FW1s Dave Sideways Sieders has reset the lap record as he drove his way back to eleventh position for the opening round of the Auto One V8 Ute Seriesprotected by Armor All at the Clipsal 500 this weekend, 28 February3 March.
The 2011 and 2012 Ute Series Runner Up eclipsed the previous record by almost three-tenths to 1:36.0919, however, Sieders will have an uphill challenge for the second year in a row as he chases the Championship from just outside the top ten with 45 points separating him from the top spot.Its obviously not the ideal way to start the season, said Sieders, you never want to be more than a sessions worth of points off the lead, but then again, we were in a similar position after electrical issues last year, and still finished in second place last year, so there is a lot that can happen before the final race in Homebush.
This year, the car was great in all of the sessions, and we were really happy with the speed out there, said Sieders, that penalty from race one really hurt us, but its a very long season, and only person has ever won round won and gone on to win the Series [Warren Luff2002].
Sieders had started on the front row for the fourth consecutive year, and had crossed the line in third for the first race of 2013, however, a post race investigation that would have promoted him to second, resulted in a 22 second time penalty, dropping his result to 26th.
The penalty in race one was unfortunate and really wrecked our weekend, said Sieders, the race officials were investigating Ryals [Harris] move at turn 14 on the final lap, and whilst he copped a 10 place penalty and moved me up one spot, the officials noted that I then passed him under a yellow flag after passing the chequered flag and enforced the relevant penalty.
Starting near the rear of the grid for race two, Sieders put his head down and got to the task of salvaging as much as he could, passing 16 cars on the track and setting the new lap record in the process, however, was ineligible for the $500 SS Inductions Hard Charger Award, as his starting position was a result of a time penalty.
I got a few off the line and a couple more by turn four, getting up to 20th by the end of lap 1, said Sieders, the car was a rocket and we got a few easy places with other racing incidents, but to get back inside the top 10 was awesome.In the final race, Sieders started off 15th position, and again was able to race back inside the top ten without too many dramas, finishing in ninth for the second race in a row.
The car was really fast again here at Adelaide and we were faster than the field in every race this weekend.The Auto One V8 Ute Series will head to Barbagallo Raceway in Perth (WA) for round two of the series in two months time, 3-5 May 2013.Weve had some great pace over there, but Barbagallo is one track Ive never quite been able to get great results at...we need to turn that around this year and start climbing our way back.
