Mostert/Owen win Pirtek Enduro Cup

Chaz Mostert and Steve Owen have won the 2017 Pirtek Enduro Cup off the back of a seventh position finish in Race 22 this afternoon.

The Prodrive Racing Australia pair set up the triumph with a comeback win in Race 21 a day earlier at the Vodafone Gold Coast 600 a day and in the process became the first Ford winners of the cup.

Mostert/Owen finished 48 points clear of Fabian Coulthard and Tony D’Alberto, who had held top spot leaving the Supercheap Auto Bathurst 1000.

The #12 DJR Team Penske Falcon actually moved up a position to finish runners-up despite coming home only ninth in the final race of the Pirtek Enduro Cup.

That was because Sandown 500 winners Cameron Waters and Richie Stanaway ended the race two laps off the pace in 21st, the latter having incurred steering damage when he hit Craig Lowndes while trying to pass for third on Lap 34.

Waters/Stanaway placed third in the Pirtek Enduro Cup, making for a Prodrive one-three.

“When you get to go home on Sunday night at the end of Gold Coast and have that cup, you obviously know you’ve had a pretty consistent Enduro Cup campaign as a team, so it’s awesome to get that,” Mostert told Speedcafe.com.

“We came close in 2014 with it when we won at Bathurst, come up second in then, but it’s awesome to have a cup this year already before the end of the year.”

Owen, who has been with Prodrive as an enduro co-driver since 2013, said that the trophy was a special reward for the hired guns of the three endurance events.

“For us it’s like the enduro drivers’ world championship, so it’s good,” he laughed.

“It’s a long campaign even for three races because they’re three long races.

“It’s sometimes a bit of a tortoise and hare type of approach and I’m definitely the tortoise but I keep bringing it back.

“It’s good to have won the cup.”

The day itself was a somewhat frustrating one for the duo, however, as they were unable to carry through their race-winning form from the day before.

Owen finished his stint in seventh position, having run sixth until being passed by team-mate Dean Canto on Lap 21.

Mostert emerged in eighth once the first round of pit stops fully played out and only regained the one position, during the final set of stops.

A need to save fuel, brought about by difficulties fully filling the car, saw him continue to circulate in seventh until the end of the race.

“I think we were just a bit too far back by the time we pitted,” explained Mostert.

“After the first ones (pit stops), we fell back down the order.

“There were snippets of great pace out there at times during stints, (but) it wasn’t across the whole stint.

“Towards the end we had another issue going on with some pit stop stuff, so just didn’t quite have the pace towards the end.”

Meanwhile, for the fourth time in the five-year history of the Pirtek Enduro Cup, there were four different race winning cars.

Pirtek Enduro Cup: 2017 results

Pirtek Enduro Cup: 2017 race winners

Previous Pirtek Enduro Cup winners