Tickford keen to carry momentum into Winton

TICKFORD RACING – WINTON SUPERSPRINT PREVIEW

17 May, 2022
Tickford Racing heads to this weekend’s Winton SuperSprint with renewed confidence following its most competitive outing of the 2022 Supercars season at the Perth SuperNight earlier this month. With two podium finishes and all four of its cars consistently in the top 10 in Western Australia, the team now heads to its designated test track for the fifth event of the 2022 campaign with Cam Waters and James Courtney’s garage pairing sitting third in the Supercars teams’ championship.
                                                       
Waters (No. 6 Monster Energy Ford Mustang) claimed finishes of third, fourth, and seventh in Perth to vault to fourth in the drivers’ championship through 12 races, but is keen to crack the top spot after a win in Race 11 was taken away from him by a time penalty.
 
Enjoying the continued support of Snowy River Caravans this weekend at Winton, Courtney (No. 5 Snowy River Caravans Ford Mustang) scored a popular runner-up finish in Race 12 at Perth. Along with two seventh place finishes in WA, Courtney climbed to 10^th in the drivers’ championship, and is optimistic he can continue his strong form this weekend in regional Victoria.
 
After showing front running speed in Perth, Thomas Randle (No. 55 Castrol Racing Ford Mustang) is looking forward to returning to track after early misfortune ruined both Races 11 and 12 for the 26-year old. Randle undertook a rookie test day at Winton last week in final preparation for the event, which will be his first race event in a Supercar at the venue.
 
Jake Kostecki (No. 56 Tradie Ford Mustang) will also take on his first Supercars race event at Winton this weekend, and is riding a wave of confidence after a career-best event in Perth. Kostecki started third in Race 11 before scoring his first top 10 finish of the season and showed promising pace across the weekend, giving reason for optimism heading into this weekend’s running.
 
After cancellations of the event in 2020 and 2021, this weekend marks the first Supercars race event at Winton since 2019, and is the fifth race event on the 2022 calendar. On-track Supercars action begins with practice, qualifying, and Race 13 on Saturday, followed by back to back qualifying and Races 14 and 15 on Sunday afternoon.

DRIVERS’ VIEW
No. 5 Snowy River Caravans Ford Mustang
James Courtney
“It’s crazy to think after all the testing we’ve done at Winton that we haven’t actually raced there in so long, we get a lot of local fans up there so it’ll be great to race in front of them again. We’ve hit a good stride the last few rounds being consistently in that top six or eight, and getting that podium in Perth was a fantastic boost for the team. Unlike a lot of the southern teams we didn’t take the full team up to test last week, but Thomas (Randle) did a rookie day and gained some good insights for us, so we’ll look to apply those learnings and get us in a good window to start the weekend. The goal’s definitely to be in that fight at the front more regularly and we’ve shown we deserve to be up there, we’ll go out and try to bring home some more silverware.”
 
No. 6 Monster Energy Ford Mustang
Cam Waters
“It’s good to be going back to Winton, it feels like we’re there every couple of months testing but it’ll be great to have the crowds back and go racing there. We’ve had a pretty up and down start to the season, but Perth was definitely a good step for us even with what happened in the second race, it was good for our championship and gave us a bit of momentum we can carry into this weekend. Winton’s a tough little track but it makes for good, hard racing, so I’m looking forward to getting back up there and having a crack.”
 
No. 55 Castrol Racing Ford Mustang
Thomas Randle
“I’m really looking forward to this weekend and racing at Winton, it’s strange to say it’ll be my first race there in a Supercar considering all the testing I’ve done there, it feels like I’ve done a thousand laps around there in testing. We took up a rookie day last week as well just to try some things and help me get my eye in for this weekend, and we’re feeling pretty good. Our weekend in Perth ended pretty terribly – getting hit by other cars on Lap 1 of both races – but we had really good car speed and I think with just some clean races we should be right in that top half of the field and top 10. It’s been a pretty tough start to the year so I really want to just have a solid weekend and get our season going in the right direction, hopefully we can do just that this weekend.”
 
No. 56 Tradie Ford Mustang
Jake Kostecki
“I’m looking forward to racing in Winton this weekend, it’ll be good to build on the progress we’ve made over the last couple of rounds. Perth was a pretty strong event for us, we weren’t perfect but we had good speed and it was great to show what we’re capable of. We’ve been making steady gains each race, so if we can keep qualifying well and having solid races we’ll keep getting stronger and stronger. I actually don’t have a lot of mileage at Winton so I have a bit of a learning curve to figure out, but obviously the team’s very experienced there and having three team mates will be great for me to absorb everything I can, and hopefully we can have a strong weekend with all four cars.”
 
Tim Edwards, Team Principal
“We’ve had a couple false starts with races at Winton the last couple years, and the fans there are always incredibly passionate so it’ll be great to finally get there and put on some racing again. It’s a tricky circuit to get right but it always promotes good, hard racing which we always enjoy. Perth was a pretty positive event for us but we still had some things go wrong, so while it’s nice for us to come in with some momentum we need to focus on executing and taking care of everything we can control. If we do that I think we’ll have a lot of happy faces come Sunday night.”
 
EVENT NAME: Winton SuperSprint
DATE:May 21-22
LOCATION: Winton, VIC
EVENT NUMBER:5 of 13
FORMAT:Saturday – 2 x 30-min RSC practice, 3 x 10-min RSC Quali segments, 1 x 36-lap RSC race (109 km); Sunday – 2 x 10-min RSC Quali, 2 x 36-lap RSC race (109 km)
CIRCUIT: Winton Motor Raceway
LENGTH: 3.0-kilometres
DESCRIPTION:Known as “the nation’s action track,” Winton is one of the oldest circuits on the Supercars calendar, founded in 1961. Despite being a relatively slow circuit, Winton’s tight corners and hard braking zones make for entertaining “elbows out” motorsport year after year.
TRACK RECORD: 1m19.71s (Fabian Coulthard, 2016)
TICKFORD RACING BEST RESULT: 1st – Jason Bright (2006), Mark Winterbottom (2013, 2014, 2015 x 2), Chaz Mostert (2015)
 
Ends.