Investchem Formula 1600 – Van der Watt remains unbeaten in F1600

Julian van der Watt may have had to work for his wins in Youth Day Friday’s Investchem Formula 1600 races at Zwartkos’ Extreme Festival, but the Capetonian went home with eight wins out of eight starts in SA’s premier single seater formula in 2017. Van der Watt overcame a tough qualifying and then had to fight off two young tigers – Sturt White and Cameron O’Connor in the respective races.

“We had a tough qualifying where my car’s drive shaft broke, so we started in 3rd for both races,” Julian explained. “I moved up into second through the first two corners of the first race and then Stuart went wide at turn 5 giving me the lead and then lead every lap from there and took the win.

I had a brilliant start again in the second race and I moved up to second after the first two corners, but I had to defend from Cameron, but I put my head down and chased him down, eventually catching him before putting pressure on. “It worked — he ran wide in turn 4 to give us the lead, but I fended him off until we got the chequered flag to take the win.

“A huge thanks to the Investchem team for all the help in getting the car ready for the race especially my mechanic Hendrik and Claudio from Race Driver SA for all the help.” Van der Watt goes to iDube to fight for the SA DD2 kart championship in two weeks before heading to Port Elizabeth in search of ten Formula 1600 wins on the trot…