‘Bump drafting’ their way past Jonathan Webb put Stone Brothers Racing teammates Shane van Gisbergen and Tim Slade in the TV spotlight in Sunday’s V8 Supercar race at the weekend’s Sydney Motorsport Park 360 meeting.
In a weekend which again provided a solid bag of points, van Gisbergen – who remains fifth in the series points standings because of it – qualified eighth and finished seventh in Saturday’s one-stop 36-lap sprint race then qualified 11th and finished 13th in Sunday’s longer two-stop 56 lap feature.
A slow start on Sunday saw the SP Tools Falcon drop back to 17th on the first lap but van Gisbergen and Slade stayed within striking distance of each other for most of the race.
Going into the final stop Slade was narrowly ahead, but a fast pit stop saw van Gisbergen exit pit lane in front.
They continued to race closely and were eventually held up together by Webb in car # 19.
On lap 48, van Gisbergen made a move to pass. Slade tucked himself behind his team mate and the pair worked their way past in a race technique known as bump drafting.
” I mucked up the start of the race so we lost quite a bit there,” explained van Gisbergen.
” We just didn’t really have anything on the first set of tyres. The second set was better but we were so far back, and it was the same with the third.
“Having said that, I couldn’t believe how fast the two cars were linked together and we both passed Webby which was pretty cool, even if it doesn’t mean much when you are running 13th.”
Results-wise Saturday was a better day, van Gisbergen using the two morning practice sessions to make changes to the car before bolting on a new set of tyres in the dying minutes of the 20 minute qualifying session to set the eighth quickest time.
That gave him a reasonable start to the 36-lap race, though as he did on Sunday he struggled for outright speed on the hard tyres he started on.
Once he got onto the stickier soft tyres, however, he was away, passing six cars in his second stint to cross the finish seventh.
“The problem,” he said, “was that it took a long time for the hard tyre to come in.
“We got a great start and tried to extend the stint and put the softs on for a shorter stint to be fast – and we were – but we were just too far behind from lacking speed on the hard tyre.”
It’s enduro time now for the V8 Supercar circus with the next round the Dick Smith Sandown 500 in Melbourne between September 14 & 16.
There and at Bathurst in October van Gisbergen will share the #9 SP Tools Ford Falcon with Luke Youlden.
