Drivers' Quoteboard: Practice, Tyrepower Tasmania 400
Craig Lowndes, Red Bull Racing Australia, p1 (combined times):
“We had a great three practice sessions today and the car is working well. My engineer Jeromy Moore and the team have worked hard to adjust to the changing conditions as the day has gradually improved weather-wise.
“We put our second set of tyres on in Practice Two to make sure we were happy with the set up of the car and knew that Practice Three was going to be the true indictor. I went deep in to turn six in the third session trying to find a little more but ended up coming off.
“It’s an early qualification tomorrow with only 10 minutes on a cold track so we’ll have to find our space as soon as we can but we’re in the best position to do that."
Jamie Whincup, Red Bull Racing Australia, p2:
“We had one little issue in the first practice session this morning with the power steering which would normally take 15 minutes to fix but with the new shorter sessions we had to sit the rest of it out.
“We were in catch up mode from then but we were lucky enough to be quick out of the truck with the team putting in some good work to the VF Commodore before the weekend. We put on a good set of tyres in Practice Three and ended up being quite competitive. It’s a challenging track at Symmons Plains to get the tyre temperature up with only a few corners in cool conditions but I’m confident in our set up for the rest of the weekend.”
Chaz Mostert, Ford Pepsi Max Crew, p3:
“Symmons Plains suits our cars but it is still fantastic to be third and I can sleep easy tonight knowing we have a quick car. Tasmania might only [essentially] be a three-corner track but the field is close so the two 10-minute qualifying sessions tomorrow morning really will determine how you fare in the two races. Qualifying has been a weakness for us so far in 2014 so hopefully we can start high up the order and stay out of trouble.”
Scott McLaughlin, Valvoline Racing GRM, p6:
“Bit of a tough day, I’m a bit surprised to finish fifth. It shows how good our car is – at the end of the day we’ve sort of had a hard time with our power steering and things but we still finished fifth.
“Hopefully we can fix a few things because I think it’s the difference between top five… maybe even pole… It almost feels like I’m driving an old car and feels like I’m doing a weight session out there.
“Hopefully we can fix the issues – we’ve never had it before.”
Fabian Coulthard, Lockwood Racing, p7:
"We've rolled the car out of the truck and it's pretty good. We just need to make a couple of changes to get the car feeling a little bit nicer in a couple of spots. We've learnt some things to do and some things not to do today. We just need to collate all the data tonight, have a look what worked and go from there. I'm comfortable in the car and I'm looking forward to qualifying and the races tomorrow."
Michael Caruso, Norton Hornets, p8:
“The car isn’t too bad. We’re pretty happy with it, considering we came off a good result at the Grand Prix.
“We didn’t want to change too much in terms of setup.
“We’re still giving away too much in a straight line – as much as 10kmh compared to the fastest car – which is too much time around a track like this that only has a few corners.
“This weekend is all about damage control. We need to get through this as best we can and focus on Winton next week where we know our car will be strong.”
Scott Pye, Wilson Security Racing, p9:
“The last session was really quite good for us. Just one-tenth quicker would have put us in P3 so it is very close. We only ran one set of tyres up until we bolted the new Dunlop’s on in the final session. It is hard to gauge what sort of gain you will get but the car really responded to the new tyre. We went a little in the wrong direction on the last run but I will work tonight with my engineer to see if we can keep the pace going into qualifying.”
Russell Ingall, Repair Management Aust Racing, p11:
“We’re off to a pretty good start, we’ve been scouting around just outside the top ten since we rolled it out of the truck and we’ve been up in the top five a few times as well.
“We’ve got indication we’re going to be up the right end of the field this weekend.
“A tenth of a second can potentially move you up ten grid sports, its ludicrous how close it is really.
“If we can pull a good time in qualifying, our work here is three quarters done; we know we’ve got a fast race car and we know we’ve got a set up to do the laps, we’ve just got to find a race car that can punch that one lap out.”
Todd Kelly, Jack Daniel’s Racing, p12:
"We certainly tried a lot of different things with the car today, and we've settled on a setup that we are now ready to fine tune.
