Dexion qualify in the dozen
5/9/2004 23:05 (Press Release) -
Dexion Racing’s Tony Evangelou has qualified in a very respectable 12th place for the final round of the Konica Minolta V8 Supercar Series at Mallala Motor Sport Park today.
The small but hard-working team will start on the sixth row of the grid and Evangelou is confident that a solid result will come from the weekend.
“The car was really good in qualifying,” he said.
“I’m sure this speed will translate into race pace. As long as we can get through the first heat and the reverse grid race, we’ll be looking good.”
Two practice sessions and a qualifying session were held today, and for Dexion Racing, it was a slowish start.
Evangelou claimed the car was “too soft” in the first practice session and recorded the 17th fastest time. Practice 2 was no better, and Evangelou fell down to 21st out of the 26 car field.
But the team found a massive speed gain on brand-new tyres and stormed up the list to claim 12th. The result puts them in front of a number of regular top five drivers, including Lee Holdsworth, Wayne Wakefield and Tony D’Alberto. It will be a career-best starting position for Evangelou and the team, but the Victorian claimed post-qualifying that it could have been even better.
“The car is very good,” said Evangelou.
“I made a couple of mistakes on my fast lap so if I had got all my sectors right, we could have cracked the top 10, for sure.
“The car had so much grip in qualifying compared to practice. It was a real treat.”
Team manager David Moulden echoed Evangelou’s analysis.
“We had way more gain on the green tyres than what we expected,” he said.
“I’m confident the car will race really well against some of the top runners.”
Stone Brothers Racing endurance driver Greg Ritter has qualified on pole position, followed by championship contenders Luke Youlden, Andrew Jones, Cameron McLean and Owen Kelly. All of the top five are Ford Falcon AUs.
Dexion Racing is again supported by a large group of corporate guest, including some of Dexion’s Franchise Outlet owners and their valued clients. They will be wined-and-dined in their corporate tent at the end of the back straight while enjoying the best racing V8 Supercar has to offer.
Mallala’s KMV8 meeting will be held tomorrow, featuring three races including a complete reverse grid heat. Race 1 is at 11.25am, Race 2 is scheduled for 1.20pm while the championship finale will be run and won at 3.10pm.
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