Drivers' Quoteboard: Wilson Security Sandown 500

Jamie Whincup, Red Bull Racing Australia, p1:

“I don’t know if I’m more excited or relieved – we did it the hard way.

“There was a little bit of confusion late in the pit-stop with the driver change and typically, a drive-through is race over but it’s a long race and we had a great car. The car was excellent but I want this race to be known as a Red Bull one-two because the whole team put in a massive effort since Winton to get us back to the podium.”

Craig Lowndes, Red Bull Racing Australia, p2: 

“It’s great to be on the podium – any time you get a chance to be on the podium at an endurance race is pretty special, especially under the circumstances.

“I’m a little disappointed given the position we were in late in the race but Jamie had a really good car and I basically just had to bring it home.

“The stacking early in the race put Luffy a long way back but it’s a long race and with the multiple safety cars it was a great comeback just to be in contention. Bring on Bathurst.”

Will Davison, Pepsi Max Crew FPR, p3:

“Finishing third is the best we could’ve done given we were lucky to make it to the end so today was far from a disaster. Steve (Owen) fought back well after he was put back in the pack after our first pit stop. We banged the front end up a bit and for some reason that cost us a bit of straight line speed so with such a wounded car I am relieved to be on the podium. We are only trailing second by one point and I love racing at Bathurst so we’ll now turn focus to the big one.”

Lee Holdsworth, IRWIN Racing, p4:

"This has been so rewarding after where we were at Winton. We were really close to the podium, it was rewarding for all of us, the Erebus Motorsport team and all the sponsors for believing in what we could achieve.

"It's good to feel like we finally have some momentum.

"The guys absolutely nailed the strategy, we're at a huge disadvantage with fuel and spent more time in pit lane than others. Some elements played into our hands with a bit of Safety Car luck, but it was an all round great team effort."

Mark Winterbottom, Pepsi Max Crew FPR, p6:

“Today didn’t quite turn out how we hoped. The stall at the start obviously made things tough but then we switched our strategy and got back into the race so credit to the team and Richo for turning things around. We showed in the last stint just how quick we were and I set my fastest lap less than 20 laps from the end so we would’ve been in with a shot if not for that delayed stop. We salvaged points and while it wasn’t a disaster we need to work hard between now and Bathurst.”

Fabian Coulthard, Lockwood Racing, p7:

“For how the car was it's not a bad result. When it's not perfect we're just going from one set-up to the next and really had no direction going into the race so reverted back to what we knew.

"For saying it wasn't a tested set-up here, seventh is pretty good. I think it's just a good consolidation for how the car was prior to the race. We qualified 15th and if someone said to me yesterday we would finish seventh with the handling the way it was I would have been happy."

Russell Ingall, Supercheap Auto Racing, p9:

“Ryan handed the car over in a position where we were able to race for the top 10, and the car was good enough over a long distance for me to race hard right to the end.

“As I said before the weekend, our long-distance form has been strong all year and that was demonstrated again today.”

Todd Kelly, Jack Daniel’s Racing, p11:

"That's as good as we're ever going to get today, it almost feels like a win.

"We didn't make any mistakes, Perry my engineer did an awesome job to keep us on the lead lap and the car was great, so for the amount of speed we were lacking up the straight and the amount of agro we were copping from cars behind, I think to finish 11th is an awesome result.

"When we get a little bit more straight line speed under our belt the cars are going to be extremely good." 

Chaz Mostert, Wilson Security DJR, p14:

“The penalty hurt us, but that’s the way it is. It’s all about the learning curve. For my first Sandown 500 and getting to the finish is a good start, I think. Dale (Wood) did a fantastic job and he ran second when he came into the pits for the driver change and it’s unfortunate I didn’t get him a result today, because he did a fantastic job and didn’t put a foot wrong. We’ll go to Bathurst now and look for a good result.”

David Reynolds, The Bottle-O Racing, p15:

“I am pretty disappointed to be honest. I let myself and the team down when I locked the outside-front wheel going into turn one. Dean (Canto) did the same thing and we both had the same issue so we will obviously look into what caused it. We’ve been close two years in a row so it is unfortunate we missed out again.”

Rick Kelly, Jack Daniel’s Racing, p16:

"We wanted a good clean run today, we knew we weren't going to be challenging up the front with the issues we have at this particular circuit, it's not easy, so to finish 16th, we're pretty happy.

"In the second last stint we had a little issue with the car which was rectified in the last pit stop so we could battle again.

"I actually really enjoyed the race, Karl did a great job, the team did a great job and for us it's really good preparation for Bathurst, so we're pretty happy with that.

"Todd (Kelly) up there as well in 11th is great for the whole team, so we just need some more results on Bathurst to keep building momentum."

