GT3 Cup Challenge – Round 4 – Morgan Park – Race Review

The famous club circuit in Warwick, the Morgan Park Circuit was the venue for round 4, of the Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge, Australia. McElrea Racing were there, bright eyed and ready to go, running rookie New Zelander, Rob Knight under the McElrea Racing Team.

With the last 3 rounds of the series being overshadowed by rain, the team was hoping for a dry run during the Morgan Park weekend.

Friday saw an extremely cold morning, temperatures hovering just above zero degrees at 7am upon moving out to the circuit. Practice 1 proved difficult to get the tyres up to temperature under 4 or 5 laps, frost and ice, covering much of the landscape. Practice 1 was difficult, and I seem to be the only driver on the grid, not enjoying the laps around the Morgan Park Circuit. We then went into Practice 2 in the afternoon and just like Practice 1, I went a few tenths slower than my teammate. This was unsettling! It was only in practice 3 where finally, we began to show some speed. We finished 8th quickest in the final practice session and also went well in qualifying. Qualifying was probably the greatest session of the year thus far. I brought the car out for around 10 minutes on track, put the car back into the pit, and we did a pretty quick 1:18.3. As the team were turning around the car to do another stint, we decided to keep the car in and set the time. As the rest of the qualifiers used more and more tyres, we managed to stick a qualifying time that put us on the 4th row of the grid, in 7th place. It was a pleasing result considering the time we have been around.

Race 1 was an exciting duel from the get go with Porsche Gold Coast owner, Terry Knight. There was plenty of bumper to bumper action, Terry getting the better of me. Though it was nail biting and extremely close. All was good fun as we traded flashing headlights between one another throughout the race. We finished in an eventual 8th place overall. Race 2’s plan, was to make a great start as I was on newer rubber than Terry Knight. Though from the green lights, I was hung out to dry, losing a couple of spots into turn 1, with South Australian driver, Goodacre and the orange car Bolinowsky getting past. After several laps, things were settling and catching both the cars that past to get back onto Terry Knight was definitely a possibility. Though on about lap 6, I was piloting the car on a high speed right hander, and the back flicked out, and the car went spinning across the sand trap at 180km/h. This destroyed any hope of getting a good result, as we fought back to a 13th place finish. Due to the massive spin, the tyres were all gone, and the rear bumper as damaged.

According to regulations, if there is a need to change more than 2 tyres, to brand new rubber, the car that needs the new tyres would start from the back of the grid. This meant that we had to start Race 3 of the weekend, from dead last 19th on the grid. Race 3 put us out on the warmup lap and as we were heading out, I heard over the communications that Ray Angus had pushed his emergency extinguisher button in the car. This pulled his car off the grid, for deploying his safety devices. One less car to go after. From lining up on the grid, it was GO GO GO, as we carved through the field, overtaking 4 cars in the first three corners of the lap. New McElrea driver, Rob Knight let me by easily, as he allowed me to carve my way back up the field. We were running in 12th place, when I tried a move on Goodacre though unfortuantely, we tapped and I went off while he stayed on. This results in dropping a few places, though in a few laps, we were back on Goodacre. On the second to last lap, we past him at Turn 4 to finish a solid 10th place.

A satisfying weekend with some decent results, given the mishaps in practice and race 2. Solid points for the team. This moves us up to 8th in the overall championship, and 5th in class.

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