PRODRIVE RACING – TOWNSVILLE 400 SATURDAY WRAP
Prodrive Racing (Australia) has finished with three cars in the top five in race 13 at the Townsville 400 with Mark Winterbottom making his return to the podium. After a stellar start, Winterbottom lead his teammates from lap one to secure third place as he crossed the line. Chaz Mostert featured in battles with Shane van Gisbergen throughout race 13, with the duo adding to their ever compiling highlights reel. On this occasion Mostert was able to execute his move on van Gisbergen; the kiwi conceding due to an engine issue. Cameron Waters rounded out the top five in what was yet another consistent drive for the youngster. Challenged by David Reynolds twice over the 70 laps, Waters was able to maintain a cool head to pass his former team-mate shortly after the second round of pit stops, to then also pass a struggling van Gisbergen with five laps remaining. Jason Bright endured a tough day on-track, colliding with a spun Fabian Coulthard on lap one and sustaining damage to the front of the car. Pitting on lap one, Bright was pushed to the rear of the field to eventually finish 23rd.
DRIVERS’ VIEW
Mark Winterbottom – #5 The Bottle-O PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 6th – 1m12.42s
Race 13: 3rd
“It was a good day. To get back on the podium is really good. It’s been a tough year. You need results to keep the motivation levels up because my car in particular has had a really heavy work load this year. You think about that stuff when you cross the line, it’s not just a podium. It’s awesome for the guys who work on my car in particular, spraying champagne on them felt like a win which was cool. We’ve now got momentum and we’ll try and keep going with it which will be good.”
Cameron Waters – #6 Monster Energy PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 4th – 1m12.37s
Race 13: 5th
“I was actually pretty happy with how today went. After practice we were really struggling but we made the car a lot better overnight. The boys did a really good job to make it better and I was really happy with fourth in qualifying. To finish fifth is really good points and the race has given us a really good direction on where we need to go for tomorrow.”
Chaz Mostert – #55 Supercheap Auto PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 3rd – 1m12.33s
Race 13: 4th
“A top five result is always a good result. The field is super-tight out there. We ran our race. We didn’t quite have the pace to match the front two guys today. It was a good race though. We learnt a lot from it and got a good read for tomorrow. We’ll see what we can do but overall I’m pretty pleased with today. It’s definitely not a bad result. This is what we need to keep doing, we need to keep getting these top-fives and keep making little gains with the car.”
Jason Bright – #56 MEGA Bulk Fuels PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 21st – 1m12.84s
Race 13: 23rd
“We really didn’t get to have a race because we obviously had the crash at turn one. There was an incident up ahead, I’m not sure what happened, I saw there was something happening so I cut across the inside of the corner and then Fabs (Fabian Coulthard) just popped out of nowhere. Copped damage in that but it cut our tyres straight away and we were a lap down from the word go pretty much. It’s disappointing. I felt like we had improved the car where we needed to from qualifying.”
Chris O’Toole – Team Manager:
“It was a great effort from the team today. To have three cars finish in the top five is a fantastic step forward and it’s great to see Frosty back on the podium. We’re getting to where we want to be now but we still have a lot of work to do to match the front guys. If we can continue this trend tomorrow I think we can be on the podium again. We just have to keep working hard.”
DUNLOP SUPER2 SERIES
Prodrive Racing (Australia)’s Garry Jacobson has finished fourth in the opening Super2 Series race at the Townsville 400, fighting a hard battle in a safety-car riddled race. Falling down to sixth from third following a slow start off the line, Jacobson was able to make the most of the car to climb back to finish fourth. Josh Kean’s run of bad luck has continued after being pushed wide onto the grass at turn 13 early in the race, causing the Wynns Ford to spin before being hit on the left front corner. While able to return to pit lane, Kean retired from race one to save from further damage.
Garry Jacobson – #1 MEGA Bulk Fuels PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 3rd – 1m15.01s
Race 1: 4th
“Today was okay. I think we could have been in the top three but I got too much wheel spin off the start line and dropped back a bit which was unfortunate. The car is almost there but there are definitely a few things that we can tune up. We had really good speed which was a massive positive but there are a few little things that we need to tune so we’ll sort those out overnight and hopefully have an even better day tomorrow.”
Josh Kean – #5 Wynns Racing PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 10th – 1m15.44s
Race 1: DNF
“Obviously not the day that we wanted today. We had some good speed in qualifying and again in the race but I got pushed wide through turn 13, got pushed onto the grass and it was pretty much all over from there which was really disappointing. Tomorrow is another day. I have a good car under me so I know we can do something good with it which will be the aim for tomorrow.”
RACE 13 RESULTS
1) Scott McLaughlin – DJR Team Penske
2) Jamie Whincup – Triple Eight
3) Mark Winterbottom – The Bottle-O Racing Team
4) Chaz Mostert – Supercheap Auto Racing
5) Cameron Waters – Monster Energy Racing
23) Jason Bright – MEGA Fuels Racing
CHAMPIONSHIP POINTS
1) Scott McLaughlin – DJR Team Penske: 1470
2) Jamie Whincup – Triple Eight: 1452
3) Fabian Coulthard – DJR Team Penske: 1402
4) Shane van Gisbergen – Triple Eight: 1248
5) Chaz Mostert – Supercheap Auto Racing: 1146
6) Mark Winterbottom – The Bottle-O Racing Team: 1053
8) Cameron Waters – Monster Energy Racing: 1000
21) Jason Bright – MEGA Racing: 591
TEAMS CHAMPIONSHIP
1) DJR Team Penske: 2907
2) Triple Eight: 2700
3) Prodrive Racing Australia: 2088
