Jamie Whincup "absolutely stinging" over Perth finale defeat
Triple Eight boss lashes "critical" strategy errors in Sunday's race
"We can't have car 888 qualifying in 19th," says Whincup
Triple Eight Managing Director Jamie Whincup was “absolutely stinging” to lose Sunday’s Perth finale to Matt Payne and Penrite Racing.
Broc Feeney was overhauled by Payne after the second stops after abolishing bold overcut strategy play by Penrite Racing.
Feeney lead Payne through the first stops, before the points leader closed the gap. Instead of sitting behind Feeney, Penrite Racing pounced and stopped Payne. Triple Eight stopped Feeney, but he was powerless to deny Payne, who had warm tyres.
Contact damaged both Ford drivers’ wheels, and they managed to survive. Feeney looked to have the edge over an ailing Payne, who clung on to win his fifth race of the season.
Feeney did bring Triple Eight out of its rut with a Saturday win, before nailing pole on Sunday. Those results were pleasing, but Whincup couldn’t hide his frustration with the defeat.
“Of course, I’m happy with pole and to have some really good car pace, but I'm still absolutely stinging about not winning that race,” Whincup told Supercars’ Equip Super Cool Down Lap podcast.
"Like, we just got beaten by another team, which is not us. So that hurts more than you wouldn't believe. So a few things, we just didn't tune the car well enough for the race and it was slow.
“And then we made two critical errors in regard to strategy, which got Matty out in front, and then the rest was history. We're still a long way from our best, but we made a good gain this week.
“But we've got to make sure we keep our head down and start our run to the Finals.”
Whincup lamented a lack of pace relative to Payne, who was without question the benchmark of the weekend. When asked if it would sting more if Triple Eight lost with the fastest car, Whincup hit back.
"Well, we didn't have a fast car. That’s the issue,” Whincup said.
"Well, we had the quickest car in qualifying, and we just didn't convert it to the race. That hurts. That hurts, and we didn't do a good job. We had all the tools.
"Everything was there. We had the resources. Everything was in the right area, we just didn't do the right job with the tools we had, and we got beaten by a better team.
"So congratulations to the Grove guys. They're doing an excellent job. Full praise to them. We just need to do better moving forward.”
Problems also remain on the other side of the garage, with Will Brown qualifying 19th for the first time in his last six attempts. Brown was then penalised over a lap 1 clash, and finished 17th.
The run of outs don’t sit well with Whincup, who continued: “We've got some issues there as well, we've got to find out what's actually going on, get to the bottom of it, and then work out what it is.
"We can't have car 888 qualifying in 19th. Whatever the issue is, we'll find it, we'll make sure Will and the 888 crew are back up the front very shortly.
“We'll make sure that we use science and not some theory or some feeling or anything. We'll apply science, work out what the issue is, and make the relevant changes to make sure he's back up the front.”
Payne leads Feeney by 118 points, while Brown is 467 points behind his teammate. Penrite Racing leads Red Bull Ampol Racing by 258 points.
