by TREVOR THORPE

EXPECT TIMES to be lower at the Vaucluse Raceway Motorsport Club's today.

The first such event ever to be staged at the St Thomas facility, the organisers are expecting a party atmosphere as drivers settle the first of the three-round championship for the Vaucluse RallySprint Cup 2006.

Under the new format, competitors will sign in at 1 p.m. , after which scrutineers James Betts, Simon Gillmore and Adrian Linton will carry out their checks in the Pits.

Qualifying is scheduled to start at 2 p.m, with the Group Heats at 6 p.m. followed by the traditional Handicap Knockout slated for 9 p.m. To facilitate completion by the deadline of 10 p.m., there will be no break during racing.

"Before the start of every season, we have a look at what we can do to create a better experience at Vaucluse both for competitors and spectators and with our track improvements last year opening up the venue far more so that everyone has a much better view, I think we have gone as far as we can currently go with that side of things," said raceway chairman Greg Cozier.

He said the organisation started looking at the structure of the events themselves and at their recently held annual general meeting and prize-giving they had a debate about how they might change things - and the new format was developed from that.

"Night racing is growing within motor sport around the world - and in other sports, like cricket and horse racing - so there seems no reason why we should not try

it here, particularly as there was such enthusiastic support for the idea from our competitors," Cozier said.

As far as competing cars are concerned, Cozier said fog lights would be allowed without the requirement to go off when headlights are dipped. Based on his experience

of driving in dusty conditions at night, at Woodburn and in Trinidad, he had suggested that drivers use low-powered fog lights, rather than long-range spotlights.

Giant-killer Sean Gill has claimed a hat-trick of RallySprint titles since 2003 at the wheel of the Simpson Motors Rally Team Suzuki Ignis JWRC, which has now been sold and he is hoping that his new car will arrive in time for him to mount a serious defence of his title, or whether a new name will be added to the list of Vaucluse Raceway RallySprint Champions this year.

The first two rounds of the Vaucluse Raceway RallySprint Cup will be run under floodlights, the second event falling exactly five weeks later, on Saturday, April 29.

The series will conclude with the Vaucluse Raceway International RallySprint on May 27 and 28, which is again the first of two events in the Barbados Rally Carnival.