The weather at Symmons Plains International Raceway started to grin and bear its wintery teeth for the Saturday morning practice session with a chilly temperature of 12 degrees. The team rolled out and tested with wets in anticipation for what may come later. Waters logged his best lap time of54.507sec good enough for P2 and Randle 54.834sec in P13.
Moving into the three-part qualifying the team cleared part1 with Waters logging a lap time of 51.474 good enough for P10 and Randle in P8with 51.445 sec.
Part 2. On lap 10 of the session, Randle came undone on the last turn, where he dropped a wheel on the wet grass running wide and losing grip. This culminated in his car coming back across the track and without any chance of being able to regain grip, was lucky to get away with a very light tap of the inside wall. This error was after his best effort, which at that time wash is sixth lap of 51.502sec putting him in 16th position and out for part 3. Waters in his run was able to achieve a fastest lap of 51.070sec on his final run (lap 19) and in P2.
Part 3 saw the fastest ten cars battle it out. Waters completed his best time of 51.070sec, putting him on the front row in P2; a gap of only 0.082 to pole.
Starting from the front row in the race, Waters and Pole sitter Feeney dragged to the first corner where car #6 slotted into second place. Mid race the team decided to take two rears in the pit stop and the undercut was not as powerful as hoped. Waters continued to fight valiantly at the front, ultimately finishing 4th five seconds adrift. Randle who started 16th, raced hard and gained four places to finish 12th.
Race 17 results place our team third in the Championship,only 8 points behind second. Waters continues to chip away at the series leader’s gap, 362 points behind, while Randle sits 8th.
We go away from the race to focus on a stronger performance tomorrow, with the same race structure for Sunday.
