Winterbottom takes top ten in first race at Adelaide

It has been a day of strong progress for Team 18 at the Adelaide 500 despite an incident for the DEWALT Racing Commodore in Practice 2.

The first race of the 2020 Supercars Championship has finished with a solid performance from both IRWIN Racing and DEWALT Racing Commodores at the Adelaide 500.

Team 18 has put in a strong showing in the opening race of the season with a top 10 result and some encouraging speed.

IRWIN Racing's Mark Winterbottom finished eighth in the 250km race. He combatted some minor steering issues but came home with a clean car and was pleased to tick his goal of achieving a top ten result for the team.

New team recruit Scott Pye, driving the DEWALT Racing Commodore, continued his learnings inside the newly expanded team, finishing 15th.

The DEWALT Racing car negotiated some radio and communication issues, but banked some solid points for the team and a strong package to build on for Sunday.

Both cars made it through the first 250km with little to no damage and, importantly, no reliability issues.

Team 18 returns to the Adelaide street track tomorrow for the second 250km leg to round out the 2020 Superloop Adelaide 500.

Qualifying starts at 11:50am with the race kicking off at 3:20pm local time.

QUOTES
Mark Winterbottom - Driver, Team 18 #18 IRWIN Racing Holden Commodore ZB

“We had a pretty clean race and kept the car clean, had a few steering dramas with a bit of right and left-hand down but the car survived which was the main thing,” said Mark Winterbottom.

“Race pace was ok, I just couldn’t go with the front guys when they were pushing hard.

“Top ten was the goal and we finished eighth so thats the best we could do today and we'll work on the car overnight and come back stronger tomorrow.”

Scott Pye - Driver, Team 18 #20 DEWALT Racing Holden Commdore ZB

“We had a few challenges with some radio and communication issues with the car so we struggled with communication back to the pits,” said Scott Pye.

“We have a straight car so we can come back tomorrow and do some more miles and hopefully qualify higher which was always going to be difficult after the crash yesterday. The crew did an amazing job to get it back on track today so full credit to them.