Latest / Full Credit to the Noise / Sandown 500 daily: Sunday
Transcript
- Recording 163 2: Hello and welcome to the Sunday edition of our daily podcast from the Sand Down five hundred. My name is Andrew Van Lorn and I'm joined by Speed Cafe's managing editor, Stefan Bartholomeyus. Stefan, that was a pretty interesting and at times highly entertaining weekend of car racing, really? It was. And nice conditions today at the track brought out a lot of fans, which was good to see it. Felt a little light on the previous two days, but today was a big day. Yeah. It was busy and we've Got our grand finalists and a pretty tasty four we've got. Absolutely. I'll just run through the headline results from the day. So the race was won by Matt Payne, which that of course secured him top seating heading to Adelaide. Anton Di Pasquale finished second, painfully close to making it through, but not quite. So he is out of the running. And Cooper Murray was third with a fantastic drive. It's just his second outing with Premier Racing, and he picks up his first podium. the first podium of the season for premiere and I think is that their first solo podium as well because the other ones came at Sandin and Bathurst. It's the first one that I can remember. Yes. All right. So that's a that was a pretty decent effort. Now in terms of the finals, as you say, we have got our grand finalists for Adelaide locked in. So Matt Payne goes in as top seed. He Brody Kastecki is second despite a bit of a ropey day for him today in the race, which we'll get onto in a moment. So he'll go into Adelaide 30 points behind Matt Payne. Brock Feeney is seeded third. He'll be 54 points behind Matt Payne and Chaz Mostett, the only non-forward runner in the Toyota Super to get through. He'll head to Adelaide sitting fourth with a 72-point gap back to the leader. Today's race wasn't sort of the action-packed epic that yesterday's was, but I guess with this format, the racing, sorry, the storylines are protected by the fact that we have. this ongoing fight to get through to Adelaide. So it was interesting all the same. Yeah, it was much more of a slower burn than than yesterday. Yeah. we had more divergence in strategies because of the fact that there wasn't safety cars triggering the pit stops like we had yesterday. Yep. And then it did build into this crescendo where Anton Di Pasquale was chasing down Matt Payne for the win that Anton had to have and he just didn't quite have enough. And Matt was able to keep his cool when he came across a bunch of lap cars in the last couple of laps that had him sweating up a little bit. Yeah, we talked yesterday about how there seemed to be a I don't know if conservative is the right term, but there seemed to be a plan at Grove Racing for Matt Payne in terms of, securing the points and and really ensuring that he did go to Adelaide as the top seed. Today was a little bit different. he just had enough car pace, he did a great job in the shootout to put it on pole and then There was that pressure from Anton, but it did feel like he had a fair bit in hand throughout the race. Well, from the start of the weekend they had a really fast car at Grove Racing. So that was the the first box tick they didn't quite execute yesterday. But one thing they did really well today was actually convert in the shootout, which is something that's been a little bit of a weakness for Matt. As good as he has been in qualifying, he's often gone backwards one or two in the shootout. So Again, tick that box and then from there it was just classic Matt Payne, win the start, get the head down. And yes, Anton was was catching him at the end, but I didn't feel like he was gonna be beaten. Nah, me neither. tough break for Anton to not get through to Adelaide. Obviously he did come into the weekend in that seventh seed, so he had a lot to do across the weekend, probably didn't quite do the damage on Saturday that he would have liked to. There was a lot of expectation that he was going to be really competitive this weekend. But we did see that today on the soft tire. obviously that car was was pretty well hooked up and he gave it a good shake. There were times there where he was actually mathematically through on points. Like he actually had a big enough gap to some of the other finalists to get through. But as the race kind of reached its conclusion, it became clear that he wasn't going to get through on points and he had to win. but yeah, I think it would be a pretty bittersweet feeling at team eighteen at the moment because it was a pretty good day for them in terms of that number eighteen Camaro, but they're out of the running. Yeah, Charlie Schwerkold and Anton were both in the press conference and you could tell they were both pretty disappointed. they missed out very narrowly on a very big prize only about a month ago. And they've just missed out again here on the grand final. But they were both using the word proud a lot as well and I do think the fact they went out in a race where they had really good car speed, they can sort of hang their hats on that to an extent. We saw the Chevies really come back today. There was yeah a couple of them that were pretty quick, but yeah, not quite enough for Antony pretty frustrated with Thomas Randall just before the second round of stops, where Tommy had pitted and come out in front and cost him a little bit of time. It was only about a second. Mm-hmm. It Would have put a fair bit more pressure on on Matt if Anton hadn't lost that. But yeah, it's the way it goes. Brock Feeney was fourth in the race. didn't look overly convincing in qualifying, to be honest. Kind of just snuck through to the shootout, but then made some pretty good ground in the shootout. And then that fourth position in the race