2016 V8 Supercar Championship: Clipsal 500 Talking Points

Another year, another mammoth weekend at the Clipsal 500, an event that seems to go from strength to strength. There was plenty going on over the course of three races, and here are my major takeaways:

1. Race Control’s Error

It had been raining torrentially around the circuit for a good five minutes before the yellow flag was called. Neil Crompton and Mark Skaife were harping on about how much rain was falling from the roof of their box into pit lane, the DJR-Team Penske bunker lost power and cars were tiptoeing around like first-timers on an ice rink.

For the life of me, I can’t work out why it took the race officials such a long time to throw the yellow flag and get the safety car out onto the track. That eventual deployment was about thirty seconds too late for James Courtney, whose HRT Commodore whacked the wall hard in the treacherous turn eight, severely damaging his car.

Why Courtney was still being forced to race – if you could call it that – in weather so appalling is beyond me. The race should have been halted as soon as the rain got really heavy. It was madness letting them continue. We’re lucky that no one was seriously injured.

Oh, to be a fly on the wall in the Holden Racing Team garage at that moment. Adrian Burgess must’ve gone absolutely berserk. The race control folks really dropped the ball and cost Courtney any chance of a good finish.

2. LD Motorsport

It was a crazy, weather-affected Sunday race, and sometimes it takes a little assist – or, in this case, a big assist – from Mother Nature to see the minnows of the sport enjoy some time in the limelight. Rain is a great equaliser, for sure, but there was some great strategy calls by the squad, and Nick Percat’s run to an improbable victory in the shortened Sunday race is one of the more memorable Clipsal 500 happenings. LD Motorsport’s first V8 Supercar race victory will not disappear from the memory of anyone who saw it.

I loved seeing the absolute sheer delight on the faces of everyone involved in a team that, to be fair, has been making steady gains over the last twelve months, moving from perennial backmarkers up towards the middle of the field, thanks to Percat’s input and skill. The former Bathurst 1000 champion will savour his first hometown win for a long time to come. And what a popular win it was!

3. Ford Troubles

As the old motorsports adage goes, qualifying is one thing and racing is another. That’s how it was for teams running Ford Falcons this weekend. Three weekend races brought three poles – Scott Pye, Chas Mostert and Fabian Coulthard – for the Blue Oval brigade but none of those head-of-the-field starts were converted into race wins. The good news is that most of the Fords showed good pace throughout what's always a trying and challenging weekend.

4. Nissan’s Speed

Michael Caruso in the NISMO Motorsport Nissan Altima leads the V8 Supercar Series after one race. Obviously, Sunday’s race involved plenty of weather-induced craziness, but even on Saturday, the Kelly boys and Caruso showed enough speed to think that the Altima squad might have really turned the corner as far as consistent race results go.

5. Saturday's Race Format

C’mon, V8 Supercars, give us back a two 250km weekend event. The gruelling races were the hallmark of the Clipsal 500, separating the men from the boys, as the saying goes. For mine, the twin 125km races on Sunday have cheapened what a Clipsal 500 race victory means. Bring back the long Saturday race!

Opinion: 6 Thoughts from the 2015 V8 Supercar Clipsal 500

1. The Clipsal 500 is the second-best race weekend in V8 Supercars. Second only behind the mighty Bathurst 1000, the Clipsal 500 combines everything you could want from a weekend at the racetrack: tight racing on a challenging circuit, giant crowds, (usually) great weather, off-track entertainment – Cold Chisel played after the race on Sunday night – and the feel of being at a track for something more than just a racing weekend. It’s an event, a big one, and it’s no wonder that drivers push themselves to the very limit of physical and mental exhaustion in an effort to win the race.

When you have someone like Roger Penske come down and speak glowingly about an event, that’s a wonderful mark of respect. Fans vote with their feet, too. The year’s Clipsal event was the third-best in terms of overall attendance. There’s nothing more appealing for teams and manufacturers than turning on the television to see the giant grandstand that runs three quarters of the length of the front straight absolutely packed with passionate fans.

2. Saturday’s race needs to go back to 250km. For mine, the only misstep the event has ever made is conforming with the ‘Super Street’ format that, for some reason, the V8 Supercar folks seem intent on instituting on the Clipsal weekend. You know that old saying, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it? Well, it isn’t broke, but the powers-that-be are trying to fix it anyway.

What separates – or, should I say, used to separate – the Clipsal 500 from any other 500-kilometer weekend event is the fact that the distance is covered over just two gruelling races. The heat, the close concrete walls and the prestige of winning a marquee event. In the last few years, with Saturday featuring two 125km races, it just hasn’t had the same feel. Let’s go back to the old ways: two legs, 250km each, and let the boys have at it.

3. DJR Team Penske aren’t too far away. It looked dire for Dick, Roger and Marcos on Saturday, but Sunday, they were in the shootout and Marcos rallied to a nice twelfth place finish. Their goal for the weekend was to finish in the top half of the field, and the returning two-time V8 Supercar champion did just that.

In fact, the newly-amalgamated team probably exceeded expectations on Sunday, with Marcos managing to qualify inside the top ten, reminding people of how damn good he was behind the wheel of a V8 Supercar, and you wonder what sort of a race finish might’ve been possible if they’d played the strategy game better. Even so, it was a solid run, and if the team continues to improve at this rate, the Captain’s squad will be up the front before too long.

4. Stadium Super Trucks are cool. I’ve heard about Robby Gordon’s series, which brings an off-road feel to enclosed racetrack events. The Super Trucks have been a support category for IndyCar events over the last few years, and although I’d never glimpsed a race before, I’d read articles of effusive praise from people in the IndyCar world, and seen pictures of the awesome-looking vehicles.

Whoever had the idea of bringing the big trucks out to Adelaide deserves an instant promotion. It’s rare that a support category upstages the main event, but the imported trucks nearly did that. When the cameras roamed pit lane during the races, there was scarcely a V8 driver who wasn't completely enthralled. And what’s not to like about trucks rolling over, taking huge jumps and managing to two-wheel it around the sharp corners of the Adelaide circuit.

Gordon spoke during the weekend about wanting to put together a 2 or 3 race V8 deal to minimise transportation costs, and based on the weekend’s performance, his phone should be ringing hot, with Aussie promoters trying to get his series to their event. What a show!

5. This could be James Courtney’s year. The oft-maligned Holden Racing Team pilot produced one heck of a drive on Sunday, holding off Shane Van Gisbergen to record a memorable Clipsal win, his second consecutive in the long race at Adelaide.

You don’t need me to tell you just how hard it is to keep Van Gisbergen at bay. Courtney displayed a cool head and an impressive ability to snuff out each sortie SVG made over those last twenty laps – which would’ve felt more like 200 to Courtney – on old tires and with fading breaks, under all the pressure in the world.

I’d rank it up there as one of the best performances we’ve seen at Adelaide. If Courtney drives like he did on Sunday for the rest of the season, the rest of the field should be very worried.

6. The last-lap race three accident wasn't Whincup’s fault. If anything, it was probably Chaz Mostert’s fault, as the Ford driver couldn’t exactly lay claim to holding the racing line. He tried to go around the outside, when Whincup had the line for the next corner. It was a scary-looking accident and if anyone was to blame, it was Mostert.

As it turned out, the stewards decided that it was merely a racing incident – being the last lap of a big event, you can understand some leeway being given – and Mostert is rather lucky. If it had been any other lap, he might’ve been heavily penalised. Nonetheless, the incident definitely wouldn’t have pleased Triple 8 Racing boss Roland Dane one little bit and it surely makes the Prodrive Racing Australia/Triple 8 rivalry even more heated.