Rick Kelly drove home to second position in Race 1 of the Hamilton 400 in New Zealand today.
After starting from third position on the gird Kelly picked up a position in the opening laps before the appearance of a couple of safety cars close together, triggered most of the field to pit. Kelly almost picked up another position on eventual race winner Garth Tander, in the shuffle of pit stops, however settled into second for the remainder of the race, after the field’s compulsory pit stop for tyres were out of the way. Kelly later claimed he just didn’t have the speed to try and get round Tander.
Kelly’s team mate Dumbrell climbed his way through the field, managing to pick up eight positions to finish in fourteenth position.
After Race 1 Kelly picked up a very valuable 92 points to creep closer to current Championship leader Jamie Whincup who failed to start today’s race after a qualifying incident. Kelly now sits 16 points behind Whincup with Races 2 and 3 to come tomorrow.
Earlier today in qualifying Rick Kelly posted the third fastest time with a 1:24.9111, Dumbrell in position 22. Light showers interrupted the first qualifying session with the second qualifying session cut short. Steven Richards qualified on pole position, Toll HRT’s Garth Tander in second.
#15 Rick Kelly (Qualifying: 3rd, Race 1: 2nd 1:25.7873)
“We had a pretty good race, to move forward a position and finish in second is pretty good. We are happy to sit behind Garth, we definitely didn’t have the pace to catch him and get past, it just wasn’t an option. We just tried to keep it consistent and bring the car home.”
“We had a really good pit stop, the guys did a fantastic job and we are quite happy with that one, particularly coming from Eastern Creek where we had a little bit of a problem. That’s a positive and hopefully we can use that to our advantage tomorrow. We are back on the front row and we got a good start today, I think we are in with a good shot if I get a little bit more speed out of myself and the car and we are starting form the front row.”
“It’s just about consistency and track position, that’s what it comes down to you get a good start, you are nice and consistent and get a great pit stop. It’s very difficult to move forward and unfortunately quite easy to move back.”
“It’s a pleasurable feeling to lead the championship early in the year but generally the person that leads it early in the year doesn’t win it. We are not too concerned about that at the moment, we just aim to consistently finish up the front.”
#16 Paul Dumbrell (Qualifying: 22nd, Race 1: 14th, 1:26.6103)
“We started in 22nd and we were able to move up eight spots. We achieved some of our goals but we still have a fair bit of work to do before tomorrow and I guess we have got our work cut out for us.”
“We will try to improve the car to get a bit more speed and try to get a bit more speed out of myself as well. Unfortunately today turn 1 and turn 2 was absolute chaos. It was a shopping centre car park there for a while. I was in first gear then reverse gear then first gear trying to negotiate myself out of there and that’s part and parcel of this circuit I guess.”
“There was a bit of youthful enthusiasm from a few people who got themselves into trouble and that’s a little bit disappointing.”
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