ensured that he got through in the third seed to Adelaide. we Spoke about it yesterday, I can't remember if it was on the podcast or if we were just talking about it. But, we felt that when push came to shove, because there, he was on the bubble yesterday, after a reasonably tough day, but we sort of felt like he would get the job done, and that's exactly what he did. Yeah, I thought they were going to be better on this tire, including they didn't have the the drama and tire life they did yesterday, but again, they didn't just quite have the speed, which is a bit uncharacteristic for triple eight at Sandown. Yep. and so he goes into now the grand final in a very different position than last year. Absolutely. Where he was the leader and had dominated the year. It was always gonna be different because he hasn't had that domination. But yeah, now he he said this evening that he feels like he's got not much to lose now in the grand final. And I think part of that is because these seeding points that they give, they've actually stretched those out this year. So I feel like they did that because Brock lost last year. So unfortunately now he finds himself on the wrong end of something that was done in reaction to his heartbreak last year. But yeah, when you actually look at the seeding spread, if Matt Payne DNFs the first race and Brock wins it, Matt's still gonna go into the Saturday with more points than Brock. So that's a significant spread. Yep. No, it is tough going for anyone outside the top two, really, in Adelaide. That's the reality of the new point system. Chaz Mostett heads to Adelaide seated fourth. He finished fifth in the race today. He had a bit to do because he didn't make the shootout. I think he was eleventh on the grid, was he? He was. He just got bumped by James Golding right at the death in that core final. Yeah, so he had a bit to do in that race. He did need need to make some strides forward. And obviously with Anton being right at the front, that was putting pressure on on everyone that was sort of around the bubble there. But ultimately put in a Chaz Mostett style drive, dragged it to fifth place, and ensures that he is still in the hunt to defend his championship. Yeah, just a bit of a Chaz weekend. he had to dig himself out of a hole on both days because he was only tenth after messing up in the shootout yesterday. So yeah, some some mistakes, some huge frustration and then dragging the thing forward and and doing enough to be able to have a crack at least at defending this title, which is a huge thing for Walkenshaws and Toyota in the first year of that partnership. I think it's it's exciting to have those guys in the grand final. Yeah, it definitely is. Will Brown finished the race seventh, which was a decent recovery given the fact he qualified 19th, was it? had an absolute shocker of a start to the day. Obviously, with all of this talk about what happened on Saturday as well and and and the mistakes that he made that that put him almost out of contention. seventh wasn't enough to get through. But if you look at it, if you isolate the race result, that was pretty good progress moving forward. Obviously, much better race pace on this tire, as you said, for the triple eight Mustangs. and Potentially it is a bit of an advantage for Brock Feeney to have his teammate out of the running heading to Adelaide. Yeah, they're not going to have that problem of having to balance the two of them. Although again, I'm sure they would have preferred to have that problem. So yeah, in the end, he he did well in the race today, Will, but the damage was done yesterday and there was still a lot of talk today in the paddock about the the mistake that he made yesterday and the context in which it occurred. Just trying desperately hard not have his pants pulled down by his mate Brody Kastecki again. And the dynamic between those two is is a big talking point in the paddock. It is, and I don't think we've heard the last of that as well. speaking of Brody Kastecki, he was tenth in the race today. He started fourth, but was hit with a pit lane penalty very early on for a grid procedure breach. Now, obviously he was locked into to Adelaide, courtesy of winning the race on Saturday, but So there was no danger he was gonna be knocked out of contention, but as we've spoken about, the seatings are actually super important going into Adelaide. So I think there was a fair bit of relief that he was able to drag himself 'cause it dropped into second last when he served the penalty 'cause it was only lap eleven, so the field spread wasn't wasn't massive. and So the penalty was for turning the engine off on the way to the grid. Yep. So Why has he done that? 'Cause that rule's been in place for for ages. You spoke to Tom Moore, the team manager and his race engineer as well. Yeah, so it's on the reconnaissance lap. So as they exit Pit Lane, they do the reconnaissance lap and then they pull up on the grid and they sit there for all the pre race celebrations and all whatever. I don't even know what you'd call it. Particularly not this time of the weekend and this time of night, but Yeah, so what he's effectively done, according to the Steward's report, the car was switched off for seven seconds as it decelerated from thirty one point eight kilometers an hour to zero kilometers an hour. Now what the rules say is that the car has to be running when it comes to a stop on the grid. And the reason for that is is because there's people on the grid or next to the track or whatever, 'cause the crews go out with their trolleys and all that sort of stuff to to do the the last preparations on the car before the race starts. So The reason he did it was to try and save a bit of fuel. It wasn't a team direction, according