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MSR, Hazelwood penalised over data breach

29 Oct 2022
MSR docked points, Hazelwood handed grid penalty
2 mins by James Pavey
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Matt Stone Racing and Todd Hazelwood have been penalised over a data breach on the Gold Coast.

MSR has been docked points, with Hazelwood excluded from Friday's results and handed a grid penalty.

Hazelwood was 13th and 22nd in Practice 1 and Practice 2 respectively at the Boost Mobile Gold Coast 500.

It was found that that MSR had been incorrectly logging the damper settings on the #35 Commodore.

The report reads:

Following Practice 2, the DRD received a report from Supercars Technical that Car 35 was logging the damper settings at 50Hz during Practice Sessions 1 and 2, in breach of Rule C15.7.13 (Logging rates are free except for those channels listed in the table – Suspension or Damper Position – 25Hz).

In summary, the Stewards imposed the following penalties on Car 35, Matt Stone Racing:(a) Car 35 is disqualified from Practice 1 and Practice 2.(b) The data recorded from Car 35 in breach of the Rule is to be deleted from the Competitor’s computer systems.(c) The loss of 5 Grid Spots for Car 35 in Race 31; and(d) The loss of 50 Teams Championship Points on the Competitor.

Hazelwood finds the fence

Stone and Team Principal Pete Vale, per the report, admitted the facts alleged and accepted that it amounted to a breach.

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Hazelwood avoided being relegated to the rear of the grid regardless of where he qualified.

However, he crashed in Race 31 qualifying and ended up 24th; he will drop to 25th and last with the penalty applied.

MSR claimed it has engaged junior engineers to staff their team; per the report, one of these engineers "was responsible for resetting the parameters for the data logging on Car 35 from the prior Event”.

The report continues: "The engineers are still undertaking their studies and so are inexperienced. The engineer made an error in the setting of the damper logging rate.

Further, "The Competitor was unaware until contacted by Supercars Technical that the data was being logged at a rate greater than is permitted by the Rules. They assured the Stewards that the data had not yet been analysed by their engineering team".

The logging was put down to "an unintentional error” and "there was no direction from the Competitor to log the data at that rate, but it is accepted that the Competitor is responsible for the error”.

The 85-lap Race 31 will commence at 3:45pm local time on Saturday.

Top Ten Shootout 31 Highlights: Boost Mobile Gold Coast 500

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