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A first win of the Supercars season at the NTI Townsville 500 is nourishing for the Shell V-Power Racing Team, according to its CEO, David Noble.
Anton De Pasquale’s victory in Race 17 was not only the first for Dick Johnson Racing since September 2022, but came after a particularly tough period for an outfit which, as the Ford homologation team, tends to be judged against high expectations.
After a troublesome pre-season, as well as broader questions regarding parity between the Ford Mustang and Chevrolet Camaro, DJR had not even finished on the podium until Race 13 of the season at Hidden Valley.
It then had dramas with both of its Mustangs in the first race of the Townsville weekend, before finally snapping its winless run.
“It just nourishes the whole team,” said Noble.
“Even our boys back in Queensland that have been working behind the scenes back in the workshop, I think it’s just a real energiser for everyone.
“We’ve got the capability in the competition at the moment that we’re not quite sure who’s going to win, so [in Race 17] it was us.
“We had a great strategy, our engineers went to work overnight found and some peace in the car, so it’s a real boost for us to get that energised feeling now to go back to work and continue to push to get back up here on a more regular basis.”
De Pasquale, who had not stood on the podium since the last day of the 2022 season in Adelaide, said, “It’s awesome to be sitting up here again and get a trophy for all the whole team.
“The Shell V-Power Racing Team has been working hard, we haven’t had a great start the season, but we’ve slowly been turning around.
“[In Race 17], everything worked out for us, so [we were] spraying champagne and getting the trophy.
“It’s the first trophy for a lot of the guys in the team as well, that are new to our team, so it’s an awesome feeling and it’s a real buzz.”
Will Davison had battled to 10th in Race 16 after DJR was one of several teams to have issues with refuelling, having had that task at an event for just the second time in the Gen3 era, while De Pasquale did not even finish that Saturday encounter due to electrical issues in his #11 Mustang.
That left the latter with more tyres at his disposal for the final day of the NTI Townsville 500, helping to enable a three-stop strategy which allowed Car #11 to take a comfortable victory in the end.
“We had some dramas yesterday, which means we had a couple of tyres better than the other guys,” noted De Pasquale.
“But, what that mattered, I’m not too sure – we’ll have to look back on that – but the car was really pacey today in all the stints, which was awesome.”
Davison, who battled to 21st with brake problems in Race 17, is ninth in the drivers’ championship and De Pasquale 16th.
