Car's on the scrap heap, but Morris still excited
1/8/2001 18:16 (V8 Wire - Jason Whittaker) -
It took just one split-second slip-up from British driver Matt Neal to setback Paul Morris and team up to six months of work and hundreds of thousands of dollars at Oran Park Raceway last weekend.
The always-excitable Big Kev came crashing back to earth on Saturday, just a fortnight after sampling the winner's champagne at Calder Park, when Neal put the team’s brand-new VX Commodore into the concrete at the start of the main straight during qualifying.
The car is now on the scrap heap after just a handful of laps under its bonnet, and you couldn’t blame Morris for putting his young import on the next plane back to London.
Instead, publicly at least, Morris remains philosophical.
“Obviously it has been disappointing for everyone involved, but that’s the way this sport can go sometimes,” the Queenslander said.
“We will need to re-group and start building a new car as soon as possible.
A new body shell will be sourced by the team in the next few weeks to begin the arduous task of building a new car. Morris is hopeful of having the car ready for a Bathurst baptism in October.
In the meantime, Morris, together with Neal, will campaign the team’s vintage ex-HRT VT Commodore at this month’s VIP Petfoods Queensland 500. After taking out the Calder round in the same car, Morris has every reason to be confident.
“We have proven this year that our old car is capable of being very competitive and I think we go to Queensland Raceway with a real good chance," he said.
“The Queensland 500 is our home race of the year and you always want to perform as well as possible in front of a home crowd,” he said.
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