Despite looming rain clouds overhead, 70,000 spectators descended upon the Ardmore Circuit to witness Auckland's first hosting of the New Zealand Grand Prix marquee event.

A last-minute modification to the track layout was made before race day to compensate for this and lap times were brought down significantly.

Peter Whitehead set the pace early on with Stan Jones regularly joining him at the top of the timesheets in his Maybach.

However, on the second day of practice, Jones' encountered engine troubles and was forced to scour the city of Auckland to find replacement parts to allow him to race.

Working around the clock to complete the job, Jones' car was finally repaired a matter of hours before the start of the race.

On lap 13, the first major calamity of the race occurred when Whitehead spun his Ferrari, clouted a marker drum and stalled.