Rovanperä edges forward as Ugochukwu keeps control in Taupo’s punchy FROC weekend
The Formula Regional Oceania Trophy left Taupo with a clear theme: Ugo Ugochukwu is still the yardstick, and Kalle Rovanperä is starting to find his feet.
Across four busy races at the lakeside circuit, Ugochukwu banked two more podiums to protect his series lead, while the wins were shared locally by Ryan Wood, James Wharton and Zak Scoular — a proper Antipodean lockout of the top step. The headliner for many, though, was Rovanperä logging his best results yet in his single-seater education.
The two-time World Rally champion came into this short, sharp New Zealand campaign as the curiosity of the grid and discovered quickly that curiosity goes both ways: the field has been just as keen to test him. After a bruising opening round at Hampton Downs — capped by an opening-corner exit in the finale — Taupo brought measurable steps.
It didn’t start that way. Rovanperä was 16th in the first 18-lap race as Wood controlled it lights-to-flag. Ugochukwu shadowed him home in second, with Freddie Slater in third, while Rovanperä’s learning curve stayed stubbornly steep.
Race 2, with the reverse top-eight format, is where the Finn finally put a marker down. Tenth at the flag won’t light up a career CV, but it was his first top 10 in open-wheel racing and a cleaner, more composed stint in traffic. Wharton picked his moment perfectly from the second row to win that one, with Ernesto Rivera second and Ugochukwu climbing to third after starting seventh.
Sunday’s first run belonged to New Zealander Zak Scoular, who kept Slater behind to score it on home ground as Wood took fourth. Rovanperä was 14th — one place behind Ugochukwu, who had a rough launch into the day — and you wondered if the momentum line had flattened again.
Then came the Denny Hulme Memorial Trophy to close the weekend, and the needle flicked. Qualifying had been a wet, scrappy affair and left Rovanperä 15th on the grid, but he picked his fights better in the race, got his elbows out against Scoular before the Kiwi later retired after contact with Rivera, and crossed the line outside the top 10 before post-race penalties for Jack Taylor and Ricardo Baptista lifted him to ninth. Progress, even if his own debrief on social media read: “It’s P14 & P11 from Sunday’s races. A lot of work to do, but we still have two more CTFROT weekends to go so let’s try to keep improving!” Either way, the trendline points the right way.
Up front, Wood bookended the meeting with his second win of the weekend to haul himself to fifth in the championship. Kanato Le chased him to the flag in the Safety Car-affected 23-lapper, with Louis Sharp banking his first podium since the Hampton Downs opener. Ugochukwu was fourth — exactly the sort of damage-limiting result that wins championships in short series.
Zoom out and the table tells a simple story: Ugochukwu is doing the heavy lifting whenever the wins go missing. He hasn’t needed fireworks to keep the advantage, just consistency while the locals scrap over the silverware. That’s not to say the Americans’ weekends have been easy — far from it — but when the dust settles on Taupo, he leaves with the kind of margin that makes the flight to the South Island feel a touch lighter.
Rovanperä’s box score still reads modestly, yet the manner of it matters. Early laps are tidier, starts less frantic, and when the drizzle rolls in he looks increasingly at home. He’s not pretending it’s easy — and he shouldn’t — but there’s now a baseline to build from rather than a survival exercise. The raw car control was never in doubt. Race craft in a tight junior single-seater pack is the bit you can’t shortcut, and Taupo suggested the lessons are landing.
There’s also a nice local arc to this championship right now. Wood’s double, Wharton’s opportunism in the reverse-grid sprint, Scoular’s Sunday strike — Taupo’s crowd had plenty to cheer. Sharp’s return to the rostrum hints there’s more to come from him, and Le’s podium underscores a field that won’t hand anyone an easy lap.
All of which sets Teretonga Park up beautifully for Round 3. It’s a fast, wind-whipped throwback that punishes indecision and rewards rhythm — the kind of place where Ugochukwu’s calm might pay again, and where Rovanperä’s feel for a car on the edge could translate into another step forward. The series is short, the margins are thin, and the locals are circling. Exactly how New Zealand’s summer racing should be.
