BJR scores top ten result in Darwin heat

Andre Heimgartner finished eighth in the first race of the weekend at Hidden Valley for Brad Jones Racing. 

A battle of strategy played out in Race 11 of the Supercars Championship at the Darwin Triple Crown.

All four of the Brad Jones Racing cars opted for two-tyre stops, which meant that while they made immediate gains at the start of the race, those that took three or four tyres were stronger in the latter stages.

It was therefore an incredible effort that the R&J Batteries driver was able to cling on to a top ten finish. 

Heimgartner was one of the late stoppers, coming to pit lane just after half race distance and rejoining in 11th.

The Kiwi was running as high as 7th before the charging four-tyre stoppers came through and he claimed 9th on the line and 8th after a penalty for Cam Waters. 

Darwin’s own Bryce Fullwood had a difficult day, though he did find pace in the earlier practice session, Fullwood wasn’t comfortable in the car during the race.

The Middy’s Electrical Camaro was serviced with a set of rears on Lap 16, meaning Fullwood had to complete 32 laps on those rears.

He was able to bring the car home in 17th, followed by team-mate Macauley Jones.

The Pizza Hut Racing Camaro of Jones had an excellent first stint, making up several spots.

It was again, in those late stages of the race where Jones fell back.

Jaxon Evans in the SCT Logistics car was slapped with a questionable penalty for contact with Cooper Murray in the Wildcard entry at Turn 1.

Which meant an uphill battle from there on in for the #12 Camaro, Evans was classified in 21st.

The event continues tomorrow with a full reset, cars are on track for qualifying at 10:25 ACST/10:55 AEST ahead of the race at 15:10/15:40. 

Quoteboard

Andre Heimgartner
 Supercars driver, #8 R&J Batteries Camaro
"The race was not too bad. Managed to find a bit of speed early on versus other rounds and managed to make up a spot or so, or at least maintain our spot which was good. But then sort of found a bit sort of numb from there on and sort of, I guess lacked our traditional really strong ending. Obviously some different strategies with four tyres. This track you need to be a lot faster to pass so it's tricky as well. Not a bad day overall. I think we need to work a bit on the quali car tomorrow to get back into the to the Shoot Out but it's good points and good learnings."

Bryce Fullwood
Supercars driver, #14 Middy's Electrical Camaro
"Tough race for us today. I felt like we were pretty competitive in the first 10 laps and then the balance really swung sort of quite unexpectedly with the car. We pitted early and put two tyres on, it's obvious now that four tyres was certainly the go. A little bit of a tough race there. I was hoping for a little bit more out of the car. So it was 17th, but had a really good little race there with Cam Hill there to the line but looking forward to tomorrow. I think if we can get the thing a bit further up there, we probably got to speed the race there if we do a little bit better job."

Macauley Jones
Supercars driver, #96 Pizza Hut Camaro
"Felt odd not qualifying on a Saturday. Yeah, the conditions are pretty hard to manage. We're not super stoked with the strategy of two rear tyres in the race. But all of our cars did that. Like our race pace wasn't too bad but sort of stuck there in traffic and stuck to the 14 car. We sort of have the same strengths or weaknesses so it's pretty difficult to pass. Still need to go to the drawing board a little bit and keep chipping away at what we're doing to make some speed."

Jaxon Evans
Supercars driver, #12 SCT Logistics Camaro
"Obviously a tough race. We had practice this morning and sort of found a little bit of time within the car, adjusting the setup to what we thought was going to work in the race. Starting out of 21st was always going to be difficult but we were pretty confident we could move forward a little bit. Everyone races pretty hard at the back of the grid, some pretty crazy moves going on and things like that. So got caught up in a bit of that at the beginning of the race and then yeah, went for a move myself down at Turn 1 and when you're in the braking zone, it's pretty hard to change a line so I made contact with another car. Turned them around and got penalised for it. I don't agree with the penalty but it is what it is, we had to serve it during the race and couldn't argue. So that sort of put a halt to any progress that we were going to make so  not an ideal race. Still managed to finish, gather some data, so we'll go through that and try reset and improve for first of all for tomorrow's qualifying and you know hopefully start a little bit further up."