Bright gets a grip at the Creek

Fujitsu Racing’s Jason Bright has endured a challenging outing at the second round of the V8 Supercar Championship Series at Sydney’s Eastern Creek.
Bright finished the weekend in 21st overall, after fighting to get the most out of the Fujitsu Racing Ford Falcon on the low-grip circuit.

The round was won by fellow Ford driver Will Davison, who took his debut round win from Mark Winterbottom, also aboard a Ford.

Despite being fifth in early practice, the Fujitsu Racing Falcon couldn’t make the most of new tyres for qualifying and started the opening race in 17th position.

In the opening race Bright struggled for grip and finished 20th. Things didn’t improve in race #2 with 22nd position; he took 20th position in the final race despite making a marked improvement in the car.

The decision to make a late race pit stop for tyres after a safety car was called onto the track could have brought a finish further up the order. However, the recovery of Steven Richards’ damaged Ford took longer than anticipated leaving only a two-lap sprint to the flag.

“We had reasonable pace – but not great pace,” said Bright.

“We could run with the competition – but didn’t have that extra bit to pass.

“There’s a lot of work to do, there’s no doubt about that. However, we have a lot of things coming.

“I’d love to have everything now, but we need to continue to work through the process. We have a new car not too far away and we are improving our engine package. Those two things are key.

“Inside the car I’m happy with how the chassis is working. Watching others during practice, qualifying and the races; our car is working as good as any out there. So once we get a bit more grunt I feel that we will be better off.

“Next week we are at the grand prix and it will be a totally different challenge. The track has a greater grip level, but still has some high-speed sections. However, I’m keen to hit the track running and get a lot out of the event.

Fujitsu Racing Chief Engineer Geoff Slater was satisfied with the car at the end of the weekend.

“By the time we got the car good for the final race, we really didn’t have any tyres left to make full use of it,” said Slater.

“It’s a really bad surface when the car is not right. It’s easy to overwork the tyres to compensate for the lack of grip.

“Our race strategy really didn’t go to plan, so we didn’t gain any advantage to improve our position.

“At the Grand Prix we are keen to re-establish ourselves as a premier team, but also try some ideas. It’s a good non-championship opportunity to do that.”