EYES FORWARD FOR PREMIAIR NULON RACING AHEAD OF FINAL BATHURST 500 DAY
After a character-building race one of the Supercars season-opening Bathurst 500 this afternoon, it is all eyes forward to what will hopefully be a better day tomorrow for PremiAir Nulon Racing.
The day started off well for Jimmy Golding, qualifying P7 and advancing to P6 in the Top Ten Shootout aboard the #31 PremiAir Nulon Racing Camaro, however it would all unravel come the start of the race when his steed would not start for the formation lap due to a battery issue.
While the team was able to rectify the problem and get Golding underway, with the field having passed by already, he was forced to start from the pit lane. Across the following 40 laps, which was punctuated by three safety cars (lap one, lap 34 and lap 39), a combination of impressive driving, slick pit stops, and strong strategy saw Golding advance up the field to P15, before a late race off while pushing hard to make further gains saw him drop back to P18.
Tim Slade meanwhile qualified P18 in the #23 PremiAir Nulon Racing Camaro, and had his position further impacted on the race start when he was caught up in Ryan Wood’s first corner off. While Slade was able to resume, it saw him at the back of the grid alongside his team-mate under the safety car conditions, from where he put in a stoic effort aided by strong strategy calls and great pit stops to make his way back up to P17 by the time the race finished under safety car conditions, despite managing a vibration in the front left.
“It has been a tough opening race for us, there is no way around that, but the boys and the whole team did a great job to recover as strongly as they did to make sure we could bank some points to start off our year,” PremiAir Nulon Racing Team Manager, Stephen Robertson, said.
“We had our fair share of bad luck, but the team all pulled together and with some fantastic strategy calls, brilliant pit stops and great driving from both Tim and Jimmy, we were able to claw some back and I know that we have the cars and the processes to make the results that we want – hopefully we can have things fall a bit more our way tomorrow for the second 40 lap race around this great place.”
Both Slade and Golding forecast a busy night ahead in preparation for what everyone is hoping will be a better day tomorrow.
“It was not a very good day for the #23, we struggled for speed in qualifying and then had contact at the start of the race which saw us go to the back of the pack,” Slade said.
“We had a little bit of a vibration in the car after that, so I think there is a little bit of damage in the front left there. We need some more speed for tomorrow, so we will look at that tonight and hopefully we can be a bit better tomorrow.”
“It was a bit of a rough end to our day as well,” Golding said.
“It started out awesome with qualifying P7 and then P6 in the shootout which was really cool, and the car has really good speed in it.
“Unfortunately, we had a battery drama on the start, so we had to start from pit lane which made our lives a bit harder. We did come back up through a few positions but ultimately we didn’t finish where we set out to, so we will dig down tonight, fix up the mistakes and come out fighting tomorrow.”
PremiAir Nulon Racing will be back on-track at Mount Panorama for the final day of the Bathurst 500 tomorrow (Sunday 25 February) with qualifying set to hit the track at 9.30am ahead of the Top Ten Shootout at 12.05pm. The 40-lap race will then commence from 3.05pm. For event information, visit www.supercars.comFor more information on PremiAir Nulon Racing, please visit www.premiairracing.com or follow the team on its social media platforms at www.facebook.com/PremiAirRacing/, www.instagram.com/premiair_racing/, www.linkedin.com/company/premiairracing/ and www.twitter.com/premiairracing
