Perkins edging forward

Jack Perkins remains confident in his ability as a racer, though his initiation to Team JELD-WEN has been tougher than expected.

The 27-year old performed well in the Dunlop Series last season,and will put in the hard yards to improve his position after a challenging start to 2014.

"I worked incredibly hard to get this opportunity and I'll be working incredibly hard to get the results to maintain this opportunity in the future," he told v8supercars.com.au.

"I look forward to getting to Perth because we're working pretty hard between events with the training and preparation... I'm looking forward to getting in the car for practice on Friday."

Perkins offered no excuses, but when asked about his issues, flagged limited track time as one of the challenges. The team has not tested since the season launch at Sydney Motorsport Park in February, in wet weather, and shortened practice time has made it tricky to make big gains at race meets.

"We haven't had the opportunity to do what we'd normally do at the start of the season, so for us it has been a matter of learning as we go," Perkins explained.

"The car wasn't directly suited to my driving... so it's taken a bit of getting my head around driving.

"What we've been doing unfortunately at the race meeting is starting each day with a new car, in terms of setup.

"With limited track time in the category it makes it difficult to get the most out of it. We're only about three or four-tenths off where we need to be, but that's a fair way off.

"Unfortunately there's not a lot of time and there's a lot pressure - I'm not making excuses, but that's what we've been doing, making adjustments to suit."

The team looked to be on the right track in Tasmania where Perkins recorded a top 10 finish, but he tumbled down the timesheets at next event Winton and has an average finishing position of 17.5 so far this season.

Perkins described managing the car as similar to a relationship between a man and a woman, as he needs to alter his driving style, while the team also works on a car that suits him.

"There's a bit of give and take, isn't there... For us it's about finding the right medium in our garage - 18 and 55 (David Reynolds' Bottle-O Falcon) have been doing certain things throughout the year and we'd gotten to the stage we hadn't made progress and we've gone down a different path.

"I think the results Frosty and Chaz (Mark Winterbottom and Mostert) have been able to achieve in the last couple of events (wins and podiums), certainly the team has got a bit of momentum so we need to utilise that with car 18.

"Perth is another opportunity to get back into the car and learn a lot about it and hopefully collectively we can make improvements to get the car further up the grid and where it deserves to be."

Team boss Tim Edwards is also hopeful of improvement from #18.

"Inching forward is the best way to describe it," Edwards told v8supercars.com.au about the progress the teammade, after the New Zealand round.

"Obviously the other three have got a bit more time under their belt at this team.

"It's fair to say Jack's not performing the level we expect him to be or the level he expects to be himself... I'm confident we'll get there with Jack as well. And we can get the one-two-three-four (FPR finish)."

Perkins is in Western Australia today for promotional opportunities with team JELD-WEN. The Perth 400 runs from May 16-18 with tickets available now.