R13 HOUR 3 - Gardner out as title hopefuls do battle
19/11/2000 13:07 (V8 Wire - Jason Whittaker) - Former leaders Wayne Gardner and Neal Bates are out of the 2000 FAI 1000 as the championship combatants play cat and mouse at the pointy end of the field.
Craig Lowndes leads the race just ahead of his title rival, Garth Tander, as the race heads into a fourth hour.
Ross Halliday brought out the safety car early in the third hour, once again bunching the big field together.
When the green flags were again waved on lap 43, a number of cars came to grief, most notably the car of pole-sitters Wayne Gardner and Neal Bates in the second Ford-Tickford Falcon.
Bates beached the car at Skyline after, allegedly, a tap from the K & J Thermal Products Falcon of which Greg Crick was at the wheel.
Bates was pulled from the sand, and got the car back to pitlane. After a lengthy stop, Bates returned to racing only to park the car on Mountain Straight with terminal clutch problems a matter of laps later.
The Matt Neal-piloted Big Kev Commodore shredded a tyre on Conrod Straight and limped back to pitlane. With the help of some gaffer tape to hold the front spoiler in place, Neal returned to the circuit.
The Chiko Commodore of Ryan McLeod and Wayne Wakefield spectacularly clouted the wall on Conrod, and the car has since retired.
Defending champions Greg Murphy and Steven Richards suffered a setback with a clogged front air dam forcing the car into pitlane for an unscheduled stop on lap 53.
As conditions worsened Greg Crick pirouetted on Hell corner, as did the Gatorade car on the top of the mountain, and Phillip Scifleet at the Chase.
After a long battle with Larry Perkins on the track, Alain Menu dived into pitlane to take advantage of another safety car to make their break pad change. The OzEmail Falcon, which is now in serious contention, did the same.
A flying Neil Crompton, who is lapping significantly faster than the lead HRT car, took third from Larry Perkins late in the hour.
A spin by the second HRT Commodore of Yvan Muller and Jason Plato has again brought out the pace car as the race moves into a fourth hour. The yellow flag conditions had both DJR cars diving into pitlane for the second of their stops.
The Mitre 10 car is in the box seat, sitting in sixth and the only car to have made a pad change.
Lowndes continues to lead the race from Garth Tander under safety car conditions with 100 laps to race. The drizzle at Mt Panorama continues.
**POSITIONS AFTER HOUR THREE**
1st LOWNDES/SKAIFE (Mobil-Holden Racing) - VT Commodore
2nd BARGWANNA/TANDER (Team Valvoline-Cummins) - VT Commodore
3rd INGALL/PERKINS (Castrol Perkins Racing) - VT Commodore
4th CROMPTON/SETON (Ford-Tickford Racing) - AU Falcon
5th JOHNSON/McLEAN (Shell Helix Racing) - AU Falcon | |
