Matt Payne fit and firing for biggest fitness test
Payne underwent surgery on broken wrist in May
Penrite Racing star leads Broc Feeney by 120 points
Matt Payne is full steam ahead on his Bathurst defence, amid his recovery from mid-season surgery.
Following a mountain bike accident, Payne underwent surgery on his left wrist in the lead-up to May's Tyrepower Tasmania Super 440.
In the lead-up to the Tasmania event, Payne sheltered the severity of the injury and passed it off as a sprain on both Drivers Only and to the media, and wore bandages pre-round and trackside in Tasmania.
Amid a successful rehabilitation program with performance coach Heath Meldrum, Payne reeled off 11 podiums in 16 starts post-surgery, and regained the points lead from Broc Feeney at The Bend.
The upcoming Great Race will be Payne's biggest fitness test yet, with main drivers facing up to at least three straight hours behind the wheel to the finish.
When asked about his fitness, Payne told Supercars.com: “I’ve still got the pins in there.
“Everything's been pretty good since the surgery, which was a while ago. It's all holding together as planned.
"I think the reliability's pretty good on the wrist. It's not like it's something mechanical.
"Heath's always keeping me sharp. I don't have an option."
Payne survived an action-packed Bend enduro, albeit after attracting penalties for hitting Cam Waters and Jayden Ojeda. In the weeks since, though, he has found time to "decompress" ahead of a massive week at the Mountain.
"I mean, it was obviously a chaotic, Sunday to say the least," Payne said of The Bend.
"I think we all escaped with minor bruises. I guess no one really knew it was gonna rain, so that was crazy in itself.
"It's been good to kind of decompress from that and, and sort of shift your focus to the big race now, and sort of fix up what we thought we could improve from The Bend and make little changes and sort of get going from there.
"It's been nice to relax a little bit before next week. But yeah, it's gonna start getting busy pretty shortly and I'm looking forward to it, to be honest."
Payne will race with two-time Bathurst winner Will Davison at Mount Panorama.
