Thomas Randle closing on top 10 in the championship
Randle has slashed 111 points from 230-point deficit in two rounds
Tickford Racing driver reached 2025 Semi Final
Tickford Racing Team Manager Matt Roberts is tipping a resurgent Thomas Randle to reach the 2026 Supercars Finals — an outcome that looked unlikely only two rounds ago.
Randle was 230 points off the pace leaving Darwin, where he missed the start of the finale after being ruled out.
As if watching someone else drive his car wasn't hard enough, Randle could only watch as the margin to 10th blew out in a big way, leaving his season on a knife's edge.
A 2025 Semi Finalist, Randle has gone with teammate Cam Waters since Townsville, and has slashed a whopping 111 points off the deficit to 10th. Heading to Ipswich, he's 119 points down.
Randle is in better form than those around him, who are fighting for the final spot. Jack Le Brocq is only 20 points clear of James Golding, who hasn't claimed a top 10 since New Zealand. Andre Heimgartner has been repeatedly stung by mechanical issues, while rookie Jayden Ojeda offers several unknowns.
One big step is getting more from the race car, given how well both drivers have qualified in recent rounds. Randle's superb qualifying average of 5.2 across the last six races dips to a race average of 8.5.
The message is simple — keep scoring big points, and it will come together.
“He's responded really well to get back himself back up into some sort of contention," Roberts told Supercars.com.
"He’s only 100-odd points down, which is very much doable from here. We've set the soft target of achieving top fives, consistently being in the top 10 every single race.
“We can give him a top five car day in, day out, and we just ask him to be consistent. Ever since Darwin, we've sort of said to him, 'There's a long road to the end of Bathurst. You don't need to go out and win. Just keep accumulating these points, head down’.
“We're all working through it, we're just chipping away, and he'll be in the 10, I'm confident of that.”
The other big step is making the moments count. Randle could have challenged for podiums had either qualifying session gone his way in Perth, while he also made an error in the Sunday Shootout.
Roberts, though, hailed his whole team to lifting, with Waters well placed to clinch his Finals spot in Ipswich.
"We thought he was fairly unlucky at Perth not to be on the front two rows, and on Sunday he was looking really good until he had a small lock-up into Turn 6," Roberts said.
“The whole team has responded really well. The guys have been able to give Tommy the car to go and do the job."
Tickets for the Century Batteries Ipswich Super 440 are on sale now.