to Tom Moore. it was something Brody just decided to do and probably misjudged it and went a bit early on it. According to Tom, it's incredibly common and you always hear cars rolling to a stop with the engine off. We also had a bit of a chat to Tim Edwards about it, just to get some clarity around why the rule exists and that sort of stuff. And he had a different take on that. It's a it's a risky play because when everyone's on the grid, they love daubing in each other. Well that's kinda what Tim said. He said no one does it because there's a lot of eyes out there. So just to fully clarify why that rule is there, if there's people there, obviously you want the car making noise so people know if there's a car approaching. The hybrid effect. Yes, correct. So yeah, really odd one. because as I said i it It wasn't like today was a risk free day for Brady just because he's qualified 'cause you want one of those first two spots. So, he really put that at risk with what happened and had a lot of work to do to to get back through the field and and ensure he was second. So there was a fair bit of relief in the DJ R garage that he was able to do that. So this is another one where it feels like the stewards have just picked a penalty out of the sky and randomly applied it. He got a Pit lane penalty, which feels really harsh. That but again, this is the recommended penalties table that Supercars supplies to the stewards that Supercars refuses to share even with the teams. Yeah. So then everyone gets shocked when when the penalty gets handed down. Yeah, because it it it was I don't think there's any real doubt about the fact that it's harsh penalty for what it is. and that was something that Tom Moore said. Like he what he had no arguments it was a penalty. He did say if Brody had said to us before the race, hey, I'm gonna. try and save a bit of fuel by switching the car off as I roll into the grid box. He said we would have said, please don't do that, because we we'll get in trouble for it. So he he had no issue with the fact. He did feel that the there was a few raised eyebrows as he said about their fuel burn on Saturday and how quick they were in the lane. And he felt like maybe there were more eyes on them in the general sense of fuel usage because of that. I don't know if that's true or not, but that was something that he did feel may have been a factor in terms of well they basically won the race yesterday because their pit lane time was a bit sharper than the others and they did save fuel in the back end. So clearly they prioritised that lowering your pit lane time and Brody had actually said after the race that's something we've been working on all year. So yeah this this is not the way to do it though. No, exactly. So yeah look like I say Tom Tom was completely satisfied that it was a breach and deserved to be penalised. He was taken aback by the severity of the penalty. Because as he said, a pit lane penalty is basically the race ender. It's meant to take you right out of contention. So he felt like that was a very harsh penalty for something that he said wasn't a performance advantage. I know other people will argue that it could be. and was a misjudgment, not a premeditated plan or anything like that. So I think there is probably a fair argument in that. I mean, if you jump the start, you don't always get a pit lane penalty. And that's literally starting the race before it's anyone else. Yeah, but if you jump the start, you don't always get an advantage. No. But if you save a bit of fuel, that's an advantage every day of the week. So either way, Brody did well to get his head down and recover to tenth and keep that second place seating and only be thirty points down on Matt heading into Adelaide. Absolutely. And that is a tasty little battle between Matt Payne and Brody Kastecki. Just if you just isolated to that for Adelaide. Like that's gonna be pretty cool. Now, let's get on to Cameron Waters because he obviously came well, he came into today with some momentum. He was one point below the cut line, but on the podium yesterday, the team really felt that the soft tire was going to be much kinder to them than the super soft was. There was a fair bit of hope that they could either win that race and qualify, or even just be fast enough to to get through on points and and and do it that way. And it was just a shocker. And they were really I spoke to Matty Roberts, the team manager. this evening and he was deflated and the whole garage was deflated because I think they really felt like they had a a big shot at getting through. And then you put Cam Waters on a street circuit and who knows what can happen from there. but they were really scratching their head because the Tommy Randall car was pretty fast. And they felt like in Q one Cam's car was quick and then they got to Q two and they went backwards by like half a second for no real reason. They hadn't touched the car or done anything. And he actually said that that there's a they have a theory that and we've been talking about this a lot, particularly with wet tires, not so much with slicks, but there could have been a tie batch issue. And they feel like once they cycled through a certain set of tires, they've been parted out and put into other sets for the race. And then the last stint that was with none of those tires, the car was a jet again. So I haven't analyzed the lap times to see exactly how quick it was, but They obviously do. And that was his theory, because they didn't really have any other reason to to believe that the pace would just fall off a cliff like that. Maybe it got faster towards the end when the ballast of that rear vision mirror was chucked out the top. Yeah, that was a funny one as well. Yep. That's bizarre. Yeah, he