By: Mpho Mahlangu
Knysna – Suzuki Auto South Africa is no stranger to the prestigious Simola Hillclimb event, and at this year’s edition of the annual racing event, the team performed exceptionally well.
Three vehicles were entered by the Japanese carmaker: one six-speed manual Swift Sport driven by Sudhir Matai (managing editor of Double Apex), who has motorsport experience, along with professional driver Wesley Greybe and motoring writer and rookie driver Kumbi Mtshakazi who were both behind the wheel of Swift Sports paired with six-speed automatic transmissions.
The pocket rocket Swift Sport is powered by a 1.4-litre turbocharged engine which produces 103kW and 230Nm and the car weighs only 970kg, making it a great lightweight package to take on the hill.
Day one began with the trio of Swift Sport models tackling their first practise session of the weekend, which went well for the team. The practise sessions which followed saw the drivers all improving on their previous times which was encouraging for team Suzuki.
The practise session times for the team Suzuki drivers ended as follows:
As the most experienced driver of the trio, Greybe served as mentor to the drivers and would discuss the runs of Mtshakazi and Matai after each session and give pointers where necessary, while still critiquing his own runs by re-watching them multiple times to find where he could improve.
With the practise sessions done and dusted, the qualifying sessions were up next. The drivers had a better feel of the track and its conditions and were ready to make the qualifying sessions count. Greybe’s mentorship bore fruit as the times set by team Suzuki improved over the practise session runs, with each driver shaving off more precious time.
“At the start of the weekend, I thought I would challenge our drivers to match last year’s impressive times. Now, with the Sunday racing ahead of us, I have decided that we can do even better. So, I have thrown down the gauntlet to our drivers and challenged them to set a sub-55 second time. I know the Swift Sport can do that, if their nerves hold,” said Chelsey Pinto, product planning and sales development co-ordinator at Suzuki Auto and team manager for the 2023 Suzuki Swift Sport Team at Simola.
The last day saw wet track conditions making the last two sessions of qualifying quite challenging for all competitors. The team Suzuki drivers, however, continued to deliver decent times. Qualifying ended off with the drivers recording the following times:
Unfortunately, Mtshakazi did not qualify for the class finals. “When I left my house, all I wanted was to make sure that the hill does not throw me off. I hoped for a time of about 1 minute, however, after completing my very first run in 1:00.221, that gave me a lot of confidence, which resulted in me continuously shaving off time throughout the sessions. Advice given from Wesley also helped a lot and saw me record a best time of 56.091,” said the rookie driver.
With qualifying done, the heavens had opened and left the track wet, making things challenging for drivers going into the class finals. Matai was first on the track and recorded a time of 1:02.667, resulting in a third-place finish in Class A1.
“I set the bar low at the start of the weekend with the aim of keeping myself calm. I had not competed in this event before, so I didn't know what to expect. My initial runs were purely exploratory. But as my confidence built, I turned up the pace. This earned me a place in the finals. Unfortunately, there was a downpour at the very start of my final run which left the track quite slippery. I don't think I did too badly for a debut outing, hopefully making Suzuki proud in the process,” said Matai.
Greybe impressed further in his last run, recording a time of 1:00.809 which earned him the second place in the Class A1 finals. Deon Joubert finished first and won the campaign in the new 2023 Honda Civic Type-R.
After a successful weekend for team Suzuki, Suzuki Auto South Africa has announced that they will continue to support the Simola Hillclimb event and will be returning in 2024.