Tickford confused with penalty: Baird very clear
Tickford Racing was confused with the 5-second penalty given to Cam Waters in the race after he bumped his way past Anton De Pasquale. It wasn’t so much that he was penalised, but more why other incidents didn’t get the same treatment.
“It was interesting,” Tickford co-owner Sven Burchartz said after the race. “I saw a lot of moves that were perhaps a little bit more savage, but only saw one yellow with a 5 in it. It’s a bit perplexing. I guess there’s some consistency in, well, perhaps inconsistency.
“There was a little coming together at turn one, that was OK. There was the one for the lead in the hairpin, and that appeared to be cleared, too, and was seen as within the rules. If you’re being strict and acknowledging that it’s a race, perhaps you give him 5 seconds, but otherwise, it’s perplexing when you see what is and isn’t allowed.”
Motorsport Australia Driving Standards Advisor Craig Baird said the decision on Waters was pretty clear and that he wouldn’t have been penalised if he had let De Pasquale re-pass. He also added that the decision on Broc Feeney’s pass on James Golding was equally as clearly not a penalty.
“Jimmy made the first mistake by leaving the door open,” Baird told Auto Action. “He could have run down the inside line out of Turn 5, and Broc wouldn’t have been there. When you break it down, you see Jimmy spear it towards the apex when he realised Broc was there and failed to leave a car’s width. Broc was in control until there was no room left, and he hit the kerb.
“Initially, it looked clumsy, but when you look at it, you realise what happened. He was slowly taken to the grass.”
It was a frustrating day for Burchartz, who was looking after the crew with Rod Nash not making the trip north. On top of Waters penalty was an incident between Thomas Randle and James Courtney which upset the Tickford boss.
“It was a tough day; but if you look at the cars, the pace was there. Cam had pace, you could see it later in the race. We were going to go long, and we did go long, and I think the strategy was right.” he said of the 29-lap opening stint.
“With Tom and James. I think James could have given him a little bit more space. Tom was where he needed to be. Some people start to race as if their careers depend upon it, and I guess maybe they do; I don’t know.
“I like James a lot, but I don’t think that was the best thing to do, particularly 20 laps from the end. If we were a little bit closer to the flag, you might say, ‘OK, I’m going to make it a little bit hard”.
“I think there was one person at fault, I don’t think there’s anything Tom could have done any differently. The move was on.
“The day’s done, the results are in, and there’s no point worrying about it. Just learn from it. There’s plenty of stuff we would have learned. I don’t think the cars need too much of a tune-up and go again tomorrow, make some spots up. Good fun.”
Waters dropped from sixth to 10th with the penalty, and Randle limped home in 24th.
The race was won by Broc Feeney with Mark Winterbottom second and Will Brown in third.
