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FPR fuming over Frosty decision

25 Oct 2014
Team boss calls it a disgrace, but DSO firmly stands by penalising Winterbottom.
3 mins by James Pavey
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Ford Performance Racing boss Tim Edwards was furious about the decision to strip Mark Winterbottom of a podium finish after a final lap bump on Tim Slade.

But Driving Standards Observer Jason Bargwanna dismissed Edwards' criticism and stood bullishly by the choice to "redress" the late pass and allow the Supercheap Auto Commodore to take third in today's race at the Castrol EDGE Gold Coast 600.

"I think it's a disgrace and that everyone involved needs to have a good look in the mirror," Edwards told v8supercars.com.au when asked about the decision.

"I mean, the reality is he was one second a lap slower and we got to the last corner, he drove himself into the front of Frosty's car.

"He was braking where you don't normally brake - but we neglect to download the cars, look at the data, just made a knee jerk decision, we make the category look like keystone cops, it's just ridiculous.

"Investigate it fully - I've said it before, you know, these exact words I've said to you before. When we don't investigate things fully we look like idiots. As a category, we make ourselves look like a joke."

Edwards had no issue with his star driver's pass, which came after a strong fight-back after qualifying 11th on the grid for the 300km race.

"The pass was absolutely on because he caught him a second a lap. Tim had lost his tyres, nobody can deny that. He was plummeting backwards and he's come into the last corner just jammed on the brakes - at a point you don't brake - driven himself back into Frosty, not the other way around.

"How is the driver supposed to know that somebody is effectively brake testing them? But we haven't looked at the data, we look at a television and make a decision like that ...You don't go to court charged with murder and nobody investigates you fully ... I don't think anyone in the crowd thought there was anyone wrong with that.

"Clearly a couple of people in race control did, but if you just want to have sanitised, boring racing we'd all be looking for jobs in a few years time."

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Bargwanna, however, dismissed Edwards' criticism completely.

"It doesn't matter [if he was a second slower]," the DSO and 2002 Gold Coast winner told v8supercars.com.au.

"He wasn't blocking.

"For me, it was pretty simple in every drivers' briefing we've had this year, we talk about a bump and run and we don't tolerate it.

"So had that have been lap 22, 52 or 102, the same would apply that we would ask them to readdress the situation which is exactly what we did. Give them the opportunity to readdress - but we readdressed it."

The late timing of the race meant it was an issue that had to be dealt with straight away.

"I've said in every drivers briefing we will deal with stuff even if it's the last lap. And we do have the ability to do that. So we've executed that a couple of times this year, we've proven we can do it again and we will continue to do that. The right people are on the podium. We did it at Winton at Russell Ingall and those guys, so we dealt with it."

Funnily enough, Winterbottom was fairly calm about the situation.

"You're allowed to block really hard on the last couple of laps, he was obviously blocking really hard so at the same time you're aggressive when you're behind when someone's doing that and he tried to back me up a bit at the last corner. It's one of those things - you're trying to race to the finish, but it sort of favours the guy in front a little bit. But it is what it is ... we feel a bit robbed from the podium, but I'm sure he feels like he was robbed so, he said she said, and we ended up fourth."

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