Allen fires into Finals picture with maiden podium

19-year-old Kai Allen was at a loss for words after claiming his first career Supercars podium in Race 18 at the betr Darwin Triple Crown, but it might be the start of a thrilling run to the end of the season.

The 2023 Super2 champion started fourth after a brilliant qualifying effort, and beat 18-time race winner Cam Waters off the line from the second row to claim third on the run to Turn 1.

From there, Allen drove a mature race, and made the most of a later four tyre stop to claw his way from fifth to third, overcoming teammate Matt Payne and reigning Bathurst winner Brodie Kostecki.

Allen, who turns 20 on Thursday, was elated to finish on the podium, a result which has seen him rise to 14th in the standings, just 92 points away from Anton De Pasquale, who holds the final spot in the top 10 in the race for the Finals.

"It's pretty surreal to be honest, to get it in my last race as a teenager is pretty cool," said Allen.

"Honestly I can't thank Steve, Brenton, the whole Grove Racing team enough. Penrite Racing, all the boys, they back me, and to get a podium this early is really cool.

"Alistair [McVean] my engineer, we've been working really hard together, it's a brutal sport and you've got to knuckle down, and when you have bad days you've got to keep going, and to get this one so early is very cool.

"I don't know what to say, it's unreal. All the emotions are flooding in, all the hard work over the years that my family has done and the sacrifices that I've been through with my family.

"To get a podium straight away in my first year is unreal, so can't thank the whole team enough, all my backers over the years, it's pretty surreal but we'll keep trucking forward and hopefully we can keep going better and better."

The bp pulse Safety Car was called late in the race after David Reynolds was clobbered by Will Davison at the Turn 6 hairpin, leaving the #20 Camaro stranded on the circuit.

After the first race of the day was marred by chaos off the first Safety Car restart, Allen didn't make any secret of whether he wanted more green flag racing or not.

"I got real scared to be honest, I didn't want them to restart. I was like, 'Can we finish it already?' but it was really cool," Allen added.

"The race played out really well, the boys did an unreal job on the strategy, to come out and we fought hard there and got past, and Matty was really good there in letting me by, then getting past Brodie and trucking on from there was really cool.

"I definitely earned that one, that was cool. I'm pumped for the team, to see the trust in me to do my job, and to give them something back this early is really cool.

"Let's keep trucking on as a team, and hopefully we can get some more results like this in the future."