Off the Back Foot and Into the Fray

Never one to be kept down by trouble at the track Cambridge driver Nick Ross made the best of a difficult start to his BNT-V8's race weekend at Manfeild Autocourse in Feilding.

After being forced to sit out most of Friday's practice day due to being hit from behind in the opening session, the Concept Motorsport team had the car and Ross back out in time for the first Saturday morning qualification session where he picked up the 10th fastest time.

The Total Lubricants Commodore and Ross were involved in the major incident in the opening laps of the first practice early Friday afternoon.

A driver following Ross failed to slow down when entering turn one at the end of the long home straight colliding heavily with Ross amounting in substantial damage to both cars.

The incident was deemed to have been a result of brake failure on the following vehicle.

"We had only put in three laps when we were shunted from behind and that was that!" he said.

"The team pieced the car back together just in time for some corporate hotlaps for sponsors that afternoon but other than that I had only the 10 minute warm up on Saturday to prepare before the qualification session." said Ross.

However with that limited track time and only a handful of laps available in the session Ross set a very creditable time in the first qual session.

"We were 10th quickest in the first qualification and we made some changes which were probably not quite the right way so we only came 15th in the second session which wasn't too bad considering."

"The car's going really well and the car speed is good - we were only just over 0.9 seconds off the top time in that session." said Ross.

Over the weekend unpredictable weather played havoc with the team's strategies as the track switched between wet and damp as the rain came and went.

In the first race of the BNT V8s the rain came and fell heavily as the race cars readied for the formation lap.

Starting from 15th on the grid Ross chose to keep his cool throughout the wet and wild frenzy of race one finishing in 13th place.

"We just tried to play it safe and finish the race in the rain for the first one." he said.

On Sunday there was a chance for Ross to make the most of his dry set up with a dry circuit and a car proving to be quick around Manfeild this weekend.

Early in the race the safety car was brought out and the course fell under it's control and full yellow flags.

The pack of V8s seeing the safety car signs come out took a breather from racing slowing the pace but Ross took a knock in the rear from another driver spinning him around at Higgins Corner.

Recovering from the spill Ross caught the pack being led by the safety car and attempted to recover his 11th place in the single line of V8s.

"The safety car boards had already come out but going around Higgins I was hit from behind and turned around."

"I had backed off but was shunted from behind - because we were already under the safety car I thought I was within the rules to return to my original position... but apparently not." he said.

Ross was shown a black flag and was required to take a drive through penalty for recovering his original placing and informed later the correct action was to wait for the official's instructions to retake his position.

After the safety car had peeled away and Ross had taken his drive through penalty he was only to retire after damage from the earlier contact took it's final toll.

"We believe the diff blew in the race following the heavy impact it received during Friday's practice session and then again when I got hit in race two." said Ross.

The final race of the weekend is a reverse grid start and Ross lined up in 10th position for what looked to be a very wet race.

This had Ross right in amongst the fight between fast cars coming up from the rear hitting up against slower cars doing all they can to hold a position near the front.

A BNT V8 race is nearly always exciting but with the pack taking their places on the grid for the final race of the weekend the rain came down heavily once more adding to the drama.

"In the last race it fogged up inside my car pretty quick - there was spray inside as well as outside and I couldn't see a thing - I had to drive the car making sure I didn't hit anything and just keep it out of danger." he said.

An incident with Paul Pederson leaving the circuit and damaging a tyre wall brought the race to a temporary halt which proved to be advantageous for Ross.

"After the red flag the windscreen cleared itself up and I got a good start and picked up a few places but the car started to get a bit loose towards the end."

"We had picked it to dry up so we had wet tyres on a dry set up and we were going really well but towards the end when it started to rain again we just didn't have the pace." he said.

However Ross brought the car home in 15th place in a wet and slippery race where a number of cars were brought in on a trailer.

Overcoming an incredibly challenging start to their race weekend Ross and the Concept Motorsport team went home with 50 points and 16th place in the championship after six rounds.

The next round is at Pukekohe Park Raceway over the weekend of 20-22nd March and is the final of this season.

The BNT V8s will however be a part of the action at the Hamilton 400 on the 17-20th April where they will contest a non-championship meeting.