1994 Peugeot 106 Rallye
1294cc 110bhp 800kg
Pugalicious and its owner Timo St Anton cruising the bends at Ruapuna. Photo Credit: Richard Opie
Chapter 1
Brought to New Zealand as one of the original 25 competition cars for the one make BP-Peugeot 106 Rallye race series in 1994.
In 1994, Peugeot New Zealand imported 30 cars to start a one make race series that would be an introductory class for touring cars. It ran for three years and created some of New Zealand’s best touring car drivers. The cars were bought for $29,812 and came with a race kit including full roll cage, Peugeot Sport branded bucket seats, Peugeot sport suspension, Peugeot Sport chip in the ECU. Twenty-five cars entered the series, 3 were converted to Rally cars and 2 remained road cars. A good number of SIERDC personalities have raced these at some point in their careers over the last twenty-six years including Andy Neale, Warren Good, Ron Mackersy, Dennis and Mike Ham with Ken Sinclair running his 106 Rallye for ten seasons at SIERDC!
Ken Sinclair and Dennis Ham campaigning the 3-hour at Teretonga in 2008 Photo Credit: SIERDC
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvFOzacG1R0
Sinclair 106 vs St Anton 106 race footage Ruapuna 2017
Timo’s car originally raced as part of the two-car team of Don Thomson Peugeot livery. Pugalicious was car #63. Noted by its blue headlight and grille area with matching blue wheels. The teammate #62 car had these highlights in red. Number 63 had a not so eventful first season in 1994 keeping out of the action. After many complaints from the driver it was later proven to be about 3 horsepower down on the rest of the field. In the 1995 season it got amongst the action a bit more.
Timo’s 106 Rallye running in period Photo Credit: unknown
1995 promotional flyer for the New Zealand “BP-Peugeot 106 Club Sport Series” Photo Credit: Unknown
Exciting close (Peugeot) racing captured the eye, mind and heart of New Zealanders Photo Credit: Unknown
Chapter 2
SR1610 took a sabbatical, a perceived early retirement from being driven at and near the limit on racetracks around the country. In what we can only imagine was a charmed life of being the other car, washed on Saturdays, driven on sunny Sundays to brunches and ice-creams at the end of a rewarding enthusiastic back roads as neighbouring towns and villages were explored with the scenic route always taken. Residing in Auckland there are many options to enjoy. Pugalicious was cashed in with an odometer bill of 45,000km. If you can shed light on Chapter 2, we would love a photo.
Chapter 3
Purchased in “street kit” by Timo in 2009 and put back into racing set up with a new roll cage from 2010. This was also the beginning of regular attacks at the Hawkswood Sealed Sprint on a bypassed segment of SH1 north of Cheviot before the Hundalee’s, it was here that St Anton and Tremain met and discovered a shared appreciation of eclectic cars including well handling front wheel drive cars punching well above their weight. Tremains wife, Kylie owning a Peugeot 206 S16.
Timo also credits this car with saving his life. His first midlife crisis was in progress so along with purchasing a homologated racing car the garage was shared with his Ducati Monster as go karting was no longer a distraction from fast bikes. Timo has always had an incredible work ethic, when he needed to clear his head, a trip to Akaroa was the antidote. Surprisingly, he noticed a strange phenomenon repeated. The Ducati stayed indoors, and the wee Peugeot was pressed into ice-cream service. It was simply more fun and rewarding, the Ducati was sold.
Timo St Anton attacking the 2010 Hawkswood Sealed Sprint in 2010 pre roll cage Photo Credit: XXXXX
Chapter 4
Timo St Anton (106 Rallye) finishes one place behind Lindsay O’Donnell (997 GT3) in atrocious conditions Photo Credit: unknown
The Pug’s first taste of SIERDC was a 1-hour race held in soaking wet conditions at Levels 2012. The German and the Frenchie battled away with car 111 finishing ahead of car 62. Timo St Anton finished 3 places behind the 997 GT3 driven in by Sam Fillmore (who would become the 2016 SIERDC 3hr Drivers Champion in a 458 Ferrari GT3) one place behind Lindsay O’Donnell (997) with the Peugeot 106 Rallye of Ken Sinclair two places behind Timo separated by Chris White and his BMW M3.
Chapter 5
Levels now holds more history for this car than any other circuit. Our first podium, 2nd in Class A in 2016 came from Le Ton and Timo’s second paired endurance outing. The real prize that day though was the compliment paid by New Zealand motor racing legend Craig Baird (14 x NZ Champion and NZ Order of Merit – services to motor racing) as he passed the pits following the race conclusion.
“You guys are a pleasure to race with” – Craig Baird
In 2017 we beat these two cars to this corner:
Peugeot 106 Rallye being hunted out of the hairpin at Levels by Mike Driver / Phill Hood Seat Leon Supercopa and Blacks 2006 BMW WTCC Photo Credit: Allison Hogg Media 77
Two drivers, no pit crew 3hr hour team. NZ Endurance Champs, Ruapuna 2017. Fire Marshall cameo Cocky Meadows
Photo Credit: SF Library
Chapter 6
New livery was rolled out for the new season. The French cigarette brands period “Gitanes livery” was selected. However, being anti smokers in addition to racing drivers we took creative license to update the marketing tagline “Quelle Corvee” translating to “What a drag”.
