Old mates battle it out to honour memory of one of their own

6th March 2010

 AARON Iremonger and Beatle Tarrant are good mates.

But that friendship will be put on hold should Iremonger's Orange Roughies come up against Tarrant's Meeanee Maulers during the inaugural Peter Barry Memorial Stockcar teams event at ZM Meeanee Speedway tonight. This eight-team event has the potential to become the Hawke's Bay equivalent of the Palmerston North Superstock teams event.

While the Waipukurau duo will do their upmost for their respective teams they agree on one thing.

"As long as one of our teams win we'll be happy ... it will be the perfect tribute to Peter," said Iremonger referring to Barry, a Central Hawke's Bay farmer who died from head injuries received racing for the Kihi Kihi Kings in Palmerston North last year.

 Iremonger, 33, who has been racing stockcars for 13 seasons and Tarrant, 48, who has been racing for six seasons, were good mates of Barry. Iremonger used to work on Barry's farms when he had a mobile engineering service.

"Then when Peter took up speedway in 2008 I built and serviced his cars. Because he was so busy on his farms Peter just drove and I did the rest," said Iremonger, who built the trophy for tonight's meeting out of old engine parts from Barry's cars.

His son Seth Peter is named after Barry and will celebrate his first birthday tomorrow.

Iremonger pointed out the Orange Roughies boast 106 years of racing experience.

"That's got to count for something. Our biggest hurdle is the fact we haven't raced together before but we're race ready ... there's no reason why we can't win the trophy."

Iremonger raced for 12 seasons before taking four off. During that time he did jetsprinting for a year and raced karts for a year.

"I got the bug to race stockcars again when Peter had me coming to Meeanee to see how his cars would go after I worked on them," recalled Iremonger.

Tarrant accepted the Roughies had more racing experience but said the Maulers' time spent teams racing together was a huge plus in their favour.

He first got to know Barry 10 years ago when they coached age-grade rugby teams together.

"I also did a lot of his farm killing ... he treated his workers like his mates," said Tarrant.

He has no doubt the Peter Barry Memorial will become the stockcar equivalent of the Palmy Superstock teams event.

"All we need is a couple more teams and it will be a two-day event next year. I think that's almost confirmed," said Tarrant.

While Hawke's Bay fans are hoping for a Meeanee Maulers-Orange Roughies final if they don't clash earlier in the night (the draw will be done this afternoon), there is no shortage of talent in the visiting teams.

Three-time national stockcar champion Peter Rees will spearhead the Palmerston North Pumas line-up which also includes the big-hitting Ron Tye and Rob Myers. Rees has won numerous superstock teams titles with the Palmerston North Panthers.

Tarrant has labelled the Pumas as the favourites.

Other teams fronting up are the Te Marua Terminators from Wellington, the Auckland Alley Cats, Kihi Kihi Crusaders, Wanganui Vulcans and Waikato Raiders.

Each team will have two races and points accumulated from both will determine the top two teams for the final. Should teams be equal on points two cars from each will battle in run-offs.

Teams demolition derby races and ministock races including a 25-lapper will be among the support races. Barry's youngest son, Sam, will be racing in the ministocks.

Tarrant's son Randal will drive for the Takapau Terrors against Wanganui's Dirty Rottens, Nu Gernation from Central Hawke's Bay and a Churchward Family team from Takapau during the round-robin teams demolition derby races.