The Walkinshaw Supercars ace was sublime in a three-part qualifying session at Highlands earlier today, securing second place on the grid for tomorrow’s NZ GP.
However he is now fighting an alleged technical breach relating to ride height that could send him to the back of the grid.
Wood was initially disqualified from qualifying in its entirety and therefore sent to the back of the grid for both today’s Race 1 and tomorrow’s Grand Prix.
However an appeal from his MTEC team has allowed him to start today’s opener from fifth place.
Still, his second place start for the GP remains under threat.
“It’s actually still under investigation so I don’t want to say too much,” Wood’s engineer Richard Harris explained.
“Basically we were found to be rubbing on the ride height tool on our final set [of tyres] when we came in after qualifying. But we were able to get the ride height tool through clear.
“After that investigation we went down and checked the car on all three sets of tyres and the car passed clearly on the first two sets, and the last set was closer.
“This was highlighted to the stewards. They didn’t realise we ran three sets of tyres in qualifying so they have now changed that decision based on the findings that we ran three different sets of tyres.
“Then they are still making their decision, I believe, on tomorrow.”
The grid for Race 1 was set by Q1 times while the GP grid was set by Q3 times, which means a Q3-only disqualification would send Wood to the back of the field for the prestigious race.
Series leader Ugo Ugochukwu is also under investigation for a technical breach, however officials are yet to hand down a verdict.
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