Maddie said that that's they think that's just the curbs at Sandown. Just cracked the it just cracked the mount and it fell down. So that compromised their strategy a little bit because they were told they had to pit straight away. he said it was a few laps earlier than they would have ideally liked to. But supercars came down and said, You gotta you gotta come in now. he Maddie said he put it behind the seat, it probably wasn't gonna go anywhere, but that that's loose loose item in the cabin, yeah. Yeah, he can't do that. So they came in and he hurled it out the window and and and off he went. So it compromised him a bit on strategy, but ultimately like the pace was nowhere near there for him to to have any crack at it. Like he was just out of the running. you think, was there a mistake in qualifying? You expect that he's gonna move forward in the race. It it probably I think by the end of qualifying the hopes were pretty dashed because he wasn't gonna be able to get far enough up unless there was some real dramas for some of the other cars. But yeah, barely would you finish fifteenth in the race, like just made just made no progress. So interesting theory. I got no idea if it's if that is the case or not, but that is certainly the view at Tickford, and that's 'cause they can't really find any other reason for the speed to have disappeared. Yeah, I'm not surprised they're hugely disappointed considering this is now two years in a row, both years where this final system's been in play. Yeah. That they've fallen at the semi final. It's like that footy team losing prelims. You just want to crack at the at the grand final and they've come up short on a day where yeah, like Tommy Randall, he did have the pace. He finished sixth in the end. so Well, I think that's I think that's sort of adds weight to the theory that something weird was going on because Maddie said the the setups and the cars were almost identical. It wasn't like they went on some drastic direction or in some drastic direction on one car and it worked or whatever. And I think if both cars had been slow, then they'd be going, Well, we we we got this wrong. But the fact is that what they did did work if you base it off where Tommy was. So yeah, it's a weird one. And like Cam left the circuit almost immediately after the race. He was obviously pretty devastated as well. and There was, yeah, like I say, it was a pretty deflated feeling in that garage, which is part of the theater of the whole thing, right? that's that's what makes it cool. And ultimately, if you look at what the points would look like without finals, like they would have been out of the running a long time ago. The championship would actually, I think, be over as of today, basically. So Yeah, with Matt Payne winning it. With Matt Payne as the champion. So as brutal as it will feel for those guys right now, the beauty of this format is that they do get to stay in contention so much longer. Yeah. It kept them in it and now it's kicked him out. what else do you want to talk about? I think just to back over the Cooper Murray performance, I think it has surprised everyone that he's found this speed so quickly since joining Premier. Yeah. And by everyone you mean people at Premiere as well. Well yeah, yeah. Exactly. And I think it would have surprised Jaden Ojada A fair bit too. He didn't have a bad day. He was in the top ten. Yep. But yeah, for Cooper to get a podium before Jaden. Obviously Cooper's done a whole season last year as well with Erebus, so he's got more experience. But this was actually a track that Jaden did last year because he replaced Richie Stanaway before the end of the season. Yep. So yeah, it's just been comprehensive in Cooper's favour. Yeah, I mean obviously that whole driver switch thing. that was that would have been a a difficult thing to orchestrate. it's an awkward thing to orchestrate. You have to have difficult conversations with other team bosses about wanting to get hold of their driver earlier than you otherwise would. You have to have difficult conversations with the outgoing driver. Like it was not the easy way to go about getting Cooper Murray into that team. This is a long way of saying that Roland Dane is a very good chess player. Yeah, it would seem that way, but it does kind of like the sense there is that this is vindicated. the effort to go through to make this happen before the season is over because that's a really quick payoff. Absolutely. And yeah, that side of the garage just sort of had no no sugar through the year. It was interesting they sent Simon Hodge, the engineer, to the press conference, giving him a bit of spotlight. And yeah, just a real change in in atmosphere in that garage just overall. Yep, absolutely. Last orders, got anything else? probably last call is just we're gonna have a cracking super two title fight in Adelaide as well. Yes. No final series there. But Campbell Logan dominated this weekend and he's actually snatched the lead in the standings. Lockie Dalton had a had an incident with Nash Morris yesterday and that cost him dearly. So now we've got yeah, Campbell Logan leading it, Brad Vaughn second, Lockie Dalton third, and Nash Morris fourth, all separated by just forty five points. That's awesome. That's less points than Brock Veneys behind Matt Payne. Yeah, yeah, that's crazy. Yeah. And Adelaide, what a place for that series to go and settle a a title battle like that. That's gonna be cool to watch. All right, we will leave it there. Thanks so much for listening across the weekend. We will have plenty of the wash up from the Sandown 500 on speakfa.com in the coming days. So make sure you keep an eye out for all of that. And full credit to the noise will be back in this podcast feed on Tuesday morning.