Craig's Corner: Title fight tipped to ignite under Sydney lights
Supercars
19 Jul
This is the seventh exclusive Supercars.com column by Supercars Hall of Famer Craig Lowndes for the 2024 season. Seven-time Bathurst winner Lowndes will preview each round of the 2024 Repco Supercars Championship from his own perspective, continuing with this weekend’s Panasonic Air Conditioning Sydney SuperNight.
This weekend, we have the first and only night races we have this season, and that always throws up completely new challenges for teams and drivers.
It does feel a lot faster at night, because you can’t gauge depth perception around you clearly like you can during the day. So, everything does seem to go past you at a million miles an hour.
And then of course, things seem to approach you a lot quicker, like corners, braking markers, kerbs. You have to get used to it as quickly as possible.
Your brain's telling you one thing because of that lack of depth, but ultimately you're travelling at the same speed as you are during the day. It’s a mental challenge for drivers to understand that it's the same at night.
Personally, I love night racing. I really enjoyed racing under lights because of the other challenges that you don't have during the day.
You need confidence and belief that you'd be able to still be able to make a pass into Turn 2, somewhat down into Turn 4, into the Turn 8 hairpin. They’re great passing opportunity corners that drivers will need to get on top of for the race.
Tyre deg is going to be quite high at Sydney Motorsport Park, we've seen that in the past. But during the night race, that will improve because of the cooler conditions.
Night racing is great for spectators too, the big thing they’ll notice is obviously the front brake discs glowing, and the flames shooting out the exhaust. They’re elements that you don't see during the day because they’re somewhat hidden.
We’re sticking with long races this weekend, which are always great strategy races. The bar is raised in Sydney, because of the night conditions, tyre degradation, refuelling and the nature of the circuit.
Teams really come into their own in longer races — we saw in Townsville how well Matt Payne and Penrite Racing made a bold strategy work. It went under the radar because no one has been super bold recently, so it could set a new tone for the season.
If you’re going to make a bold strategy work, you need to have the speed to compensate for that extra stop. But you also need to be able to manage traffic, and get through traffic fast enough so you're not held up in the shorter stints to capitalise on the benefit of the tyre.
Penrite Racing proved they can make it work, and that they’re here to win. It was fascinating to watch, given we didn’t get the full picture of that race until three-quarter distance.
Talking championship, there’s obviously no doubt Will Brown and Broc Feeney will both want to bounce back strongly after Townsville. Generally, when Triple Eight has a bad weekend, they bounce back the following weekend. For Will, after what happened in Townsville, he needs to.
Scoreboard pressure counts for a lot, and any ground you can gain right now heading into the enduros is massive. After all, we are only two race meetings away from the start of the endurance season, which in itself is a massive part of the whole championship.
Simply, in the case of Feeney, Payne, Cam Waters and Chaz Mostert, if you need to maximise points, you need to do it now. The Ford drivers in particular will definitely want to continue that momentum after dominating in Townsville.
The Townsville battles between Cam and Chaz were amazing to watch. It was as good as it gets. They’re both a little bit older and a bit more mature now, so I think they're a bit smarter in how they attack each other. They know that a street race like Townsville is high risk for any passing opportunity, and they brought home crucial results.
I’m not sure whether they'll be that polite this weekend if they get into that same scenario, because at Sydney Motorsport Park, there’s a lot more run-off, and there are areas where you can be a bit more aggressive. We've seen that in the past, even between teammates, when Jamie Whincup and Shane van Gisbergen went door-to-door a few years ago.
All told, the Ford drivers have got some momentum now and, critically, they've got belief that they have got equipment that can win races. Importantly, that's across a number of Ford teams — it's just not one Ford team dominating. There will be confidence in the Blue Oval ranks, especially going into the enduros.
It’s also a big weekend for Lochie Dalton, who will make his debut in a Tickford wildcard Mustang. One great thing about this championship is having young drivers come in and getting an experience of what it takes at this level. We saw what Cooper Murray did in Darwin, and with a big team, Lochie has a chance to impress.
Motor racing is tough, but it’s important to take your opportunity to see what you’re made of. From practice, you're talking about qualifying pressure, you're talking about getting a lap time, and you’re then talking about how to piece together a race. Lochie has been solid in Super2, and I have no doubt he’ll take this chance with both hands.
I'm really looking forward to this weekend. We’re at the halfway mark of the season, and the championship is heating up. Knowing this track, it’s set to go to another level in Sydney!
