Double Undies podium in 14 hour Winton marathon

BOTH Hy Undies and all eight of the Mansfield Motorsport race drivers stood on the Winton Rumble podium to collect medals and trophies for 2nd and 3rd place in Division 3, lapping the tricky circuit relentlessly in just under two minutes for nearly 380 laps or 1140 kilometres over 14 long hours. This is like driving to Sydney via the Alpine Way and the A1 coast road flat out non-stop. The Mansfield cars were the lowest priced, lowest powered cars in the event but still beat six other teams in Division 3 and 16 teams overall and were only bested by a BMW. A quarter of the 25 teams did not finish. The two Mansfield Hyundai Excels were built up from four wrecks into faultless performers. As rookie Kit Rundle explained: “The car is still running on its 1999 shock absorbers, but it’s doing amazingly well.” Since Brett Smith is in charge of keeping everything mechanical on Mt Buller running smoothly and was the main man on all the Undies mechanical preparation, faultless performance is no surprise. Tony Brown, Mansfield’s gun fabricator, built the AASA required safety installations as well as creating the crazy theme and logo, which brightened the racers and team shirts. The endurance aspect was tough, especially for those who had to work between stints, like Stuart Wadsworth, whose idea this was: “I was catering for 100 people at a wedding, so it was a very late night and I was first stint on Sunday; fortunately the adrenalin kicks in for the 45 minutes in the car and then I can sleep." But pro race preparation and reliability can be defeated by poor strategy. Team manager Dane Nye had to work out how to balance lap speed against fuel consumption and rate of R-Spec tyre wear, to try to achieve refuelling and tyre changes coinciding with driver changeovers. Ultimately it was the Hy smarts of the Undies which got them the trophies. For those who think motor sport is a high cost individual sport where egos battle, Motor Events Racing and AASA have a program of very low cost, good fun, but proper competition. The team format brings people together to share costs and work, and families and kids can all find an important job. The vibe in the pits is like no other motor sport event. Will there be a next time? Well, there’s a 12 hour day into night race in May. Meanwhile, if you know an Undie, give him a COVID-safe pat on the back. They all did Mansfield proud.

Double Undies podium in 14 hour Winton marathon

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