Tasman delivers on Oran Park promise
16/8/2004 12:23 (Press Release) -
Tasman Motorsport promised their fans something special for their home round, and delivered with Jason Richards’ meritorious eighth placing in Round 8 of the V8 Supercar Championship Series, after being close to the top of the category all weekend.
Additionally, the team ran a second car for the first time, with Richards’ young partner for the upcoming enduro races, Fabian Coulthard, given a chance to race in a V8 Supercar for the first time. Given a charter to simply learn all he could, Coulthard failed to disappoint with a strong, mature debut.
Richards said he was delighted with the competitiveness shown by the single-car, Sydney-based team in only its third round with its new VY Commodore. “We just wanted to come here and show what we could do, and I think we achieved that,” he said.
“We expected a good showing here on our home track, and we’ve had a pretty decent handle on the car since early on in the weekend.”
Richards exceeded all expectation by not only reaching the Top 10 Shootout, but posting the fourth-fastest time to start from a career-best fourth on the grid. With a fantastic start he went to the first corner in third placing, but was pushed wide a few corners later to lose three positions. From that point Richards found his niche, holding his own to eventually finish 7th in the first race and 9th in the second.
Coulthard, meanwhile, had an eventful start to the weekend with a collision with Kmart Racing’s Greg Murphy – who ironically is Coulthard’s boss in the Porsche-based Carrera Cup category where Coulthard has raced with great success this year – during one of the practice sessions.
However, he put that behind him as he set off on a self-proclaimed mission “to learn as much as I can and keep the car on the black stuff”.
He succeeded on both counts, a minor brake lock-up in Race 1 a small setback as he dropped several positions to finish 29th, but recovering well in the second race to finish 19th.
“Look, you’re always thinking you’re racing to win, but this weekend I had to put that in the back of my mind and just cram as much in as I could about the way these cars work,” he said.
“They don’t have ABS like the Porsches do, and that’s a big adjustment to start with.
“I’m very much looking forward to the enduros, I think Jason and I can form a pretty strong combination if current form is any indication.”
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