The Clayton-based Ford squad is the only team in the Supercars Championship field to have undertaken a full test day since the season began at Bathurst in February.
With a typical testing allocation being three days per team, the normal pattern is a pre-season hit-out, another in May or June prior to the Hidden Valley event, and the last in the weeks prior to the first enduro of the year.
WAU, however, is the only team to have held its mid-season team test day (as opposed to rookie day) prior to the long haul across the Nullarbor for the Wanneroo event.
Both the #25 Mobil 1 Optus Mustang of Mostert and the #2 Mobil 1 Truck Assist of Ryan Wood were rolled out at Winton on Wednesday, May 8, with their respective enduro co-drivers Lee Holdsworth and Fabian Coulthard also on-hand.
Mostert had a simple explanation for the relatively early return to the northeast Victorian circuit.
“It was heaps of stuff for us,” he told Speedcafe of what the squad worked on.
“We already had probably enough things we had question marks on, that we wanted to basically get a bit of a direction on earlier than later.
“So, when you’ve already got a full test plan that you can put together, it’s probably best to test; try and find some improvements earlier in the year rather than waiting for something mid-year.”
Whether that translates into gains at Wanneroo is now the question.
“It’s always the same thing; you come out of most times you test at Winton and you think that you’re about to be on and who knows if it makes you more confused or not?” quipped the two-time Bathurst 1000 winner.
“We felt like we came out of the day learning some things and learning some new tools and we’ll just have to see if it works this weekend.”
It has been said from within the paddock that the off-season rehomologation of the Ford Mustang’s aerodynamics was more significant a change than that of the Chevrolet Camaro’s.
While Mostert is winless thus far, WAU evidently must have a reasonable handle on its 2024 package considering he is behind only Triple Eight Race Engineering’s Will Brown and Broc Feeney in the drivers’ championship.
“I think you’re always still learning every race you go out,” remarked Mostert, who also has a new Race Engineer this year in Sam Scaffidi.
“It’s definitely changed in the off-season. I can’t talk about the other brand but, for us, it’s definitely feels like the aero’s even come up a bit more from last year, which they were trying to achieve.
“For us, we probably made more gains in the off-season as a team than what we were last year, just trying to get some fundamentals right.
“The guys and girls worked extremely hard and I think that’s probably where our biggest game this year has come from.”
Mostert boasts 21 Repco Supercars Championship race wins but none since the 2022 Adelaide 500.
He has come close a number of times this year, though, with podiums in both Bathurst 500 encounters and another at Albert Park, before losing a wheel while battling with eventual Race 7 victory Andre Heimgartner in Taupo.
“I’m hoping [to break the drought]; the longer it goes on, the more you start to think that sometimes you can’t do it, but the pace has definitely been there this year,” said the #25 pilot.
“Obviously, we’ve got a pole this year, which is fantastic, [but] didn’t quite convert that.
“I feel like I like the longer races better – the pit stop elements and all those factors that can come into it; the strategy – so Perth is always one of them great tracks that seems to create great racing as well.
“I’d like to think that we could be in with a shot this weekend.
“Last year, I didn’t think there were some races that we were in with a shot with a win, but I can definitely feel it this year.
“We’ve just got to try and piece it all together. There’s been a few things that we just haven’t quite executed properly and maybe that’s been just lacking a small little bit of pace, but if we can find that bit of pace it always makes that job quite easy.”
Penrite Racing also tested between Taupo and Wanneroo, although that was just a ‘rookie’ outing for Matt Payne during which team-mate Riche Stanaway was also able to enjoy 10 laps in the #19 Mustang.
The majority of the Supercars Championship field is expected to test late this month at either of Queensland Raceway or Winton.
Practice 1 at Wanneroo starts this afternoon at 14:20 local time/16:20 AEST.
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