Castrol Perkins Motorsport Leads Championship
14/4/2004 22:31 (Press Release) -
Castrol Perkins Motorsport driver Steven Richards has taken the lead in this year’s championship after finishing 4th in today’s rain soaked race at Eastern Creek.
The race started behind the safety car when a downpour just before the race made conditions to dangerous for a conventional start. Steven settled into third position with Ambrose and Skaife pulling a small gap.
The conditions went from bad to worse when Skaife spun while trying to pass Ambrose bringing out the safety car. The rain started to ease off when Steven came in for the first of his compulsory stops taking on fuel on lap 34.
Steven came in again on lap 46 for the second stop for tyres and rejoined the track in 4th position.
The race was eventually stopped when conditions became unsafe on lap 68 of the 77 lap event giving Rick Kelly the win from Craig Lowndes and Garth Tander.
“We opted for a setup that was half dry half wet so I battled with the car most of the race. It was a mistake free race weekend and if you want to win the championship that is what you need. So I am very happy to finish 4th and go into the lead of the championship” said Steven.
Next of the Castrol Perkins Motorsport drivers was Tony Longhurst who finished 24th in his first race meeting in the VX Commodore. He battled through the race suffering from understeer and at one stage was tapped from behind spinning off the track.
“That was a hard day’s work, I battled with the car all day but I am just happy to finish in one piece and collect some points” said Tony.
Paul Dumbrell was next finishing in 30th position after driving most of the race without a windscreen wiper. The team tried to fix the wiper but was unable so Paul battled on not being able to see much in front of him.
“That was a hard race the wiper stopped working just after the start and I couldn’t see a thing. I came in to see if the guys could fix it but they were unable to so we just battled on and tried to get as many points as we could” said Paul.
The next round heads overseas to New Zealand on the 30th of April.
Release Date: 04/04/2004
Castrol Perkins Motorsport
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