Winton finale a 'cluster' for Courtney

James Courtney has described his Pizza Hut Winton SuperSprint finale as a “cluster”.

Courtney suffered a dramatic and incident-packed end to his weekend on Sunday.

There were happier scenes across the garage, with Tickford teammate Cam Waters winning the race.

However, Courtney slumped five laps down in 27th and last.

His race unravelled after contact with teammate Jake Kostecki at Turn 10.

The incident earned Courtney a 15-second time penalty; he later took the blame for the contact.

He later tangled with Tim Slade as the latter exited the pits and into the Turn 1-2 section.

“It was my fault,” Courtney said of the Kostecki clash.

"I thought I was catching, and I thought Jake was letting me by, so I started to roll in.

“Then obviously he wasn’t and I took his apex, so then we touched.

"It was 100 per cent my fault.”

The 41-year-old said his pit stop also went array.

“[Slade] had just come out and was on cold tyres,” Courtney explained.

“I was on the outside around [Turn] 1 as he went into [Turn] 2.

"I think he’s had a bit of a slide and we banged, and hit wheel-to-wheel.

"It broke a steering arm in my thing, so we went straight ahead.

"Disappointing way to end the day with car five, we were pretty speedy in the first one [eighth in Race 14].

"The pit stop didn’t go to plan, we got dropped without the wheel on as well so then we had to jack it up.

"It was a bit of a cluster this afternoon, but on the other side of the garage I’m super stoked for Cam.

“He’s been driving flawlessly all year and was really quick today, so hats off to those guys.”

Courtney is 10th in the championship heading to Darwin.

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