The Ferrari team of Nick O’Halloran and Alan Simonsen took out the Sandown GT classic last weekend. Held over two one hour heats the black Ferrari crossed the line over 16 seconds ahead of the Viper of Ross Lilley and former Nations Cup Champion Greg Crick.

Tony Quinn making his debut in the ex Peter Hackett Aston Martin DBRS9 led the race at various times but fell back to third late in the race.

The Lamborghini team of Ted Huglin and John Bowe came through to finish fourth with former F1 driver Ivan Capelli impressing everybody with his speed in the Maserati Trofero.

Max Twigg in a Porsche GT3 Cup Car was sixth to take out Class B over the team of Michael Locisano and Marc Cini with high profile Hollywood actor Eric Bana also in a Porsche in third.

Only 13 cars finished the race which was dealt a blow on Friday when the cars of Championship Contender John Kaias and Kim Bourke came together during private practice.

With Kaias out Mark Eddy in the Lamborghini became the Australian National GT Champion after a seventh place finish.

After the race a delighted O’Halloran was full of praise for co-driver Simonsen who won last years classic in it’s original three hour format.

“He’s just a fantastic co-driver, he teaches you what to do, and at the end of the day he can take it home his experience is just amazing.”

Simonsen who has spent much of 2008 driving overseas was delighted to be back and thrilled for his team-mate.

“It was good fun to have Nick on board this weekend, he’s new to the game so it was quite a challenge (for him) He’s done a fantastic job.”

Simonsen told In Pit Lane that he was delighted to see the improvement in local GT racing after the series mid season problems. ” I think it’s looking extremely good” he said. “We have the three Maserati GT3 cars for this weekend and with the new Viper… It’s just adding on to the Championship.”

Simonsen said that he would try and assist the series to grow by acting as a conduit between Australian and International GT teams. ” i think it’s very important for Australia to have an Australian GT Championship and it’s been really good.”