Leversedge Looks Beyond Lockdown for 2021/22 Season
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 11/10/21
RaceFit©
The uncertainty of the latest Covid-19 outbreak in New Zealand has caused the speedway season to be put on hold. Auckland, the home of the world-famous Western Springs Speedway continues to see an increase in cases which suggests that there may be no racing at the ‘holy grail’ of New Zealand Speedway any time soon. The South Island season has also been delayed by another month, but with the future looking promising. How does this affect the drivers? We touched base with RaceFit Athlete Matthew Leversedge on how this has affected his 2021/22 plans.
Leversedge, the wheel man of the number 78 Sprint car has previously run out of Western Springs, while also making regular trips back home to Ruapuna Speedway in Christchurch. We asked why Leversedge, and his team, scheduled their season like this. Leversedge stated:
“We initially planned to run out of Western Springs a few years back to test ourselves against the best drivers in the country and race against the travelling international drivers, but we always love coming back to Ruapuna and racing in front of our home crowd.”
Leversedge has seen success several times at Western Springs winning three feature wins and picking up the Auckland Championship and the King of the Springs title. We asked if he was planning on returning. Leversedge said:
“We always want to base our season around the (western) springs, but with the Covid-19 situation it is looking unlikely that we will be able to get up there any time soon. It’s obviously disappointing for us, but safety comes first and there are millions of other people who have made far worse sacrifices due to the virus, so it is what it is. I just hope we can back to normal soon and get some racing in.”
We asked how the Covid Outbreak has affected him, he added:
“It has made training difficult with gym access restrictions, fortunately RaceFit provided me with workouts I could do at home during lockdown. Partnerships have also been affected due to economic downturn associated with the virus, I consider myself very lucky to be backed by the partners I have and can’t thank them enough for everything they do for me so I can chase my dreams. For racing, it’s tricky to know exactly what the plan is. We’d love to run at the springs again but will have to wait and see what happens with the current situation. At the moment, our main goal is to race wherever we can and represent our partners to the best of our ability, any way we can”
Regardless of where, we are excited to see Leversedge compete in his V8 powered 800hp Sprint Car again. While the lockdown has made training somewhat difficult, we are pleased with the shape Matthew is in going into this season and can’t wait to see what he achieves!