Final showdown: our racing driver's last round at Toyota's GR Cup in Zwartkops
The Toyota GR cup heads to Zwartkops Raceway for the final round this weekend.
Image: Supplied
And just like that, it’s about to end.
When we started our journey in the Toyota GR Cup Media Challenge at Killarney in Cape Town in March, colleagues who had previously participated said it would be over before we knew it and that the most important thing is to enjoy it.
They weren’t wrong.
Progress
From bordering on nervous nausea when we first pushed our Toyota GR Yaris’ start button in a 25-car field, to bumper-to-bumper racing as the season progressed, we’ve come a long way, improving our racecraft in leaps and bounds while pushing our cars and ourselves to the limit.
This weekend sees the sixth and final round of the GR Cup at Zwartkops Raceway as the National Extreme Festival winds down, and we take everything we’ve learnt and push the limits one last time.
The GR Cup drivers will take everything we’ve learnt during the season and push the limits one last time.
Image: Supplied
In it to win it
The GR Cup Media Challenge winner was decided at the previous round in Cape Town, with Nabil Abdool (SuperSport) crowned 2025 champion after a stellar season.
The race for second place is up in the air with Kyle Kock (CAR Magazine), who won both races on his home track last time out and Phuti Mpyane (TimesLive) having everything to play for as they battle it out.
Don’t think that because Lawrence Minnie (AutoTrader), Charl Bosch (The Citizen) and I (Independent Media and IOL) are out of the running for a medal, the racing will be any less intense.
As the season has proved, anything can happen, and none of us has given an inch, and we have the scars to show it and stories to tell.
It will be another packed field with the GR Cup Dealer Challenge and GR86 Development Academy drivers giving everything for a last hurrah.
Every second will count at the last race for the season.
Image: Supplied
Home track
Zwartkops Raceway, housing Toyota Gazoo Racing’s Headquarters, is home to most of us, and while I’ve done many laps around it on various car launches, always with an instructor, our previous outing was the first time in a fully stripped-out race car.
This time round, I’ll be watching my previous laps closely and reviewing my notes from racing ace Lorenzo Gualtieri of Comprehensive Driving Solutions, and hopefully, times will be quicker and speeds faster.
I know that I lost time at the turn two hairpin, the scary sweep at turn four, and I need to brake later and turn earlier at the sharp right-hander at turn five.
Trust me, I’ll run the 2.4-kilometre track through my head a hundred times before first practice, but it’s a whole lot different suited up and surrounded by other hopefuls all trying to do the same.
Racing is expected to be bumper to bumper again.
Image: Supplied
Tough Friday
The event starts early Friday morning with us out first on the track at 7am, which means a cold, tricky track that hasn’t had rubber laid down yet by other classes.
We have two more sessions and then qualifying later in the afternoon.
It’s going to be a long, tense day, and you only get to understand what a 10th of a second means once you’re in a race car.
Will it be an emotional day when we drive into the pits for the last time? Absolutely!