THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY IN SANDOWN 😵💫
It was a difficult weekend of racing for Matt Stone Racing’s Nick Percat, with the 2024 Supercars Championship Endurance Season opener in Sandown providing both the highs and lows of motorsport for the Bendix-backed entry.
In what was a wild and challenging weekend thanks to unpredictable weather conditions, Percat rolled out of the blocks relatively speedy by posting the eighth fastest time in the opening practice session on Friday.
Co-Driver Dylan O’Keeffe replicated the pace by driving his way to the third fastest time in the dedicated Co-Driver session on Friday, proving that the MSR crew had done their homework on setup with the #10 car.
After a handful of tweaks in between additional practice sessions, the 20-minute qualifying session greeted drivers on Saturday amidst wet weather conditions, throwing a curveball to the field as they exited pitlane on full wet tyres.
Once again showing pace, Percat would hover around the top ten - with the top ten drivers entering the shootout later in the afternoon, however, a small mistake on his lap proved costly, as he would finish just outside the bubble in P11, which is where he would begin the 500.
Blue skies appeared for Sunday with the weather having passed by, with drivers powering off the line as 154 laps of jam-packed action would ensue.
Unfortunately for the #10 crew, they would be a part of the action, when O’Keeffe wound up in collateral damage of another driver's mishap, which caused significant damage to their Camaro, and essentially spelled the end of their race.
The MSR crew did the best they could to patch up the damage, with the team finishing up in P23 to complete the event.
Taking the positives from the weekend, the speed was there in the car consistently, with the difficult elements of motor racing hampering the result. Attention now shifts to the Mountain on October 11-13.
Nick Percat: “Just the one that got away from us. The car was really fast and I thought we would have been in the hunt for a podium which is great for car speed but unlucky that we didn’t quite get the result. We’ll rebuild her, make her nice and shiny again, and get ready for Bathurst. The boys did a great job to get the car back out there, but everyone would have had their stories from today. It would have been good to finish at the front but that’s motorsport.”
