Max Vidau has admitted to an element of surprise at leaving Albert Park as the Porsche Paynter Dixon Carrera Cup Australia championship leader.
While several drivers entered Round 1 with plenty of pre-season miles under their belt aboard the new 992 generation Cup Car, Vidau was not one of them.
That didn’t stop him from starring across the weekend, taking four podiums from as many starts for Tekworkx Motorsport.
Those results put the 20-year-old South Australian on top of the standings, four points clear of 2017 champion David Wall, one-off competitor Aaron Love, and Race 4 winner Harri Jones.
Love won the first three races of the round before finding himself in the gravel trap after contact with Luke Youlden in the event finale, opening the door for Vidau to steal the round win with results of second, third, second, third.
“It’s pretty surreal looking back two years at the Melbourne Grand Prix when COVID struck, and to be honest, I really didn’t see myself back in a Cup Car,” said Vidau.
“[Tekworkx Motorsport owner] Rob Woods came along and gave me an opportunity to not only work for the team but drive for them, and I’m absolutely stoked to be on the top step of the podium.
“It’s awesome, massive thank you to the boys and everything they do to me as well, as all my sponsors Tyrepower, Bondi Carpets and Exedy.
“I’m ecstatic, but obviously Aaron got a bit stitched up with what happened to him, but we’ve had some awesome battles over the years.
“He’s heading over to Europe, hopefully I’ll see him over there soon.
“We didn’t really do much testing either, we just stumbled across something good and stuck with it.
“Hopefully it works at Winton too.”
As indicated by Vidau, Round 2 of the season will take place at Winton Motor Raceway across May 21-22, in support of the Repco Supercars Championship’s event at the northern Victorian venue.