Nissan: Past glory doesn’t count for anything
One year on from Michael Carurso’s victory at Hidden Valley, Nissan Motorsport will return to the Northern Territory with modest expectations.
Citing difficulties surrounding the switch to a new construction tyre for 2017, the four car outfit has struggled for speed this season and is yet to secure a podium finish.
While front-running squads Shell V-Power, Triple Eight, Prodrive, Tekno and Garry Rogers all tested ahead of Hidden Valley, Nissan elected to save its precious allocation for later in the season once more new parts are developed.
General manager Scott Sinclair says the team is pushing hard to close the gap to the leading teams, but is not placing any expectations on Darwin based on last year's win.
“We do have fond memories of Darwin and last year, but in terms of expectation it’s a difficult question,” Sinclair told Supercars.com.
“The field has moved on a fair bit and we probably aren’t on top of this new tyre as much as we’d like at the moment.
“Past glory doesn’t count for anything. You’re only as good as your last race and our last race wasn’t that flash.
“I think the other teams got a bit more comfortable a bit quicker than us.
“Our initial pace was good but we weren’t able to see the improvements the other teams have got.
“We certainly haven’t hit the sweet spot with our car on this tyre and we’re working hard to hit that as quickly as we can.”
Despite impressive speed from Rick Kelly at the pre-season Sydney Motorsport Park test and the Clipsal 500, Sinclair added the quick turnaround between the early season races has made development difficult.
“Maybe the first few events were a bit of a false economy while everyone got their act together,” he added.
“Once they did we got into the run of races where it’s difficult to make changes and improvement when you’re not at home to go through the data and analyse what you have to do.
“It’s race track after race track. We’ve had a good break now, we’re refreshed and have locked at some new ways of doing things. We’ll see how that plays out in Darwin.”
Sinclair added having four cars is an advantage for developing the car but it does carry a risk.
“We’re still not where we want to be at the moment and that’s what we’re focused on rectifying,” he said.
“The more cars the better. But it can create sometimes, more confusion.
“You can see things work and then you start debating which way to go.
“There are positives and it needs to be managed properly so it doesn’t turn into a negative.
“The gap to the leaders now has increased compared to last year in terms of the time, so we need to look at every area.
“We’ve got three of four things we’re targeting first, then we’ll move after improvements to those.”
Dunlop Super2 Series team MW Motorsport will field a fifth Nissan at Hidden Valley for youngster Jack Le Brocq.
