Winterbottom delivers his promise to Schwerkolt

Mark Winterbottom’s first race win for Team 18 represented the fulfillment of a promise made to the squad’s owner, Charlie Schwerkolt.

The 42-year-old took victory in Race 13 of the Repco Supercars Championship at the Betr Darwin Triple Crown, his first since the Pukekohe event of 2016, when he was a Tickford Racing driver.

Indeed, it was the first victory altogether for Team 18, which essentially began as a squad in its own right in 2016 after periods as a fourth car at Tickford and Walkinshaw Racing.

Winterbottom’s triumph was therefore a landmark moment in Schwerkolt’s long, rocky motorsport journey, and a personal milestone as well after 13 years at Tickford, including its days as the factory Ford team.

“Charlie’s a very proud, successful person that brings his mates and wears his pride on his sleeve when he comes racing,” said ‘Frosty’.

“He dominates the forklift industry and he wants to dominate the Supercars industry, and he’s a very proud man, so to see him so emotional…

“It’s a big moment because when you leave a team and you go from a big team with 80 people to, I think we had 15 at the time, it’s a big step.

“But you’ve promised each other what you want out of it, and what you’re going to do, and it’s a big moment to get that win.

“It’s not saying we’re going to win every race, by any means, but it’s one; it’s one that we said we were going to try and get.

“I said to him, ‘We’ll win a race; sign me and we’ll win a race.’”

Schwerkolt bought into Dick Johnson Racing in 2008 before he and the legendary driver parted ways in acrimonious circumstances in 2010, ironically just as James Courtney won them the championship.

Courtney had done so in the #18 entry underpinned by the Racing Entitlements Contract which Schwerkolt owned then, and which is now (as a Teams Racing Charter) the Winterbottom entry.

In fact, Car #18 had not won a race since that 2010 championship year, and had not even finished on the podium since its Tickford days in 2013.

Seven years ago at Hidden Valley, no less, a heavy crash saw then-Team 18 driver Lee Holdsworth hospitalised and forced onto the sidelines for three events.

However, it was arguably the 2018 campaign – yet another irony – that was the squad’s nadir, when Holdsworth finished just 21st in the standings despite completing the full season on that occasion.

Schwerkolt signed Winterbottom and returned to a Triple Eight Race Engineering alliance for the following year, and while the latter has ended again, Team 18 is now enjoying its greatest high.

Winterbottom is a Bathurst 1000 winner and a Supercars champion but described the Darwin victory as “probably one of the most emotional” because “when you haven’t had it for such a long time, it’s a big thing.”

On the other side of the Bruin Beasley-led garage, which houses the #20 entry of Scott Pye that was added in 2020, it was a case of a top 10 slipping away in unfortunate circumstances.

Pye qualified ninth and was still running in the top 10 but copped bodywork damage in a messy Safety Car restart, battling to 12th at the chequered flag.

Winterbottom, who inherited the lead when Cameron Waters’ Tickford Mustang caught fire, survived late pressure from Broc Feeney to beat the Triple Eight youngster to the chequered flag by less than half a second, while Will Davison scored Dick Johnson Racing’s first podium of the season in third place.

Qualifying for Race 14 starts this morning at 09:30 local time/10:00 AEST.