area was blanketed in snow, but the weather had cleared by the weekend.

“We had issues with frost at the top end of the track which made driving conditions challenging, particularly early in the day, ” says Shearer, “but with everyone’s understanding and cooperation we worked it out.”

Five class titles were up for grabs at the meeting with the winners spearheaded by Wellington driver Ryan Wood, 11, who successfully defended his 2014 title in the Vortex Mini ROK class.

Wood was the class of the big Vortex Mini ROK field, winning three of the five heat races. Second overall was local driver Alex Patrick who won one of the other heat races, and William Exton from Blenheim was third.

It was a big win for Wood in more ways than one; with it he has earned free entry and the use of a kart and engine at the ROK Cup International Final event in Italy in October.

South Island class title holder Ayden Polaschek, 16, was the other class winner on Saturday, finishing one point ahead of fellow Christchurch driver Lewis Ball in the Formula Junior class.

Both claimed a pair of heat wins apiece but Polaschek also had two second place finishes compared to a second and a third for Ball.

Polaschek and Ball also contested Junior 100cc Yamaha on Sunday but the results of that class remain unconfirmed due to a pending appeal.

In the other classes, Mason Porter, 9, won a three-way battle against fellow Aucklander Liam Sceats and Christchurch young gun Louis Sharp to take Cadet ROK honours, while another Auckland driver, James Blair, 16, won the 125cc Rotax Max class title by the narrowest of margins from Christchurch ace Ryan Yardley with the other heat winner, Kieran Woods, also from Christchurch, third.