“The Burger Fuel Evo pedalled by Kat Benson Racing improves on yet another personal best despite troublesome gearbox issues”

Image: René Vermeer — **Image:** René Vermeer

Every round of the Prowear NZ Superlap Series Kat manages to dial in the Burgerfuel Mitsubishi Evo just that little bit more. With the Evo still on wastegate pressure, the Evo is becoming more competitive every round. This round of Superlap was no different and even though Kat was suffering from gearbox issues, she still managed a new personal best at Bruce McLaren Motorsport Park.

A two-day affair, round four was held yet again at Bruce McLaren Motorsport Park with two sessions on Saturday and a much busier four on Sunday. After arriving and driving down Saturday morning, Kat’s team set into high-gear fuelling the Evo and checking over the vital components. With the all-clear, Kat made her way out to for the first session to assess track conditions.

Soon after coming in, Kat’s helmet was off, and we were told of the cool track temperatures, and high winds carrying pumice sand across onto the circuit. Unfortunately, this made things extremely slippery, but thankfully each competitor noticed the conditions “It was still a good opportunity to get valuable time on the track, but may have put me off a bit. After a few changes in the pits and a rethink as to my approach, I went back out in the second session of the day and dropped a full two-seconds,” Kat explains.

Unfortunately, Kat’s gearbox was giving her serious grief by falling out of gear. With this issue, and a stern hand keeping it in place, Kat pushed on chasing down good friend Andy Brooking in his 600kW-plus R32 GT-R and managed to chisel off yet another one-second off her personal best time, which is now sitting at 1:37.6-seconds for the circuit.

Image: Damian Smuts — **Image:** Damian Smuts

“I smashed our personal best by a second but was unable to continue past this due to the gearbox not playing ball. It’s bittersweet we came in second place in our class as we knew there was more in the car and driver, and just a small issue with the gearbox held us back. But, among such a good group of competitors, we are super stoked with the outcome.”

"We can't wait for the final round, and we might even swap back in the factory gearbox to ensure we get the most seat time possible. We're looking forward to seeing everyone back out there May 5–6!"