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Team 18 and Tickford Racing struggled in a spectacular 20 minute warm-up session Sunday morning at the Supercheap Auto Bathurst 1000.
The warm-up gives teams the opportunity to conduct final checks, including practice stops, before the 161-lap Great Race begins at 11:00 am local time.
Despite the overnight rain, the track was dry for the session, but that didn’t mean it ran smoothly.
Team 18 is diagnosing an engine problem in Scott Pye / Dean Fiore’s DEWALT Racing Entry # 20, after Fiore stopped the car in the outlap with an alarm on.
“We just hit the road with some wet and as I was going up the Mountain Straight, I looked at the dash and there was an alarm light,” explained Fiore.
“Then the next signal was ‘engine off’ so I turned it off and chatted with the guys and that was it.”
While the team initially seemed willing to change the engine, Pye is hopeful that it won’t be necessary.
“I don’t think it’s an engine change, it looks like it’s a sensor failure and they just have to change the adapter on the sensor,” he said.
“If there was really serious drama, I suspect there will be some oil on the track, but Deano didn’t report it when he was pushed back.
“We hope it is a simple solution. Unfortunately, with the recovery time, we couldn’t do a lap. “
Fiore’s problem triggered a long red flag and with time left unadded during a stop in warm-up, the rest of the field faced a significantly reduced session.
There was more drama after the restart, with 18-year-old Broc Feeney crawling down the mountain on both wheels on the left side wobbling in the Boost-backed Tickford Mustang.
Feeney pitted but was sent back with his left rear still reeling. Lead driver James Courtney later explained: “The front wheel was loose so we got in.
“We thought the rear was loose too, so the guys re-tightened it and changed the front wheel.
“But the rear wheel was buckled. How it slid through the cracks … good we found the wheel was bent now.
“The guys were here until 3 am, there are some tired eyes so it’s a wake-up call for all of us. But that’s why we have the warm-up, to find these things. “
Andre Heimgartner finished at the top of the order aboard Kelly Racing’s NED Whiskey Mustang with a 2: 05.3194s.
Scott McLaughlin / Tim Slade, Shane van Gisbergen / Garth Tander, Chaz Mostert / Warren Luff and Jamie Whincup / Craig Lowndes rounded out the top five.
