Waters finishes 4th in wet conditions

6 March 2016

Frosty finishes 9th

Prodrive Racing (Australia)'s Cameron Waters has made a standout debut at the Clipsal 500, finishing fourth in a manic, rain-filled race. 

A delayed start, red flags and safety cars interrupted the extremely wet race, which was eventually shortened to a time-certain finish. 

Waters started ninth after taking a spot in his maiden top-ten shootout, and then made his way through the field after falling back early in the race. 

With only a brief period on slick tyres, Waters was called in for his final fuel drop just prior to the red flag, allowing him to stay up the front of the field. 

Mark Winterbottom was the only other PRA team member to finish the race, finishing ninth overall. 

Despite recording the most number of pit stops, Winterbottom was happy with the performance of his car in the wet weather. 

Cam and Frosty will continue their search for further car speed at the Australian Formula 1 Grand Prix in two weeks' time.
 
DRIVERS’ VIEW
Mark Winterbottom - #1 The Bottle-O PRA Ford:
Race 3 Quali: 8th – 1m20.826
Top 10 Shootout: 7th – 1m22.389
Race 3 Result: 11th 
"It was an interesting day. I think we won the award for how many times we pitted – we pitted more than anyone. I passed a lot of cars, the car was actually pretty good in the wet and starting under safety car I went to last and started to come back through and then I went back out again and then went back to last again, I just kept getting the raw end of the stick. The car was actually really good, that's probably the best I've felt in the wet for a long time. There was always going to be people crashing so you try and keep in clean because I want to try and fix the speed not fix the car. Overall I struggled a bit this weekend; the car wasn't quite there for me. Even in that race, when it was dry I was struggling a bit but we did a whole 180 flip of going from understeer locking to oversteer. We'll try again at the Grand Prix and hopefully kick start the championship from there."

Cameron Waters - #6 Monster Energy PRA Ford:
Race 3 Quali: 10th – 1m20.886s
Top 10 Shootout: 9th - 1m22.630
Race 3 Result: 4th 
"I'm stoked. I can't believe I came fourth to be honest, it was so hard. You didn't really know when people had pitted and those conditions were probably the toughest I'd ever driven in in my life so I just wanted to keep in straight and to come out the other end in fourth is just absolutely awesome for the team. I just can't thank everyone enough. Bring on the rest of the year."

Tim Edwards – Team Principal: 
"It was a bit of a lottery out there to be honest. We're lucky that both Mark and Cam's cars came back clean for the weekend. Cam's performance today was fantastic. It's a real credit to him and his racing; he drove a really level headed race today and worked with Brendan (Hogan) [engineer] really well throughout the race to time their pit stops. They're proving to be a good combination and I'm excited to see what they can do throughout the year. Frosty was a bit unlucky today with the timing of the safety cars and his pit stops but to finish ninth after all of that was a great effort."

CLIPSAL 500 RESULTS – SUNDAY
RACE 3
1) Nick Percat – Lucas Dumbrell Racing 
2) Michael Caruso – Nissan Motorsport 
3) Garth Tander - HRT
4) Cameron Waters – Monster Energy Racing
5) David Reynolds - Erebus
9) Mark Winterbottom – The Bottle-O Racing Team  

DRIVER CHAMPIONSHIP POINTS 
1) Michael Caruso – Nissan Motorsport: 222
2) Garth Tander – HRT: 202
3) Jamie Whincup – Triple Eight: 201
4) Shane Van Gisbergen – Triple Eight: 198
5) Scott McLaughlin – Garry Rogers Motorsport: 189
7) Cameron Waters – Monster Energy Racing: 184
11) Mark Winterbottom – The Bottle-O Racing Team: 165

TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP
1) Triple Eight: 398
2) HRT: 388
3) Nissan Motorsport: 352
4) Prodrive Racing (Australia): 349

- See more at: http://www.prodriveracing.com.au/news/2016/03/06/waters-the-standout-in-crazy-clipsal-race#sthash.5z8DcZ7e.dpuf