FROSTY POCKETS THIRD PLACE POINTS
Prodrive Racing (Australia) has claimed both third place trophies at the Castrol EDGE Townsville 400 as well as a pole position at the hands of Mark Winterbottom in an intense 200 kilometres of racing. After qualifying third earlier in the day, a stellar lap in the top ten shootout saw him take the front row for race 15, where he lead until shortly after the second round of pit stops, caused by safety car. A battle with Shane van Gisbergen after the race restart saw Frosty drop to second before a photo finish with a charging James Courtney pushed him to third. A clever call from car six engineer Brendan Hogan enabled Cameron Waters to push to a sixth place finish in a rough-and-tumble race for the young-gun. Fresh tyres allowed Waters to wade forward from the middle of the pack to finish in one of his best positions all year. Despite a strong race overall, the late safety car cost Chaz Mostert a strong race position, where dropped from sixth to 16th after electing not to make a last-minute pit stop. Mostert, however, is pleased to have a straight car but insists he must improve to perform in each race per event. Chris Pither was unable to improve on his starting position in race 15 despite making up spots mid-race. Forced to double stack, Pither lost his position but was pleased to see minor improvements in the car.
DRIVERS’ VIEW
Mark Winterbottom – #1 The Bottle-O PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 3rd
Top Ten Shootout: 1st
Race 15: 3rd
“The safety cars didn’t fall the way you would have wanted. They probably came at the worst times possible. Yesterday the Whincup car was well down the road and credit to the guys to get back into today and give me a car that was pretty close. There are still a few things that we’ve got to improve but what my engineer and the team are doing really well is that they can tune the car and that’s pretty cool and actually enjoyable. We lead for a while; safety cars probably killed our race a little bit but at the same time we still fought on. It was a good finish. It was a crazy race and it was good to be a part of.”
Cameron Waters – #6 Monster Energy PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 13th
Race 15: 6th
“I’m wrapped with how today went. We had really good pace in the car and really good tyre life which was awesome. I think I was probably on for about an eighth position right behind Courtney but then we did that different strategy at the end, put a good set of tyres on and came through so I’m wrapped to finish sixth. I’m really happy for the crew and for Frosty too to get a podium which is awesome for the team.”
Chaz Mostert – #55 Supercheap Auto PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 7th
Top Ten Shootout: 7th
Race 15: 16th
“Really happy with the weekend overall. It’s a bit of a shame to have this one good race one bad race thing going on but we have a straight car. We finished all of the laps today. 16th isn’t a great position to finish a race but at the end of the day we didn’t take the gamble and it obviously didn’t pay off. A lot of other people took it and it payed off for them so that’s the story of our day.”
Chris Pither – #111 Super Black PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 22nd
Race 15: 22nd
“Today was a lot like yesterday to be honest. We thought we sorted out our setup last night and put together a good car but we just didn’t see the improvement. It was a frustrating race really. The car improved slightly and I was able to make my way through a bit but stacking in the middle of the race cost us and put us a lap down. Not much to say really, I’ll just look forward to the next race and try and do a bit better next time.”
Tim Edwards – Team Principal:
“Another podium on the board is always good and the pole position is awesome as well. To have both Frosty and Cam finish in the top ten is really good to see. The late call was obviously good for Cam but not so good for Chaz but that’s the way it goes sometimes. It’s about who takes the risks and sometimes it can reward you and other times it backfires. But overall we have some really strong positives to draw on from the weekend and we’ll take those into Ipswich.”
DUNLOP SERIES
Prodrive Racing (Australia)’s Jack Le Brocq has taken a clean sweep of the Dunlop Series round at the Castrol EDGE Townsville 400, taking home the first place trophy after finishing race two with a six second lead. After a good battle off the start with Paul Dumbrell, Le Brocq was able to hang onto the lead until the end of the race thanks to strong pace. Garry Jacobson was pleased to stand on the podium for the Dunlop Series round after a challenging weekend. Jacobson finished sixth in race two thanks to a five second race penalty due to a start breach. Despite a strong overall result, Jacobson says he still has work to do to make himself comfortable in the car ahead of Sandown.
Jack Le Brocq – #5 GoGetta Racing PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 1st
Race 2: 1st
Round: 1st
“I’m absolutely stoked. The car was really good all weekend for us. It showed that with great pace so it’s great to build on Perth. Hopefully we can continue this streak, we’ve got five wins and a healthy championship lead, I think it’s something like 60 points so hopefully we can build on that at the next round and continue this run.”
Garry Jacobson – #6 Challenger Valve PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 3rd
Race 2: 6th
Round: 3rd
“It was a challenging weekend for me with car setup. I’m still happy to maximise my points for the weekend with a third for the round. Now I’m just looking forward to knuckling down with the team trying to come up with a better package for me and what suits the car going into Sandown.”
RESULTS
RACE 15
1) Shane van Gisbergen – Triple Eight Jamie Whincup – Triple Eight
2) James Courtney – HRT
3) Mark Winterbottom – The Bottle-O Racing Team
4) Jamie Whincup – Triple Eight
5) Scott McLaughlin – GRM
6) Cameron Waters – Monster Energy Racing
16) Chaz Mostert – Supercheap Auto Racing
22) Chris Pither– Super Black Racing
DRIVER CHAMPIONSHIP POINTS
1) Jamie Whincup – Triple Eight: 1545
2) Shane van Gisbergen – Triple Eight: 1492
3) Mark Winterbottom – Prodrive Racing: 1470
4) Craig Lowndes – Triple Eight: 1392
5) Scott McLaughlin – Garry Rogers Motorsport: 1374
11) Chaz Mostert – Prodrive Racing: 1046
18) Cameron Waters – Prodrive Racing: 844
21) Chris Pither– Super Black Racing: 634
TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP
1) Triple Eight: 3047
2) Prodrive Racing: 2329
3) HRT: 2182