"We put a new set of tyres on the car at the end of the last session, and it wasn't too bad, but there are only three corners here that really matter, and we had a little bit of understeer in each of them.
"When we dial that out, I think the car will be quite good.
"We're in not too bad of a position, but it's all about making the right decisions overnight with what we do with the setup."
David Reynolds, The Bottle-O Racing, p13:
“The first session was good and I had reasonable pace and just needed a bit more turn. In the second I had too much turn and no drive and by the end we half-sorted it. I feel like I am lacking a bit in a straight line but Frosty was fastest through the speed trap so it’s clearly not a horsepower issue. The car doesn’t feel as flash as I want so to be not far off the pace in 11th isn’t too bad.”
Jack Perkins, Team JELD-WEN, p15:
"It's tough, with the format change, three 20-minute sessions. We've clearly made gains over the first two events, with all the work we've done that has helped us out. All four FPR cars were in the top 16 here, which is good considering our results at the Grand Prix. Qualifying is going to be mega important. I'm feeling confident with the Team JELD-WEN Ford, we had a different set of brakes in the last session which weren't as good as the morning sessions, so I think our lap time should have been a bit quicker.
“It's great to see Chaz [Mostert] in the top three."
Mark Winterbottom, Ford Pepsi Max Crew, p16:
“I started quite well and we rolled out okay but we progressively got worse. We need to look and see what we’ve done but the better the tyres were, the slower I went so we will check it over and work it out. Chaz has a good car so there is the right data to look at so we plan to work out what we need and hopefully be at the front tomorrow."
Jason Bright, Team BOC, p18:
"We started the day with really good pace but near the end of the first session I got some really weird brake lock ups. Ever since then we've struggled. We need to check the car over – I'd be surprised if we don't find something that's not quite right. We'll just have to start looking. It felt like the pace was in the car this morning for sure. I feel like we've got the pace but there's a problem.”
James Moffat, Norton Hornets, p21:
“We had a steering problem in the first session which delayed us a bit, and with the new shorter practice session format, it was less than ideal.
“Thankfully, the boys got it fixed and we got on with it.
“In general, we’re just not fast enough, so we’ve got a bit of work to do. At the moment, the car feels better on older tyres than it does on new ones, so we have some things to fix overnight.
“On a track that is only 51 seconds, you only have to be a whisker off to not look very good. That’s where we are at, but it’s good that Michael is right up there. We need to see if we can do the same as him tomorrow.”
Rick Kelly, Jack Daniel’s Racing, p22:
"This was one of the tougher rounds we had last year with our straight line speed issue, and it's not so easy again this time.
"We started off practice one and practice two behind the eight ball with the car and the way I was driving it, we made a lot of changes with it for the last practice session and it drove a bit nicer.
"It was definitely a big improvement, which is really good, but still obviously a long way back.
"You can see from the lap times it's very close here, now that we have the car a bit closer to the window.
"We'll chip away at it overnight, and we'll make sure that we have a better package for qualifying in the morning to try and capitalise on the championship points on offer."
David Wall, Wilson Security Racing, p23:
“It was a tough day. We had a power steering problem in P2 and I think we may have done a gearbox in the final session. We did a bit on the first set of new tyres but not much on the second so we are lacking some track time to decide a set up for tomorrow. Still chasing some rear end balance but we did make some progress. Scott is obviously happy so we will work on the set up tonight.”
Robert Dahlgren, Valvoline Racing GRM, p25:
“We have done the first day of practice, three sessions. We had a few issues in Practice One and Two, which continued a little bit into Practice Three but we are onto it, it just took a little bit to sort it out today – they will fix it tonight.
“For myself it was difficult because with the lack of running I got on a new track makes it quite difficult, but saying that, it’s a very competitive series and covered the whole field about 7-8 tenths. A couple of tenths faster I would’ve moved up a lot of spots.
“I improved every lap I went out… just went quicker and quicker even though we had a few issues, so all in all I think it was pretty good and will just get better from here.”
The Tyrepower Tasmania 400 continues tomorrow, with Qualifying at 11.30am AEDT.
