Reporter: While Formula Virtual’s teams are preparing for their 2 month American flyaway to conclude the 2022 season, back in New Zealand one of the three debuting teams for the 2023 season is already hard at work getting ready for next year. Toyota Kōwhai Racing have just moved into their brand new 25,000m2 factory in Palmerston North, but the team is already flat out designing and building their 2023 car. Interim team principal David Nesbitt spoke to us briefly today, giving NZ motorsport fans a teaser of what’s to come from the country’s premier racing team.
Q: How are the preparations for next season going? A: It’s all going well, we’d like to thank Toyota for helping us to build this new factory, obviously just down the road is Toyota’s NZ base so the engines won’t have to travel too far. Things are looking good for 2023 at the moment, obviously we know our first priority is to just qualify for a race and even that won’t be easy but we are looking to hit the ground running and we don’t see why we can’t do just that with the car we are designing. Q: There have been rumours going around about who you might sign for next season, SRT and Maserati both already have announced their driver lineups and both look quite strong. Are you worried that you might lose out on the good drivers? A: Not at all, we’ve been having talks with plenty of good drivers, some who are race winners and champions. We believe we can have a competitive driver lineup next year and we aren’t too worried about what other teams have been announcing. Q: Lastly David, can you give your fans an indication of when we might see some news from your team. A: Well once the 2022 season has wrapped up we’ll be looking to finalise our plans for next season and we are hoping to be ready to announce drivers around then. After that we are looking to have our car on the race track in January for some shakedown runs at Manfeild, followed by pre-season testing over in Europe. As well as that we do still have our junior team based at our old factory in Drury and they will also be announcing their plans for 2023 in due course. Reporter: So there you have it, not a lot of concrete details given to us by David Nesbitt who’s probably waiting for his boss to get back from Australia before making any big announcements. But he did let slip that Kōwhai are in talks to sign some championship winning drivers, something that will reassure all of us here who have seen the likes of Jean Mattson and Will Hoskins joining the Q1 battle in 2023. And of course any motorsport fans in the Manawatū will be thrilled that they could get their own taste of Formula Virtual early next year when Kōwhai Racing’s first FV car hits the track in Feilding. Stay tuned for more, after sport it’s the weather with Angus.
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