WITH a pair of wins and a runner-up finish over the last four years in the Bathurst 1000, Prodrive Racing has become one of the most consistently strong performers in the Great Race.
And if the first leg of this year’s Enduro Cup – the Sandown 500 – is anything to go by, Prodrive will again push for a podium at Mount Panorama.
At Sandown the Ford outfit filled two of the three podium spots with Cam Waters and Richie Stanaway claiming a surprise win while Chaz Mostert and Steve Owen picked up third.
The impressive results were in part due to the work the team had put into improving their Falcon FG-Xs, a process which will continue as the Bathurst 1000 draws closer.
“As a team we’ve been working pretty hard. We’ve had some lows this year – Winton we had a mechanical failure, and also Darwin we struggled for pace – so I think we’ve been putting those bricks back together, getting more base setups with our cars,” Mostert said.
“Even in the wet our car was really, really quick. I felt very comfortable in the car.”
Stanaway, who went from pole position and handed over to Waters in the lead, also praised that work.
“It’s a huge credit to our team that have been pushing really hard to increase the performance of our cars,” he said.
“What we’ve rolled out ... has obviously been very competitive.”
The best Prodrive has managed as a team in the Bathurst 1000 was in 2014 when Mostert and Paul Morris placed first with Mark Winterbottom and Owen sixth.