Burgess Free to go to HRT

Triple Eight Race Engineering owner Roland Dane says he has released a contractual hold on former team principal Adrian Burgess which would have stopped him joining Walkinshaw Racing until February.

Burgess informed Dane in August he would be leaving the Red Bull-sponsored operation to take over as managing director of Walkinshaw Racing from fellow Englishman Steve Hallam in 2014. 

The Melbourne operation will run four cars in the 2014 V8 Supercars Championship – two for the Holden Racing Team, the Supercheap Auto Racing Commodore VF and fresh addition Nick Percat backed by South Australian motor racing patron James Rosenberg.

Burgess has spent the balance of the 2013 season on ‘gardening leave’ and Dane claimed he had a hold on his services until February 1. 

“I fired him on Friday,” Dane told v8supercars.com.au after Triple Eight wrapped up its third successive Championship one-two for Jamie Whincup and Craig Lowndes at the Sydney NRMA Motoring & Service 500.

“He is irrelevant to us,” added Dane. “I don’t need to protect our position any longer, so he can go and do what he wants.”

“Honestly, is HRT going to regularly beat us? I wouldn’t put any money on it.”

When contacted by v8supercars.com.au, Burgess seemed more amused than anything else by Dane’s comments and chose not to respond. He is currently in England on holiday and will start his duties at Walkinshaw Racing in the new year. 

There is no doubt Burgess’ decision to move on has annoyed Dane, who has managed to keep a very stable workforce at Triple Eight through the years. Burgess was a relative late-comer, recruited from Dick Johnson Racing for the 2011 season when that team was split by internal feuding.

“Adrian is what I call – in the nicest possible way – in motor racing terms, a mercenary, whereas most of the people in our business (Triple Eight) are not. They don’t just follow the dollar. Motor racing is full of people – and it doesn’t make them bad people – who are interested in short term gain.”

Dane took back over from Burgess at the ‘prat perch’ after their split, but refuses to say anything about whether he plans to continue on in the role in 2014, or have someone else step in. He did say planning for next season was well underway.

“We have been thinking about it for a while and what we will be doing car-wise, preparation-wise, personnel-wise. We have been thinking about if for the last six months.”

Dane was pragmatic about the chances of Triple Eight’s Championship dominance continuing on into yet another season. Jamie Whincup has won five of the last seven driver’ Championships, Craig Lowndes has finished second five times in nine years, the team has won Bathurst five times in 10 years and 2013 was its fifth teams title in six years.

“Sport is cyclical,” he said. “Things go down as well as up and one day we won’t do as well and that will happen at some stage,” Dane said.

“My job is to delay that as long as possible but time will tell. I will try and delay it as long as I possibly can and try and keep us competing at the top.

“But there are cycles in sports, look at Manchester United at the moment. They are struggling to stay in the top 10 of the Premier League at the moment, having dominated it for years. It happens in all sports.”

Dane paid tribute to the team’s personnel as the key to its lengthy history of success. 

“It is an exceptional bunch of people, the core of the team, including the drivers, very much so. But the core of the team is just so hard working, with some very good technical people and some very dedicated people all the way down the food chain really.

“It’s a people business and it always has been.”