The #21 Mustang of Zak Best, Chris Delfsma and Brianna Wilson finished second in class and sixth outright in Sunday’s enduro, only to be listed as disqualified on the final results.
The car was racing under a cloud of uncertainty after being disqualified from qualifying due to a technical breach.
The issue was a supposedly non-homologated differential ratio, however the team – DNA Motorsport – was under the impression there was a dispensation in place given the car was originally delivered with that gearing.
That argument was made at a Sunday morning hearing and when the documentation couldn’t be easily accessed the outcome was a lodged appeal – paid for up front – that supposedly meant the car could start from seventh and take part in the race.
That would have allowed the correct paperwork to be located at a later date.
That is at least the view of the team, which is supported by a grid sheet signed by the stewards that was published at 10:40am and had the #21 listed as starting seventh.
The situation appears to have changed mid-race, though, with race control issuing an email at 3pm saying the car would be disqualified.
That email didn’t lob at DNA’s end, though, which meant Best, Wilson and Delfsma only learning of their disqualification when they tried to get onto the podium.
“When we first went to the stewards to discuss the issue with the differential we were essentially given two options,” team boss Andre Nader told Speedcafe.
“The first option was you accept the penalty and there’s an immediate disqualification, and the other is you appeal.
“Obviously appealing the decision requires a payment of $6600, I believe it is, and the instructions given to us there and then were if you appeal the decision it will stay the proceedings and a decision will be made in in three days, once further evidence is brought forward and things like that.
“I had to chat with the team and the team said, ‘yep, we’re happy to front the money for the appeal, that way it gives us the opportunity to race and we can show what we can do’.
“At the end of the day, the other Mustangs in the field, based on their speed, there’s a lot of of them running the 3.73 differential. We know that for a fact.
“The grid sheet was released. The grid sheet on the email says it was approved by the stewards, who we’d just had that meeting with, and it showed us in seventh position. So of course we’re going to go and put our car in the seventh grid box.
“We got a great result and at the end of the race as my boys and girls have gone up to the podium they get told that they’ve been disqualified.
“The event manager said that they had forwarded us an email from the stewards at 3pm. But there was no email in our in our inbox.
“She showed me the email and the timestamp and everything. For whatever reason it didn’t make it to us, but there were some email issues.
“So for us that was a bit of a head scratcher. Unfortunately we never got to taste the champagne or get some silverware to at least acknowledge the effort that the team in the drivers went through.”
As for how the situation changed so significantly during the race, Nader said: “We don’t know. We were completely blindsided”.
While understandably frustrated, Nader did praise officials for their attitude and for refunding the appeal money after the race.
“We were told at the time that as soon as you front that money you lose it but to their credit they were happy to give us that money back and they allowed us to revoke that appeal,” he explained.
“Considering we’d already been disqualified and it was done, I asked the parents of the drivers and the owner of the car what they wanted to do.
“They said, ‘well there’s no point in appealing anything because best case scenario we get our second back but we never made it on the podium, we never got the photos’.
“They’re not calling everyone back to Bathurst in three days to cheer us on the podium.
“I do want to say it was an absolute pleasure to deal with [the officials]. There was no kind of animosity in any way.”
Nader also reiterated that the car should have been declared legal and there were no attempts to break any rules.
“There is a serious breakdown in the admin side of what’s going on here, and there are paper trails that should be there that aren’t,” he said.
“At the end of the day, I’m not the technical delegate for the round. So if I get dispensation, I don’t write my own form. I have to receive something from technical.
“The last two years that the car has run it has never been disqualified and in the last two years it’s run two different ratios at the instruction of technical.
“Last year we ran the 3.55 and we lost 14 kays an hour down the straight. I believe the 3.55 is the automatic ratio. And then the year before we ran the 3.73. We have the on-board computer data to prove that.”
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