First-time Super2 race and round winner Bryce Fullwood maintains that he never lost his confidence behind the wheel despite a trying 2018 season.

Fullwood, back in an MW Motorsport Altima after a year at Matt Stone Racing, left the Superloop Adelaide 500 with the series lead having picked up his first two race wins and first round win in the Dunlop Super2 Series.

His results, which included a second placing to Brodie Kostecki in Race 2 after leading the first three quarters of the encounter, are a far cry from those of the previous season.

In 2018, he finished 17th in the standings with a best race result of ninth and three 10th positions to his name, as MSR struggled on two fronts in conjunction with its step up to the Virgin Australia Supercars Championship with Todd Hazelwood.

When asked if his confidence had been hit by that season, Fullwood replied, “In a nutshell, not really, because I think you have to have a healthy level of self-confidence.

“You don’t need to boast that to everyone, but you have to believe in yourself. We’re all here for a reason, we’ve obviously done well in previous categories or whatnot to be here, so I always was certain I could do the job.

“I’ve jumped into other cars and some other main series drivers’ cars and done really, really well against them, so I’ve proven to myself that I can definitely do it, but if you don’t have all the stars aligned – if you don’t have the right car, the right team, if you don’t have any luck, the right supporters, and you don’t do a good job yourself – no matter how good you are, you’re just not going to be able to make it work.”

Fullwood debuted in Super2 as a 16-year-old at the start of 2015 and was beginning to trouble the front-runners when he stepped into an ex-Kelly Racing Altima midway through 2017, before a move to MSR and, initially, a former DJR Team Penske FGX Falcon failed to pay dividends.

“I’ve had a pretty tough time in recent years and this has made it all the more sweet,” said Fullwood.

“I can’t thank you guys at MW Motorsport enough, the Nissan Altima was hooked up. I’ve got to put the hard work down to them; I’m just the nut behind the steering wheel doing my job.

“All my sponsors, Middy’s Data & Electrical, they’ve been behind me the last five years to help me get here. All my family, my extended family, my grandma – she sells raffle tickets at the pub every Friday night to try to raise money to get me here – so this is a team effort for everyone and I’m just the person that can put the icing on the cake for everyone.”

The Northern Territory native even thought that a highly impressive test day at Winton prior to the first round of the season wouldn’t translate into the pace he showed in Adelaide.

“We had a really, really good test day two weeks prior to this event,” he recalled.

“It was almost so good that I forced myself to take it with a pinch of salt because I thought there’s no way we can roll into (Adelaide) with that kind of form.”

The weekend also saw new team-mate Zane Goddard, who spent his rookie season at Brad Jones Racing last year, take his first podiums with results of second, third, and third.

“I’m just stoked, obviously, my best round so far, and I can’t thank the guys at MW Motorsport enough, said Goddard.

“Like Bryce said, at the testing it went super, super well and it was hard to understand how it went so well.

“Coming into this round, it’s just been fantastic; took the one-two in the first race. It’s pretty special to start off the year and to stay in the top three throughout the whole round.”

Goddard sits third in the series, 28 points behind Fullwood and eight behind Race 2 winner Brodie Kostecki, ahead of Round 2 at the Pirtek Perth SuperNight on May 2-4.