Waters started today’s race from pole, however his hopes of victory were dashed before Turn 1 thanks to a clash with Tim Slade.

Slade had made a better start from the second row of the grid and tried to split Waters and Will Brown when the contact happened.

Waters made a comment about the standing start over the radio, before elaborating to Speedcafe after the race.

He said his thoughts on the Safety Car start are down to the additional white lines at the front of the grid that put the front row starters at a disadvantage.

“I got not the best start, so did Will,” said Waters.

“I think the painted lines for us, we get to them really quick, it hurts our momentum, and that’s probably half the reason why it caused all the cars going into one part of the track.

“So yeah, I think we should have started under Safety Car.

“I don’t make that decision. But when it’s that wet, the front row has to go on those white lines, it hurts that front row more than the rest of the field.”

Waters said he had briefly chatted to Slade after the race and there were no hard feelings.

“I chatted to him and, at the end of the day, they got a good start behind us and Will and I were just trying to get some power down because we were flaring them on the white lines,” he said. “It was just kind of a bit unfortunate, I think, so no hard feelings to anyone.”

Waters managed to get going after the crash and recovered to a remarkable eighth, despite battling bent steering.

“It was wild. I said it was gonna be wild,” added Waters.

“The steering was out and the thing was pretty wounded and we just kept fighting away. We had a really fast car in that last stint and put it to good work passing a heap of cars.

“It was a bit of a shame, really, because the car was super-speedy, even being bent, so probably could have been a race win I think.”