Bright finishes third in V8 Supercar Championship
11/1/2005 16:15 (Press Release) -
Jason Bright fought a weekend-long battle for second placing in the V8 Supercar Championship Series with rivals Russell Ingall and Greg Murphy, eventually being shaded by Ingall but edging ahead of Murphy to finish third.
On an often torrid weekend of desperate racing, fellow PWR Racing driver Paul Weel continued his miserable run of outs with another big accident which saw him completely miss Race 1, and eventually limp home in 27th placing for the round to finish 17th in championship standings.
Bright was deflated after the third and final race, having held a small lead over Ingall and Murphy after Race 2. “This isn’t how we planned to end it,” said Bright, who leaves the team to make way for Murphy in 2005.
“We knew coming here that it was going to be tough to catch Marcos (Ambrose) and he deserves to win the championship, but we really thought second placing would have been a great way for a team in only its second year to finish off.”
The weekend kicked off promisingly for Bright, consistent speed in practice and qualifying sessions translating to a 5th-place start in Race 1 and a 3rd place finish.
However, a missed start in Race 2 cost Bright five places, and a coming-together with Mark Skaife pushed a guard on to a tyre and resulted in an extra pitstop which relegated him to near the rear of the field.
“I just got a bit loose as I was trying to get past David Besnard and lost the rear end, then Skaifey got under me and I steered into him,” Bright said. “It was all my own fault, unfortunately, and that really stuffed us up.”
Bright finished 21st in the second race but retained 2nd placing in the championship, but a coming-together with Mark Winterbottom at the beginning of Race 3 cost another handful of placings and bent Bright’s steering, rendering him unable to make up any further ground.
“It was really all over at that point, unless Russell tripped over,” Bright said. “We really thought we had the car speed to pull off second place this weekend but a few errors – mine, the team’s, other drivers – put us on the back foot.”
Weel was blunt in his assessment of the weekend’s racing, coming on the heels of a huge shunt at the previous round in Tasmania. “I must have run over a black cat,” he said. “I can’t seem to take a trick at the moment, I’m just happy that it’s finally over.”
His woes began in qualifying, when he was inexplicably shunted into a wall by John Bowe on just his second lap, relegating him to 32nd position in qualifying.
However, he was unable to take his position for Race 1 after the team was unable to fix the damaged #16 Commodore in time. After sitting out the race Weel rejoined Race 2 at the rear of the grid, an oil leak costing him 15 seconds during his compulsory pitstop and killing off any hope of a good finish.
Starting from 25th for the final race, Weel had raced to 13th within the first four laps but another pitstop problem – this time Weel flooding the engine and stalling – saw him limp home in 26th placing.
“It’s pretty disappointing because we certainly had good car speed this weekend,” Weel said.
PWR Racing owner Kees Weel said the team had made its own luck. “Good teams find a way to stay out of trouble, and we didn’t do that,” he said. “Things have happened that shouldn’t have and I’m disappointed that we haven’t been able to deliver on what we set out to do.”
Release Date: 05/12/2004
PWR Racing
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