Holdsworth Audi fixable after crash

Lee Holdsworth’s Audi R8 will start Sunday’s Bathurst 12 Hour despite a heavy crash in qualifying.

The Supercars stalwart lost control of the #9 Hallmarc Audi he’s sharing with Dean Fiore and car owner Marc Cini during the early stages of Qualifying 2.

Running wide through Griffins Bend onto the exit kerb, the car spun into the right-side wall, making heavy side-on contact.

Audi Sport Customer Racing engineering manager Erik Pender told Supercars.com that the car is fixable on-site, expecting that repairs will be completed later tonight.

“The damage is essentially cosmetic, all of the stuff that holds the aero and panels in place,” Pender told Supercars.com.

“The structure of the chassis is fine, so it’s just a matter of welding on the new bits and piecing all the bodywork back together and making it sure it’s in the right spot.

“Until we start doing more it’s hard to say how long it’ll take, but I’d say we should be done by 10 o’clock or so.

“We’ll take it to the TAFE building, where you can weld, bolt some new good bits on and use them to gauge where the replacement chassis members have to be.

“We did a very similar repair on Tim Miles’ car last year in New Zealand, so we know what to do.

“Fortunately the way the Audi is built, it’s a spaceframe car, unlike some of the others that have pressed steel sheets that form the chassis structure that are glued and welded together.

“This is more like a Formula Ford with bodywork, which makes it a lot easier to repair.”

Cini’s entry is part of a five-car Australian Audi outfit that has 70 staff at the circuit, leaving no shortage of hands to help out with the repair.