Scott Pye and David Reynolds have called for changes to safety fencing at Sydney Motorsport Park after suffering heavy impacts in Race 28.
Reynolds was tagged into a spin by team-mate Mark Winterbottom at Turn 3 on the opening lap, sending The Bottle-O Ford into the path of Pye.
Ensuing contact between Reynolds and Pye saw both cars slide across the wet grass and into the outside wall.
Pye’s car met the unprotected concrete head-on, while Reynolds’ car sustained heavy rear-end damage.
Both drivers later expressed frustration that the consequences of the incident had been so severe.
“It’s crazy that at that corner there’s no gravel trap, there’s no tyre bundle or anything, it’s just downhill grass into a concrete wall,” Pye told Speedcafe.com.
“The result is a destroyed car and I’m pretty sore.
“The incident was one of those things, but the impact could have been minimised.
“I think that it should be changed.”
Reynolds echoed Pye’s sentiments over the angle of the fencing, which also claimed an FPR chassis in the hands of Steven Richards in 2008.
“I’m a little bit disappointed that I hit the fence 90 degrees to the track, which I shouldn’t be able to do in any form of motorsport whatsoever,” he said.
“It’s done a lot of damage to the car and it set the little light off in the car that means it’s gone over a certain g-(force) so obviously it’s been a pretty big accident.”
Pye said that the concrete made this accident bigger than his head-on contact with the Turn 2 armco at Symmons Plains last year.
“That’s a lot harder than I’ve ever had, I’m a lot more sore,” he said.
“At Symmons the rear of the car kicked up and it lost a lot of its impact, but that today it just hit the wall and stopped.
“I think we left the track at about 130km/h and I don’t think it slowed down much from that.
“I’ve got quite a few cuts and things. I’ll be very sore tomorrow.”
DJR and FPR crews were left to assess the two cars on Sunday evening, with the full extent of the damage not likely to be known until the cars return to their workshops.
The incident is the second major crash for DJR this year following David Wall’s accident at Pukekohe.
“It’s tough, not just financially but with the amount of work involved for the guys,” said Pye.
“I thought we were finally starting to hit our stride as well,” he added, having been classified a lowly 20th and 22nd in the two Saturday races.
“In qualifying we lost 0.2s at the last corner with Dale Wood, if not for that I think we could have been on the front-row or at the very least the top five.
“We were confident we had a good car for the race but again it didn’t go our way.
“That’s the disheartening thing, but hopefully we can come back stronger and faster and get the results that the boys deserve.”
The crash completed a weekend to forget for Reynolds, who had been taken out in a Turn 3 incident on the opening lap of Saturday’s Race 26.
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