Alex Davison, Team JELD-WEN, p17:

“It was a very disappointing weekend as we never got on top of the car. In the race it handled poorly and we just did the best we could with what we had. In the last stint I was conserving fuel but we had bad oversteer and struggled on power down, which hurt us. We obviously need to overcome this for Bathurst which I am sure we will.”

Dean Fiore, Dodo Insurance Racing, p18:

“The middle stint was ok for me, we got some fresh air and were doing some reasonable times. Once the best of the tyre had gone it was very difficult to drive. I had to try and keep the tyre on it so we struggled with that and we also struggled in the last stint to just maintain speed. I think we improved it a little bit from warm up but there still is a lot of improving that needs to be done before we go and challenge for top ten at Bathurst.”

Michael Caruso, Norton Hornets, p20:

“All weekend we had dramas, and today was no different.

“I am disappointed and I’m not sure what’s going on. We need to get back to the shop, sit down and really go over the preparation and procedures.

“We knew this event would be tough, but we seemed to make things worse for ourselves.” 

Tim Slade, Heavy Haulage Australia Racing, p21:

"It was another great job from Andrew – I didn't have the pace of Lee and I'm not sure we could have kept with him at the end. I think we had a solid car, we had a lot better pace than other people. We lost some time in the pits with the fuel.

"Once the drama happened with the fuel fill, we just came in and changed the tyres to some older tyres for the finish.

"We never had the outright pace, but we had at times a top five car, which all looks promising heading to Bathurst and for the remainder of the year."

Tony D'Alberto, Team HIFLEX, p23:

“I got a really good start and I was doing it pretty comfortably.

“It was not a nice feeling to have the throttle stick wide open and it ended our race right there. The boys got onto it straight away, but we lost a few laps in pit lane and that was the end of it. 

“After a weekend like this, we need to regroup. There’s a few things we need to sort out before Bathurst. It’s frustrating that it’s such a small thing that cost us a decent result.

Jason Bright, Team BOC, p24:

“I just felt really lame as soon as I got in the car. It's not the car we've had all year. The lap before I went off the steering worsened another level again and I locked up over the hill. I nearly just pitted then because I thought I must have a puncture. My engineer said let's just bring it home but it completely failed in the end.

"I'm very disappointed. Yesterday wasn't a good day but I thought the car was better in this morning's warm-up and Andy (Jones) was doing a good job. We were in contention in the top five or six for the first half of the race. We certainly could have snagged a much better result that it looked like we could have yesterday. We made gains today but just never got to realise them."

Maro Engel, SP Tools Racing, p25:

"We were on a different strategy to the other cars and mid-race we were in a good position to bring a strong result home. It would have been interesting to see what came out of it should we have been able to play everything out to the end.

"Not long after getting out on track, the car didn't feel right and there was a problem with the brakes, which we traced back to an earlier incident. The pedal went to the floor and I had to bring it in.

"The SP Tools Racing team did a great job to fix the car and get us back out there. A massive well done to the #4 car, they did an awesome job.” 

James Moffat, Norton Hornets, p26:

“There’s not much to say really. I’m not quite sure what happened with the suspension failure, but obviously something has broken that wasn’t supposed to and it was a pretty scary incident. 

“I was right behind Caruso at the time and I almost torpedoed into the back of him, and that wouldn’t have been a great look if we’d wiped out two cars in one shot.

“It was a disappointing day, to be honest. We knew we were up against it and we were hoping to get as many points as we could, but we didn’t do that.” 

Scott Pye, ekol Racing, DNF:

“The first half of the race was pretty horrible to be honest, we struggled with a lot and we made quite a few little mistakes. We seemed to be pitting on the wrong lap every time, there was a problem in the second pit stop so once the lights were green we ended up following the safety car in and pitting late.

“When the car got given to me we were in a pretty bad position, we were half a lap down just because we were unlucky where the safety car fell and it made it hard for us. We were lucky that we made up a spot because of the amount of pit stops we had made at the start of the race.  

“We found ourselves in P12 towards the end of my stint and we really felt like we were going to have a top ten with a green set of tyres to come home on and I think we were one of the only cars to have that. 

“I believe, we definitely had the car to be inside the top ten, but we had power steering failure with 20 laps to go so and that was our race done. We made a few mistakes today but we will learn from them and we’ll come back for Bathurst and we’ll be in that top ten.”

Tim Blanchard, Wilson Security DJR, DNF:

“In race trim and on a full tank and on long stints it looks like the car is really good, certainly it was this weekend, so that gives us something to look forward to. I think we would have been up for a pretty good result today and I think we will be quite competitive at Bathurst. Every time Ash (Walsh) gets in he’s one of the quicker co-drivers out there. He made up a lot of spots and was doing a really good job, but these things happen. There have been a lot of mistakes by people throughout the whole field today and we have to go back and make sure we’ve done all we can to make sure we’re not one of them at Bathurst.”