DJR: WE CAN’T BEAT T8 FOR TITLE

Ford flagbearer Dick Johnson Racing has conceded the 2021 Supercars championship, pointing to a recent Chev engine upgrade as a key performance advantage for arch-rivals Triple Eight.

The concession came from DJR technical guru Ludo Lacroix, who cited the Holden team’s freshly upgraded KRE Chevrolet V8 engines on top of better braking performance and improved pitwork and strategy as key reasons T8 had gained a performance edge.

He also praised the driving of Shane van Gisbergen and Jamie Whincup, who sit first and second in the championship well ahead of DJR’s Will Davison in fifth. His team-mate Anton De Pasquale sits sixth.

“On the day, we can beat them [T8] but for the championship definitely not,” said Lacroix.

Van Gisbergen and Whincup have won 12 of 19 races conducted so far this year, with the Kiwi championship leader taking 11 of them.

DJR’s new driving line-up for 2021 has managed one win, which came for De Pasquale at The Bend

If van Gisbergen does go on and win the drivers’ championship as expected, it will defeat the Queensland Ford team for the drivers’ championship for the first time since 2017.

Scott McLaughlin, now racing IndyCars in the USA, won three straight drivers’ championship for the team in its previous guise, DJR Team Penske, between 2018 and 2020.

Triple Eight also dominates the 2021 teams’ championship, more than 800 points ahead of DJR. If it carries that form on to the end of year it will next year occupy the prestigious pit exit garages for the first time since 2019.

Lacroix, who swapped from T8 to DJR Team Penske in 2017 and played a key role in its rise to competitiveness and then dominance, was philosophical about the performance gap to the Holden team.

“We are clearly the second team,” said Lacroix. “Unfortunately we are fighting a car which has an upgrade in the engine which is not a bad aero car either.

“It has a big performance in braking that we can’t do.

“The boys next door (T8) have raised their game; they are not making so many mistakes, they are not blowing tyres. All of a sudden they are making the one per-centers better with the base car and an incredible driver line-up.”

From Darwin onwards KRE Chevrolet engines received a revised 1.65 rocker ratio, bringing with it a slight horsepower boost. Van Gisbergen won the second and third race at Hidden Valley with the new engine-spec after a pitlane problem denied him in the opener.

He and Whincup dominated both 250km races at Townsville’s Reid Park hybrid circuit, finishing 1-2 each time.

“At this stage I don’t think we have the performance to out-race them,” said Lacroix. “I don’t see that coming soon because we are not allowed to homologate [engine or aero upgrades].”

Lacroix said the KRE upgrade meant beating T8 at Mount Panorama would be a big challenge: “At Bathurst probably not, because with the new engine and basic aero I don’t think we can get there.”

Lacroix wasn’t alone along pitlane in his concern about the KRE engines, which are also supplied to T8 customer teams and Brad Jones Racing. One team owner described the advantage it delivered as “shocking”.

Lacroix pointed to the 105mm longer front undertray fitted to the Holden Commodore ZB as a potential reason the T8 cars had better braking performance than the DJR Ford Mustangs.

“Is the shorter undertray a good excuse for braking? I don’t know,” Lacroix said. “I can tell you one thing, it hasn’t been tested in aero, we never go that low in braking position.

“Clearly in braking performance we are suffering,” he added.

Both Lacroix and team principal Ben Croke were confident DJR was still operating at an elite level, even taking into account its new driver line-up and some engineering restructuring.

They did concede the departure of McLaughlin had hit DJR’s win-rate simply because he was such an exceptional talent.

Croke said T8’s improved form had prompted a response form DJR and a focus on what needed to be improved to close the gap as soon as the second Reid Park event this weekend.

“We closed the gap a touch on Sunday compared to Saturday,” he said. “We will work hard this week to try and close the gap some more.

“Whether we get all the way or not, probably not.

“We have already identified areas we need to improve on and we will work on those; qualify better and early stint pace.”

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