'I was just destroyed': Reynolds details health ordeal
David Reynolds battled ill health during Townsville weekend
Team 18 driver defied battle to secure historic pole for Saturday race
Teammate Anton De Pasquale claimed Friday sprint podium
Townsville was a promising weekend on track for David Reynolds, but few were put through the wringer quite like the Team 18 driver.
The TRADIE Energy Chevrolet driver’s weekend was derailed by a brutal bout of the flu, which kept Reynolds bed-ridden until Friday practice.
Somehow, the 2017 Bathurst winner dragged himself off the canvas and delivered a stunning pole position on Saturday, before racing to 10th.
On a weekend Reynolds was far from fighting fit, the 40-year-old scored Team 18’s second Supercars pole, and proved to many he still has it.
Speaking on Supercars’ Cool Down Lap podcast, Reynolds said after initial improvement, his health went backwards on the day he scored pole.
"Thursday I would've been like a four I reckon,” he said.
"And then Friday I turned up at about an eight, and then probably Saturday I was probably seven and a half, eight.
"I took some drugs that ruined my gut, so I couldn't eat anything after that, so I was just destroyed. Today, I'm about nine, which is about a normal person's 10.”
In a Team 18 release, he added: “I knew it was going to be tough for me this weekend, because I had the flu in the lead up and I was written off until pretty much Friday.
"It was like my first day out of bed in four days. So my preparation wasn't the best and I was feeling pretty weak all weekend. Couldn't eat anything, sweated all night, coughing up stuff, so not the best preparation.”
After starting on pole, Reynolds finished 10th in Race 21 after battling handling issues in the latter half of the race. On Sunday, he climbed into the top 10, only for contact with James Courtney at Turn 2 resulting in a 15-second penalty that dropped him to 21st place by the finish.
Crucially, despite the hiccups, Reynolds showed the clearest glimpses of speed yet, but was disappointed to drop back on Saturday and hit Courtney on Sunday.
“Friday was okay. We qualified 17th and was nowhere in the race, but on the Saturday I qualified fourth for the Shootout and got pole position in the Shootout, which was amazing.
“We came back on Sunday with high hopes qualified 13th. Just missed out on the top 10 by a tenth of a second. I had a big overseer at Turn 1 and I lost about a tenth, so that would've put us in the Shootout.
“In the race I was coming 13th, 14th and coming out of the pits I turned Courtney around and got 15 seconds. It was a stupid mistake and feel really bad for those guys because they were just innocent bystanders."
