Young Kiwi kart champ Breanna Morris has earned praise for her efforts in making the A Final and finishing 23rd in the Vortex Mini ROK class at the big Trofeo D’Estate kart race meeting in Italy on Sunday.
The 12-year-old from Auckland’s North Shore earned the right to contest the annual ROK Cup International Final meeting at the South Garda Karting circuit in northern Italy in October this year when she won the New Zealand Vortex Mini ROK class title at the Giltrap Group KartSport New Zealand National Sprint Championship in Hamilton at Easter.
Her trip to check out the track and competition at the Trofeo D’Estate meeting over the July 02-03 weekend was made at the suggestion of her GP Karts team boss here, Auckland-based international Daniel Bray.
With funding help from Auckland businesswoman Meegan Pollock of Centrepoint Fabrics and her husband, motor industry and motorsport entrepreneur Peter ‘PJ’ Johnston, as well as Wayne Green and Sebastian Jonsson of Auckland demolition specialist Green Way Ltd, Breanna was able to make the trip and drive for a GP Karts team.
The faith Bray and everyone else who helped make the recce trip possible was initially rewarded when, after testing at the track last week, Breanna qualified 16th in her group and 34th out of a field of 52.
She then worked her way forward in each of her heat races – to 18th in the first, 13th in the second and 16th in the third.
That earned her a spot in the A Final (for the top 36 drivers after the heats), starting from P34 on the grid and ending up 23rd after a hectic 12 laps.
“Our first goal was to make the A Final so that in itself is something Breanna can be very proud of,” said Bray. “To then manage to go forward in that race, against the best drivers from Italy was something else again. She did a good job, a very, very good job.”
Breanna summed it up best when she said; “I had a battle on my hands all race long. Even though I made up 11 positions I must have made at least 30 passes during the race. The racing was very hard, harder than I expected.”