Quelle Corvee / What a drag – Endurance racing is anything but a chore! Photo Credit: SF Library
In 2018 again at Levels Seriously Fun were pleased to “settle” for 2nd Overall in Class A, 3 hour for the Carter’s Tyre Service South Island Endurance Series Drivers Championships after almost sneaking the series win with the Class A Champions – 3 hour Series Integra of Phillips & Phillips momentarily parked in the wall with several minutes remaining of the final race. The Black brothers WTCC BWW (pictured above) settled for 3rd Overall in Class A in 2018.
So close to taking Class A Series Honours as the Phillips team narrowly escaped our race friend “Attrition” Photo Credit: SF library
Ahead of the 2019 opening round at Teretonga Allison Hogg unwittingly named the car when she affectionately sent through some images of “Pugalicious” – Thank you Allison.
Chapter 7
Gremlin chasing. Star driver Timo, race suit clad, takes a short break from driving to change his own fuel pump R2, Highlands
“Without Ice-Cream there would be darkness and chaos” – our first non-point scoring race Photo Credits: Richard Woodward
At Highlands, round 2, in 2019 trouble was starting to brew. The car would instantly switch from being a dream machine begging to race to having difficulty even running. There had been intermittent micro flashes of issues throughout 2017 and 2018 but realistically they were never problematic or sustained. Late in the race it became clear that the last hour was going to be a long one, the car regularly switching without warning between full attack and how do we keep this thing running? With a ruling of needing to complete your race within four minutes of the 3-hour race winning car, strategy was at play to circulate the 4.1km long Highlands Motorsport Park Circuit at 30kmp/h within the required four-minute window. Mission accomplished. We managed to get a very enthusiastic checked flag from an awesome volunteer who felt both our anguish and delight. The other rule to prevent you being a hazard is you must complete at least 70% of the race distance of your Class winner. With too much 30kmp/h running and Timo changing the fuel pump during his driving shift we didn’t cover enough distance to collect any points. Luckily, we had an ice-cream during the pit stop to avoid the darkness and chaos, motorsport has highs and lows.
Pugalicious remains road registered and legal as a streetcar. With the third round being a hundred miles down the road at our endurance epi centre, Levels. The decision was taken to drive Pugalicious to the race. Timo celebrated as the 160,000km milestone proudly rolled over the odometer.
This brings us to the spectacle that unleashed at Levels on Saturday the 19th of October 2019. Practise the day before was rained off so Timo retired early, had a hot bath, and broke the internet. Qualifying on race morning were sensational. The race was another story with Timo in and out of the pits, not long into Le Ton’s stint this happened…
Link to embedded R8 Smoke video
Even our lucky charms were hurting Photo Credit: Doctor Bike & Martin Ansley
Safely parked up with an hour to run – Safety Car not required Photo Credit: Doctor Bike
The result is our first ever non race finish. By Sunday afternoon Timo had dropped some stuff and found the problem…. We would also like to take this opportunity to thank our fellow competitors Vaughan Moloney and Mark Taylor who finished 2nd Class A – 3 hour Race Series 2019 in their well driven/presented Honda Integra Type R DC2 – generously loaning us a trailer for the return trip.
Race on Saturday, family time on Sunday – but not this time Photo Credit: SIERDC
Honda Integra Type R DC2 of Vaughan Moloney and Mark Taylor with Class A champions Stu and Aaron Black, WTCC BMW being passed
by George McFarlane and Jack Milligan in the Class E Porsche 997 Cup R who finished 4th overall at Levels and 1st non-Audi R8 GT3! Interesting fact is McFarlane / Milligan finished 4th every race they finished (retired @ Teretonga) placing them 4th in Class E – 3hr Series Photo Credit: Doctor Bike
Despite finishing 3rd in Class at Levels, Class A competitors Michael and Rodney Parkes also had to pull their Honda S2000 engine following the race unfortunately not making the grid in time for Ruapuna Photo Credit: Doctor Bike
Fire in the hole. No wait it looks like a valve head Photo Credit: SF Library
Thank fully the block is fine Photo Credit: SF Library
The 2019 endurance season was for the first time, held over four rounds visiting all the excellent South Island racetracks. This meant that with a broken car a serious amount of work was required to be on the grid in thirteen days’ time, twelve if you wanted to test the car the day before race day to take on the series penultimate round at our home circuit in Ruapuna.
With bent pistons, separated valves and cracked cylinder sleeves not all was lost. The trusty Fixations workshop Peugeot 106 XSi (MC3?) took one for the team. Offering up its kidneys in this time of need. Timo worked through the evenings and weekend to perform open heart surgery transplanting “the big block” cast iron lump precisely were the alloy Peugeot sport block once sat.
No Merci was shown for the 2019 series final when the Big Block was unleashed. Photo Credit: SF Library
Our good friends from Le Coq Racing sent us down an ECU. Thank you! Timo quickly discovered that our ECU had been the issue we had been chasing.
Chapter 9
We are pleased to report that our final round was a ripper. Motorsport is a journey of emotions
Ruapuna SF video to go here
Flat out vs Flat out – the drag up the front straight into turn one at Ruapuna 2019 Photo Credit: Terry Marshall
