Prodrive Racing Australia’s Chaz Mostert has finished third in his home race at the Ipswich SuperSprint after storming home with strong, late-race pace.
Mostert finished where he started in race 17 where a late pit stop strategy enabled him to charge through the field in the final stint.
Mark Winterbottom also finished in his starting position in the 200km hit-out despite challenging second-place getter Jamie Whincup for much of the race. Tyre life hurt Winterbottom who ran in third position earlier in the day.
Chris Pither has achieved yet another strong result at Queensland Raceway, finishing eighth after an 11th place start.
Pither remains pleased with his progress in the Super Black Racing Ford and hopes to continue his run of speed at Sydney Motorsport Park next month.
While the majority of the field ran a two-stop strategy in the weekend’s final race, the Monster Energy Racing team ran a three-strop strategy but were unable to capitalise fully on the car’s speed on newer tyres.
Waters ran in the top ten in the second stint but was pushed back to 16th after the final pit stop.
DRIVERS’ VIEW
Mark Winterbottom – #1 The Bottle-O PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 5th
Race 17: 5th
“It was okay. We just didn’t have enough car pace and tyre life wasn’t great either. The guys were trying to make it quicker but we just didn’t get the car we wanted for that race. You just go into survival mode really and count down the laps. We had a go and tried our best but it was a tough weekend. We’ll keep working and try and get quicker but it’s not for a lack of effort. The guys are working really hard and I’m confident we’ll be able to get the speed back like they’ve done so many times this year.”
Cameron Waters – #6 Monster Energy PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 12th
Race 17: 16th
“We ran a different strategy today but it didn’t quite give us the result we planned for. If we hadn’t done this we probably would have just done a normal strategy but sometimes you need to try something different. We were actually probably going to look pretty good for a result if we didn’t try this but these things happen, there’s nothing you can really do about it. We had a pacey car and I learnt quite a lot this weekend. We’ve got a test day between now and Eastern Creek so we’ll see how we go there.”
Chaz Mostert – #55 Supercheap Auto PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 3rd
Race 17: 3rd
“Strategy got us here on the podium in the end there. The car has been pretty good over about 20 laps but a bit after that it struggles. We’ve got a bit of homework to do when we go back to the workshop and try and work on a bit more tyre life on this soft tyre but overall I’m pretty happy to get back on the podium. This is my home race, I’ve had some good success here so to spray champagne with these guys is pretty special today.”
Chris Pither – #111 Super Black PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 11th
Race 17: 8th
“Pretty happy with the weekend overall. Yesterday qualifying was unreal. We dropped back a bit in the race but I feel like we’ve made a good step up in our race pace today and had the elbows out a bit more at the start and managed to maintain position and stay in a groove and it paid off late in the race, I think we had good pace in that middle stint. The car was good, I just can’t thank the entire Super Black Racing Team enough for giving me an awesome car and the opportunity to go out there and do it and hopefully this is a turning point in the championship for us and we can keep getting more top ten positions now and keep qualifying towards the front.”
Tim Edwards – Team Principal:
“Yeah it’s great to see Chaz on the podium again, he’s got a few of those for this year now but we still need to get him that race win. He had great pace in the final stint and the decision to pit him late was a good one. The reality for Frosty is that he just didn’t have the pace or tyre life. Fifth is still another consistent result but there is some work to do on the soft tyre before we go to Sydney. Cam, his strategy didn’t work out as we would have liked but he was able to make up ground in the end there and it’s great to see Chris improving and really feeling comfortable in the car.”
RESULTS – RACE 17
1) Craig Lowndes – Triple Eight
2) Jamie Whincup – Triple Eight
3) Chaz Mostert – Supercheap Auto Racing
4) Michael Caruso – Nissan Motorsport
5) Mark Winterbottom – The Bottle-O Racing Team
8) Chris Pither– Super Black Racing
16) Cameron Waters – Monster Energy Racing
DRIVER CHAMPIONSHIP POINTS
1) Jamie Whincup – Triple Eight: 1821
2) Shane van Gisbergen – Triple Eight: 1711
3) Mark Winterbottom – Prodrive Racing: 1701
4) Craig Lowndes – Triple Eight: 1671
5) Scott McLaughlin – Garry Rogers Motorsport: 1536
9) Chaz Mostert – Prodrive Racing: 1286
18) Cameron Waters – Prodrive Racing: 901
20) Chris Pither– Super Black Racing: 796
TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP
1) Triple Eight: 3542
2) Prodrive Racing: 2617
3) Garry Rogers Motorsport: 2418
