AMBROSE FOCUSED ON 6HR RELIABILITY
Marcos Ambrose believes if reliability can be sorted, the Miedecke Motor Group Mustang will fight for outright Bathurst 6 Hour honours, he stresses that this is not a comeback.
The Garry Rogers Motorsport/Miedecke Motor Group prepared Mustang will compete in Class A2, however the speed is there to take on the all-conquering BMWs but reliability is more of an issue.
“The scope of the project was to run the 10-speed auto in the Mustang, the car is super-fast, but we’re breaking new ground with the 10-speed auto,” Ambrose explained to Auto Action.
“So, when we’re running an auto for six hours in a race environment, temperatures and reliability come into play.
“That’s the big question mark on our car, is it going to make the six hours? That’s what we’re talking about and
working through right now.
“It’s obviously coming down to crunch time, we’ve got a couple of weeks before the race and we’ve got another test scheduled to try to keep moving forward this weekend, but it’s just such a new thing for us here.
“We are working with Herrods, who did the transmission and the engine, to come up with a really good solution to make the transmission live, and to keep the temperatures under control.”
One of the six-hour’s challenges is making a production-based car last the distance, Ambrose highlighted the difficulty of testing out of a race environment.
Ambrose will test the car this weekend and is optimistic of a fix.
“We’ve got new parts and we’ve got a new way of thinking about how we’re going to do it, so we’ve just got to go to the track and prove it. It’s either going to work or it’s not,” he stated.
BMWs have won all five Bathurst 6 Hour races, however Ambrose is optimistic of taking the fight up to them.
“George and Andrew (Miedecke) ran a Mustang last year with the manual gearbox and their feedback from the testing we’ve done is that this car is significantly quicker, it’s got a better brake package, it’s got a little more power, it handles very well and the auto will really suit a faster lap time.
“If we get that auto to work and keep the temperatures under control I think we will be really fast and we’ll definitely be chasing outright.”
Ambrose hasn’t raced at Bathurst since 2015 when he ran for Team Penske paired with Scott Pye for the Bathurst 1000. He said that the 6 Hour is just a one-off drive.
“I’m actually looking forward to the event, it’s just a more relaxed vibe, we’re doing it as friends,” Ambrose said.
“The expectation from my perspective is that I’m not making a comeback, for me it’s fairly low key. George will be the number one driver and I’ll be just support for him.”
