Richard Kelly's Bio

Richard is 31 years old and lives in Wellington with his understanding wife Meredith and daughter Alicia. Richard is branch manager and technical sales engineer at the Wellington branch of Amber Technology, a leading supplier to the film and television industries where he specialises in the Avid video editing and storage ranges of products.

Outside of motorsport, Richard enjoys spending time with his family, cooking and running.

Growing up in Christchurch, Richard started racing karts and circuit racing cars before being introduced to rallying in 1996. After discovering that he could read while being driven through a stage, navigating became a natural choice over driving on shingle.

This lead to a highly successful partnership with Christchurch driver John Weir in a hybrid mid-engined Honda Accord.

Richard has finished every rally he has started and has received seven podiums in his last ten events; the highlights being 3rd in class at the 2005 Canterbury Rally with John and another 3rd in class with Nathan at the 2006 RNZC Whanagrei round. His first event both with the Wilford Motor Sport Team and in the National Championship.

Richard’s favourite event is the South Canterbury Rally with the Rally New Zealand International being the event he most wants to compete in.

Richard still keeps the tarmac skills tuned up by competing a home-built Lotus 7 Replica in motorkhanas, sprints and race meetings including theNZ Sports Car Championship in which he is currently 3rd in class.

Passing on his knowledge behind the wheel as a volunteer instructor for the ProDrive program, which teaches practical driving skills to secondary school pupils, is a very important part of Richard’s year. He also operates Atomised Ltd; a track day company providing driver training and motor sport experiences to corporate groups plus represents the Ariel Atom sports car in New Zealand.

Richard’s goal is to win the New Zealand Rally Championship along side Nathan in 2007. In the longer term Richard wants to keep rallying and continue to compete at a high level..