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Stress-free for GT

22 Aug 2016
Shakedown runs to plan for HRT star as he switches chassis for the Sydney Motorsport Park event
2 mins by James Pavey
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Holden Racing Team driver Garth Tander was pleased with his new Holden Commodore after a shakedown at Winton Motor Raceway today.

He will switch into a different chassis for the Sydney Motorsport Park round for the third year in a row, after debuting his old car there in 2014 and then swapping back into it in ’15 after it was repaired from a huge Bathurst crash.

That car will become a spare for HRT.

“A new car is as good as a holiday, so we’ll see how we go. It was due to come online so straight into action,” he told supercars.com after his 60km run.

HRT shared the circuit with Preston Hire Racing as the rival squad checked its new Triple Eight chassis and Holdsworth’s fitness, after a significant accident in Darwin in June.

The weather wasn’t ideal, but Tander was able to have some dry running after the team sorted some quick issues early on.

“No dramas, it all went well,” Tander said.

“It was really wet this morning so we just did a lot of our systems stuff early. We had, really, no issues with the car at all rolling out the gate.

“We had one sensor issue which was just the wiring – which wasn’t stopping the car from running, it was just a calibration thing – so we fixed that and just waited around for the track to dry. We did a few dry laps at the end and that was it.”

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Tander and teammate James Courtney have been pushing hard for results this season, but only Courtney has recorded one win in 2016 as the team focuses on developing the cars.

News broke last week the team had lost Holden’s support from 2017, with Triple Eight to be the sole factory squad. Walkinshaw Racing will remain on the grid according to its owner Ryan Walkinshaw.

Tander said it was business as usual after hitting the race track today.

“To be honest, I don’t think anyone out there today was thinking about anything news-wise – we’re not talking about that too much, we’re just focused on Eastern Creek,” Tander said.  

“We’ll wait and see how we go, it’s best to look forward.

“We’ll see what we can do, we go to every event trying to win and the next one is no different.”

Sydney Motorsport Park was tough for the team last year with Courtney injured in a freak helicopter accident on Friday and Tander recording 18th, 11th and 12th finishing positions.

He and co-driver Warren Luff bounced back in the endurance races, though, taking out the Pirtek Enduro Cup last year.

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