BJR commences Winton Supercars test

Brad Jones Racing has belatedly commenced its Winton Supercars test day after opting against running 24 hours earlier due to wet weather.

The Albury-based outfit was one of five Repco Supercars Championship teams at Winton yesterday, but did not turn a wheel in testing.

As was the plan then, it is putting miles through all four of its Chevrolet Camaros and most of its complement of enduro drivers.

Jack Smith is in action in the #4 SCT Logistics Camaro, Andre Heimgartner/Dale Wood in the #8 R&J Batteries Camaro, Bryce Fullwood/Dean Fiore in the #14 Middy’s Camaro, and Macauley Jones/Jordan Boys the #96 Pizza Hut Camaro.

Smith’s co-driver is factory Porsche pilot Jaxon Evans, who is absent on this occasion due to overseas commitments.

As it turns out, Car #8 did turn a wheel yesterday, as did Tickford Racing’s #6 Monster Energy Mustang of Cameron Waters, despite both squads abandoning their test day because of the damp conditions.

Speedcafe understands that Heimgartner and Waters were tasked with completing engine map validation running on Supercars’ behalf, with the laps not counting as testing.

Calibration work is still ongoing for both brands, but the Ford’s in particular.

It is likely that, when the next event takes place at Hidden Valley, the Mustangs will use an evolution of the test map which produced very promising results during practice last time out at Symmons Plains.

Kenny McNamara from Chevrolet engine supplier KRE Race Engines and a representative of Herrod Performance Engines, which supplies the Mustang contingent, were both on hand at Winton, as was Supercars’ own engine expert, Craig Hasted.

The latter was seen working on a laptop plugged into the aforementioned cars between their post-testing runs, which ended at around 12:45 local time for Waters, the last track activity for a Supercars Championship entry on the day.

Tickford, as well as Walkinshaw Andretti United and Grove Racing, called off their tests before the two-hour cut-off and hence the day does not count as part of their allocation.

However, teams may only invoke that wet-weather provision once during the year, with BJR retaining that option given, engine map work aside, it did not turn a wheel at all.

Erebus Motorsport, which was to have conducted a Driver Evaluation Day for Jay Hanson and Cooper Murray, likewise did not venture out of pit lane.

Today, BJR is the only team from the Supercars Championship cutting laps at the rural Victorian circuit, although there are a handful of Supercheap Auto TCR Australia and TA2 cars completing testing ahead of a Shannons SpeedSeries round at Winton in just over a week’s time.

Speaking to Speedcafe ahead of the test day, BJR team owner Brad Jones said there was plenty to learn despite the highly technically controlled nature of Gen3.

“We’ve done a bit of racing now, so it’ll be nice to go and validate some stuff,” he remarked.

“You’re still learning about these cars – they’re very different – so if you go to a circuit and try one thing, and it doesn’t work at the circuit, doesn’t mean that you wouldn’t try it again the next day or the day after that or the next time you go back there.

“Because, different weather conditions, different amounts of rubber on the road, surface age… all these things contribute to making the thing work, so there’s usually a couple of things you can change to try and achieve the same outcome.

“So, I don’t think they’ll have any trouble finding things to play around, to adjust, to learn with when they go to the test day.”

Meanwhile, Triple Eight Race Engineering (including wildcard), Dick Johnson Racing, Matt Stone Racing, and PremiAir Racing are testing at Queensland Raceway.