There really is nothing quite like the Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit.
Where else on the V8 Supercars calendar – or the calendar of any other category with a schedule graced by the 4.4-kilometre track for that matter – can you be rained on, get sunburnt and catch a cold at the same time?
But the appeal of the circuit extends far beyond the typically Melbourne weather and the perverse joy Melbournians have in noting to anyone who asks that yes, they do have four seasons in one day (even if the circuit isn’t at all in Melbourne, despite the start/finish signage suggesting otherwise).
Indeed, in the humble Phillip Island Grand Prix we have one of the country’s finest motorsport destinations.
When you have the opportunity to watch a race against the supreme backdrop of Bass Strait, the bitter cold and the gnawing damp matter nought, because Phillip Island is home to one of those circuits where a car or bike just looks *natural*.
As a motorsport fan it’s only when try to leave at the end of the day to find some four-wheel-drive has rolled while doing 40 kilometres per hour on the only bridge off the island that you come crashing back down to earth.
EVERY V8 SUPERCARS RACE THIS YEAR LIVE ON FOXTEL
But luckily for those not prepared to brace the traffic or the weather, the spectacle of a Supercars round on Phillip Island is nonetheless impressive from the comfort of your living room, where conveniently enough it can all be seen on Fox Sports this weekend.
The 500th round of the Australian touring car V8 Supercars championship
Off the back of Holden’s 500th race win last time out at Symmons Plains, all of Australia will be able to share in the bipartisan milestone of the country’s 500th touring car round. Give yourselves a pat on the back, everyone, we’ve made it.
The first Australian touring car race was held in Orange in 1960 at a place actually called Gnoo-Blas. It was a series of rural roads connected to form what was once a devastatingly quick eight-turn track.
That opening chapter in our touring car history featured a healthy 50 entries, none of which were prepared by Triple Eight, and was won by David McKay, who became the inaugural touring car champion.
The series has obviously come a long way since those humble regional racing days – for one we have Greg Rust on the TV now, and we’re all the better for it – plus it’s now an internationally-respected racing series of value etcetera.
Jamie Whincup looks to win 100 in T8’s 400th
Jamie Whincup will be looking to tie himself to this singularity of racing history as he searches for win 100.
If Whincup can sweep this weekend’s races (preferably not from pole, for the sake of the viewing public), he’ll become the second driver in Australian touring car history to make the tonne after Craig Lowndes permanently etched his name into Supercars folklore in Darwin last year.
But adding to his tally of 98 wins might be secondary to him looking for redemption after a scrappy Sunday race in Tasmania. Two offs at the hairpin – one a mistake, one the result of the now infamous oil slick – left him nineteenth for 48 points, putting him third in the championship standings.
Triple eight race engineering enters 400th race
Whincup’s Triple Eight Race Engineering team will likewise have one eye on the bigger picture when it enters its 400th race on Sunday.
Triple Eight is running three factory entries this season, with Whincup and Shane van Gisbergen’s Red Bull Racing Australia cars in one garage and Craig Lowndes’s TeamVortex Commodore in another.
Prodrive’s Tim Edwards, who previously ran four cars in the competition, remarked earlier in the year that operating multiple garages would be a real challenge, and Lowndes has confirmed the logistical hurdles are proving tricky.
“We’re still finding our way,” Lowndes said as he looked back on the weekend at Symmons Plains.
“We’re still running back and forth from trailer to trailer. We’ve got to find a better way of doing things at the moment.
“I’m still lacking a little bit of data time – for me, I didn’t have any data at Clipsal and basically had minimum [in Tasmania], so we’ve got to find a better solution of how we process the way we operate.”
Lowndes can comfort himself with the knowledge that he’s the most successful Supercars driver there’s ever been around the Phillip Island circuit, with 11 wins to his name in 20 years of racing. If ever there was a time for Triple Eight to get to grips with its expanded line-up, round three would be it.
Tyre life could be key
Phillip Island is a famously volatile circuit, with the weather combining with high lateral loads to cause maximum wear to the tyres and strategists.
Something as mundane as cloudy conditions can have a massive effect on the Phillip Island tarmac, and with the tyres already under stress – the medium rather than the soft tyre will be used this weekend – mastering rubber usage across the returned full-length Saturday race could make or break a weekend.
Prodrive in particular will be hoping to cure its high tyre wear in time for reigning champ Mark Winterbottom to cling to his fourth place in the standings as the only Ford driver in the top eight of the championship.
Falcons have nabbed every pole position on offer, but it remains desperately winless in the last 12 races, dating back to New Zealand last season.
It’s a long shot, but the team knows the raw speed is there to be captured, and in a season featuring five different winners from five races it’d be a brave man to rule any possibility out.
All that, plus the Dunlop Series, Formula Four, the V8 Utes and the Aussie Racing Cars (a series with a name I’ve never stopped finding amusing) makes for a solid weekend of Australian motorsport from the country’s formost motor racing circuit.
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