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Image: InSyde Media
Ford Supercars teams still believe that there is work to do in reaching technical parity between the Chevrolet Camaro and Ford Mustang after mixed reviews on the changes made for the Sydney SuperNight.
Revisions ahead of the previous Townsville round focused on the Mustang’s aerodynamic package. For the Sydney round, the Ford ran a new, smaller 80mm throttle body while shift-cut tweaks were made to the Chevrolet.
While the changes were not intended to produce instant results, Townsville saw a breakthrough victory on the Sunday for the Shell V-Power Racing Team #11 Ford Mustang of Anton de Pasquale.
While De Pasquale showed mixed qualifying form at Sydney, where he started 23rd and 9th, the DJR driver scored a podium finish in Sunday’s Race 19 when he passed the Red Bull Racing Camaro of Broc Feeney for third on the final lap.
“It’s a pretty good feeling to know on the Saturday you can turn it around, and we’ve done that a couple of times this year, so I guess we’ll look into that,” De Pasquale said.
“We’ve got a few more base points of understanding the car for a couple different tracks now, so hopefully now we can go to the next few ones and roll out a little bit stronger and the progressive from there.”
DJR team-mate Will Davison has also shown strong but mixed pace, scoring the team’s first podium of 2023 at Darwin, yet neither of the Yatala-based team’s Mustangs able to perform consistently.
“I think the take on our cars is that it’s such a really narrow working window,” said Team Principal, Ben Croke. “It’s the smallest working window that we’ve probably ever seen, where the Mustang is at the moment.
“We’ve been fortunate enough to get in it a couple of times over the last few rounds with Will [Davison] in Darwin, Anton in Townsville and Anton again today, but it can go wrong so quickly for us at the moment, and so it’s such a small window for us to get the Mustang right at the moment.”
Ford Performance motorsports boss Mark Rushbrook has said that the parity issues had made Supercars frustrating, however progress has been made. When asked by Speedcafe if the stronger yet sporadic speed shown by both Shell Mustangs means the parity issues are over, Croke suggested otherwise.
“No. How long have you got?,” he said. “That’s difficult to answer. You know, there’s been a few shining lights, but it’s still not a lot a blue very high up on the leader board in quali or races at the moment. Why that is probably eludes back to what I said before – it’s a very small working window for where our car is at the moment, and it’s really hard to find.”
Similarly, Walkinshaw Andretti United driver Chaz Mostert told Speedcafe that while there have been some steps forward, there’s still changes that need to be made to achieve parity between the Ford and Chevrolet.
“I’m sure different teams will have different opinions and all kinds, but for me the throttle body changes were good,” the Mobil 1 Optus Mustang driver said.
“They definitely made the driveability of the engine less laggy, which is something they wanted to focus on; I thought that was a really good positive.
“There’s still some things that are probably a slightly different between the cars and how the engines operate definitely under braking, which is more engine braking; I feel like that should be the next focus.
“That was pretty much the feedback I gave to go forward. So yeah, I think there’s been things through this year’s configurations [that] have been also better from an aerodynamic point of view. I’m not really sold on the new aerodynamics – that’s my opinion.”
Mostert recorded third and second places at Round 5 in Darwin – his first podiums since March’s season opener at Newcastle – and a second in Sunday’s Race 19 in Sydney. Yet he too suggests that further tweaks need to be made in both aero and engine areas.
“The suspected balance change around the rear wing was more focused around trying to look after the car on the entry to mid-corner phase, and it hasn’t really changed that; if anything it’s probably made it slightly worse, where the car then has been probably picked up a lot more stability on coasts yaw, and then the rear wing for me feels like it kind of disappears a bit under drive.
“So it’s given it a lot of stability in an area that wasn’t the sole focus around the car. And you think about it and you look at the way the two cars are now, the rear end is completely in different positions for both cars. So yeah, I would, I would personally go back and, and look to more of that engine side of things.”
