DJR responds to homologation mockery
Dick Johnson Racing (DJR) endured a tough time at Newcastle but laughed at the suggestions it should have an advantage as Ford’s homologation team. Andrew Clarke reports on why all is not as it seems.
DJR left Newcastle with plenty of head-scratching to do and 10th place in the Championship. Team principal Ben Croke is confident the team will bounce back “if not at the next round but the one after” following a soul-searching week at the famous Stapylton team.
Croke also was able to laugh at suggestions his team should have had an advantage as the Ford homologation team, pointing out that DJR was only responsible for the bodywork of the car.
“I was having a laugh at some of the things we’ve read, you just have to. We designed the body, which is the aero side of it,” Croke told Auto Action.
“As far as I’m aware, and certainly how it worked with us, is that Supercars retained all the data from testing.
“I think we just missed the mark set-up-wise. These cars are quite a bit different to what we’ve used in the past. It was quite a big change away from that and the way that the roll bars and the front end and all that works, and I think we just missed the mark there.
“So we need a good, honest look at ourselves and find something that fundamentally didn’t work for us over the weekend.”
He echoed the thoughts of Ludo Lacroix when on Sunday morning, he told Auto Action the team was going for a bit of a ‘hail Mary’ with the set-up. Croke said that didn’t work either.
“It was a fairly dramatic change from the Saturday to the Sunday, and it didn’t seem to have much effect on it. If anything, it was maybe negative.
“Of course we’re nervous [heading the AGP meeting]. You can’t come off the back of a weekend like that and be bristling with confidence. There’s an element of nerves about it, but I back the team we have here and the people we’ve got involved in turning it around and bouncing back.”
Neither Will Davison nor Anton De Pasquale qualified inside the top 10, and they fared little better in the races, with only the Tickford pair of Declan Fraser and Thomas Randle trailing them in the 2-car Mustang ranks, and Fraser effectively didn’t start the second race.
Davison left Newcastle with 11th and 19th in the two races, and De Pasquale had a pair of 16th-place finishes.
Croke said the lead-up to the races for the team was not smooth sailing, but he didn’t want to use that as an excuse.
“We didn’t have an ideal lead-up either with some clutch issues, the rain and SMP and then the shortened shakedown because of the track hire situation. I think we spent a lot of that time trying to fix issues rather than concentrating on speed,” he said.
“So for us this week, it’s been good to sit down and have a fair bit of reflection time on where we are set-up wise and just really being able to look deep into how we think this car will work and what we’ve got coming up.”
Croke is also confident he has the drivers to do the job and rejected the idea that they couldn’t drive around problems like other drivers.
He said the clitch problems appeared on Davison’s car on Saturday and that probably cost him a spot in the Shootout, which would have change the entire weekend.
“We changed the clutch, the master cylinder, the slave cylinder, the lines… there’s probably not a part that hasn’t been changed in that system twice, it not three times,” he said.
“I think anything new makes it a little bit more difficult to get your head around, but there are some pretty clever people here. I’m sure we’ll work it out.”
He said the headlines stung a little, but his team did not close up shop on the media and suggested the issue might have been with some of the media. Auto Action can confirm this since we spent time in the garages talking to DJR people, including Croke.
“That’s not us, but one bad weekend doesn’t define our team. One sunny day doesn’t mean it’s summer. Every team has a weekend like that, probably more than once during the year,” Croke said.
“So for us, just put that behind and bounce back. It’s essentially the same group of people here that won championships years ago. The runs are on the board.
“Anyone saying no Penske, no DJR has just got no idea. Nothing’s changed. We’ve still got the same amount of sponsorship with the same people. You read that, and you have to laugh at it because it clearly shows they’ve got no idea.”
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