Reynolds baffled by shift from top 10 to 'junker'

David Reynolds has been left confused and frustrated by how a top 10 car on Saturday could turn into a "junker" on Sunday in Townsville.

It was a mixed weekend for Team 18, whose struggles for qualifying speed were cancelled out by Anton De Pasquale's brilliant drive from 11th to second on Saturday.

However, that was as good as it got for the Chevrolet homologation squad, with De Pasquale caught up in an opening lap crunch on Sunday, and Reynolds tumbling back through the field after an early benefit.

Reynolds' early appearance inside the top 10 became 12th by the chequered flag, immediately pointing to severe understeer on the #20 Snowy River Caravans entry.

"It was a junker then, so we struggled," said Reynolds on broadcast.

"It was heaps better yesterday. I got a really good start, I started 11th and got to seventh on the first lap.

"If I had the same speed as yesterday, I think I would've stayed there or got better.

"Today just too much understeer, too much front locking, just no grip."

It was another weekend where Ford dominated, whilst the Walkinshaw TWG Racing Toyotas also showed encouraging speed. De Pasquale's podium was Chevrolet's highlight, though the performances of Jack Le Brocq and Jayden Ojeda were also strong.

When asked by Garth Tander why the Chevrolets have been difficult this year, Reynolds bluntly replied: "Good question, if we knew that we would've fixed it, Garth. I honestly don't know."

It's been a mixed year for Reynolds, who has had to come to terms with his package developing different handling problems after an aerodynamic parity tweak in New Zealand.

"It's kind of different every round to be honest," explained Reynolds.

"At the start of the year it was all oversteer, like turn in oversteer, couldn't carry any speed, the car was just going backwards.

"The only person who could deal with it was Anton, and all the other cars struggled. Then they did the little change to our car, and now we're just struggling with understeer here and there.

"The understeer has got really bad this weekend for some reason. Because the surface is so bad, the front tyre just doesn't work at all through the corner, so we were just trying to make it turn as best we can.

"That's why we struggled from pretty much lap one in practice until the end of the race."

De Pasquale and Team 18 undertook further parity testing at Queensland Raceway on Wednesday, with Supercars officials analysing fuel consumption data and different engine maps.

Reynolds is 15th in the championship, 230 points outside the Finals bubble, heading into the Bosch Power Tools Perth Super 440 from July 31-August 2.