Brodie Kostecki was unfazed by a bizarre run-in with a safety vehicle, which potentially cost him a podium finish at the Repco Bathurst 1000.
Kostecki and co-driver David Russell in the #99 Erebus Motorsport ZB Commodore were contenders in the closing stages of Sunday’s Mount Panorama enduro.
They had been second before a Safety Car was called with 20 laps remaining when Will Davison found the tyre barriers.
Both Kostecki and race leader Shane van Gisbergen dived into the pits for their final stop.
When Kostecki rejoined the circuit he was in a race to the safety car positioning line against Chaz Mostert.
However, the Erebus driver found himself behind a recovery vehicle and had to lift off to slot in behind the Walkinshaw Andretti United car.
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The Kostecki/Russell combination slipped to fourth at the chequered flag, having struggled for top-end speed down the straights all day.
“Unfortunately it was just a bit unlucky,” Kostecki told select media, including Speedcafe.com.
“Got the wrong side of the timing; there’s a car stuck under the fence and safety does come first and unfortunately we just got a bit of bad luck there.
“I’m not sure if we would have beaten Chaz or not, but it was really really tight.
“I did have to lift out of the throttle, you know, trying to beat him out and so yeah, I’m not sure what the outcome would have been.
“It was a bit sort of disappointing — yeah, might have put us on the podium not really sure but we didn’t have a fast car today.”
Questioned on whether he asked for a redress, Kostecki responded: “I thought I was in front of Chaz.
“[It’s] sort of really hard to see who is in my blind spot; I definitely saw that he wasn’t in front of me to the point where I lifted but yeah that’s not the line.
“I was trying to navigate the safety truck and him; I saw him coming [at the] last second as well so I had to lift so we didn’t have a monumental with the safety truck.”
It was a freak scenario, with Kostecki saying it’s a “one-off” and doesn’t think it has “ever happened before”.
Speedcafe.com understands normal procedure is that recovery vehicles stay on driver’s left, a point that is made in drivers’ briefings.
In the circumstance surrounding Kostecki, the safety vehicle was indeed on driver’s left, it just so happened to be near the pit exit merge lane at an awkward time when two cars were fighting for the same piece of road.
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