Hi to all you V8 Supercars fans around the world!
On the weekend of the 3rd to the 5th of November 2017 was the ITM Auckland SuperSprint.
This is held at the Pukekohe Park Raceway just south of Auckland in New Zealand.
The V8 Supercars have been racing here since 2013. The track has changed a little from last year with more turns added for the drivers to navigate so I’m sure that the teams would use a different setup for this race weekend.
Other factors that will affect team strategies are:
– With only one race to go for the season after this one, the drivers who are in the championship fight will probably hold back from any risks as they do not want to damage their cars.
– The cars had to be flown over to NZ for the race and their trucks stay in Australia, meaning they have limited spares on hand for repairs.
– There are only 3 safety cars being used for the race.
I think the Red Bull team will be extra careful to ensure they don’t have a repeat of last year when Jamie Whincup and Shane Van Gisbergen came together in the race.
Race 23 on Saturday and Race 24 on Sunday are both 70 laps and 200Kms each.
In the preliminaries to the race, the Qualifying session was abandoned part way through due to the wet weather. As a result, the grid was set from the Friday Practice times.
Things got better and conditions had improved by the time Race 23 started. Rain had stopped and the track had dried out somewhat.
Cameron Waters started on pole position alongside him was Jamie Whincup.
Jamie Whincup beat Cameron Waters to turn 1 and held lead for the first couple of laps. It wasn’t long before Scott McLaughlin got into 2nd place and was pressuring Jamie Whincup’s number 1 position.
Scott McLaughlin took a risk as he tried to go around the outside of Jamie Whincup but didn’t succeed. Jamie Whincup was defensive and didn’t leave him enough room which earned him a bad sportsmanship flag.
On lap 56 David Reynolds and Fabian Coulthard made contact sending David Reynolds into a tyre barrier and Fabian Coulthard had a massive roll over. He was the only DNF for the race. The car was a mess and the Dick Johnson Racing Team Penske didn’t finish the repair until 4:30a.m. Fabian Coulthard was adamant to race on Sunday.
Shane Van Gisbergen was now the race leader followed by Mark Winterbottom and Scott McLaughlin.
Chaz Mostert was trying to re dress so that he wouldn’t get pinged after making contact with David Reynolds exiting turn 8.
In the last laps Shane Van Gisbergen held his lead confidently. No one seemed to be able to catch him.
It was a tight finish. Shane Van Gisbergen reached the chequered flag first having moved up 5 places from his starting position. Mark Winterbottom had taken advantage of his grid starting position 3 and came in 2nd just over 0.8 seconds later. Closely followed by Scott McLaughlin, Jamie Whincup and Jason Bright, with finishing times 01:24:00.2363, 01:24:00.6912 and 01:24:01.3644.
Results for race 23
1st Shane Van Gisbergen – Red Bull Holden Racing Team.
2nd Mark Winterbottom – Prodrive Racing Australia.
3rd Scott Mclaughlin – Shell V Power Racing Team Dick Johnson Racing Team Penske.
4th Jamie Whincup – Red Bull Holden Racing Team.
In race 24 Jamie Whincup started on pole position alongside him was Scott McLaughlin.
During Qualifying for race 24 Craig Lowndes nearly caused a red flag due to running wide in between turns 3 and 4. He recovered well and managed to be placed 12th on the starting grid.
I couldn’t believe that DJR managed to repair Fabian Coulthard’s car after he rolled it the day before, especially due to the limited spares that all the teams have at an ‘away’ race. Fabian Coulthard is a determined man and scored himself the 8th position on the starting grid. It was great to see.
At the start of the 70 lap race Jamie Whincup got the led into the first corner. Scott Mclaughlin had to pull in behind him and stay put because there isn’t room to pass between turns 2 and 3.
Garth Tander was running well early on. He started 11th on the grid but soon moved inside the top 5.
Shane Van Gisbergen was another driver doing well early on and had drama free pit stops.
After the first round of stops and the drivers re-joined the race, Jamie Whincup took his lead back.
Simona de Silvestro was following Rick and Todd Kelly because it was her first race at Pukekohe raceway in New Zealand.
When the 2nd round of pit stops started, Tim Slade making entry to the pits had his pit lane speed limiter on and Shane Van Gisbergen came into the pit lane entry behind him way too fast, and I mean way too fast! He rear-ended Tim Slade who must have gotten the shock of his life. It was a bizarre mistake on Shane Van Gisbergen’s part and he ended up with a bent up bonnet resembling a tent that blocked his view and required him to be guided into his bay. The result was devastating; By the end of the race he had dropped from 7th place on the starting grid to 24th. Such a poor result now put an end to him being a possible contender for the championship.
In the middle of the race the weather was getting worse with clouds starting to come over the race track. It was really dark so fast. I laughed at Neil Crompton comment to fellow commentator Mark Scaife, “It’s gotten so dark, it is like night”.
Towards the end of the race no one else could catch the top 3 drivers which were Jamie Whincup, Scott McLaughlin and Cameron Waters.
Jamie Whincup said he wasn’t feeling very well before the race but he managed to start from pole and basically lead the whole way all bar pit stops.
Results for race 24
1st Jamie Whincup – Red Bull Racing Team.
2nd Scott Mclaughlin – Shell V Power Racing Team.
3rd Cameron Waters – Monster Energy Racing Team.
4th Craig Lowndes – Team Vortex.
Jamie Whincup now leads the championship by 30 points heading into the Coates Hire Newcastle 500 which will take place between the 24th and the 26th of November 2017.
With this win Jamie Whincup now has 75 career pole positions and 107 career race wins.
The big question at the moment is, “who will win the 2017 V8 Supercars Championship?”.