TEAM 18 FRIDAY BATHURST 500 REPORT

MEDIA RELEASE/Team 18 – Photos: Velocity Magazine

DEWALT Racing’s Mark Winterbottom and TRADIE Beer Racing’s David Reynolds are encouraged by their performance and progress after practice for the Bathurst 500 today.

Practice 1 saw warm, dry conditions as cars ventured out on track for the first time in anger for 2024. Reynolds and Winterbottom worked through an extensive program evaluating their setup for the weekend ahead.

The heavens opened before Practice 2 as cars headed out on to Mount Panorama in torrential conditions. On his first flying lap, Reynolds had a moment at The Chase and skated into the sand trap, glancing the outside concrete wall on the way.

The Team 18 crew swiftly repaired the damage to the left rear corner of the TRADIE Beer Camaro, before Reynolds went out in the final 15 minutes of the session. 

Winterbottom survived the conditions unscathed and made strong progress despite not setting a meaningful time in the final session with multiple red flag stoppages and a quickly drying track at the end of the session, he was pleased with the balance of the DEWALT Camaro heading into Qualifying and Race 1 tomorrow.

Team 18 return to action tomorrow for Qualifying at 10:20am AEDT, before a Top 10 Shootout to set the grid for Race 1, kicking off at 4:10pm. All the action can be viewed live on Channel 7, Fox Sports and Kayo. Check your local guides for further details.

SEE OUR FULL THRIFTY BATHURST 500 GALLERY HERE

SEE OUR FULL THRIFTY BATHURST 500 GALLERY HERE

Mark Winterbottom, #100 DEWALT Racing Chevrolet Camaro ZL1

Practice 1: 13th 
Practice 2: 24th 

“In the first session I really struggled with the car and the balance, but the second session really tidied it up.

“I didn’t get a lap with the red flag and what not at the end but I was actually really happy with the balance in that second session. 

“I was worried after the first one, but the guys did a good job. I thought it was pretty quick at the end and hopefully we get to show it tomorrow.

“It was just little subtle changes. We just got to hope that the track didn’t mask up a lot of the problems, but I think we’re starting to understand the car a bit more than what we used to, the changes are probably more effective as opposed to throwing everything at it.”

David Reynolds, #20 TRADIE Beer Racing Chevrolet Camaro ZL1

Practice 1: 7th 
Practice 2: 12th

“This morning was the first dry session, we actually we did a safety car session and we thought we needed a bit of a setup change and we went for the setup change in practice one and the car was better straight away. Then we stuffed around for a bit with different tyre sets, different tyre batches, doing a couple of runs, and made a couple of other changes. 

“The car’s been very responsive, and I think we have progressed the car a little bit. We went back and forth, but I think as a general trend we’ve gone a little bit better. We sat down, had a really good chat after practice one. 

“I love working with Krusty, he’s awesome, really positive, really energetic, and I love it, it’s cool. He makes me happy and we have a good laugh. 

“We had a bunch of changes to put in, and then it pissed down rain, and then had that moment where I gyrated at max speed at the chase. I came around the corner of the chase and it was just all like sheen, aquaplaned and I thought ‘Oh No, this is going to go bad!” And sure enough it did. I kissed the fence and spun into the sand. It wasn’t too bad, did some steering damage on the left rear. The boys did an awesome job to fix it in half an hour and got me back out again.

“It was drying up at that time, it got drier and drier and then the last run was fully dry. I did a reasonable lap, stuffed up the final two corners but I think we’re sort of there or thereabouts. We’ve got a couple of tenths to find, get some understeer out of the car and I think we’ll be apples!”

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