POPULAR Ford driver Mark Winterbottom is confident V8 Supercars officials will change the sport's new controversial restart rule before the category hits Symmons Plains later this month.
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The new rule, which requires drivers to hold between 50km/h and 60km/h until the leader reaches the designated acceleration zone, contributed to several incidents in the opening round at Adelaide last week, including veteran Jason Bright's dramatic double- roll at the first corner.
"They got that wrong and that needs to be changed," the man known as Frosty told The Examiner.
"It was never going to work at Adelaide, and that end result was always going to happen, it was just the question of who it was going to happen to, I'm sure for Tassie there will be something done about it.
"At the moment the rule is when the lead car is on, it is game on, but the slight change with no overlapping which wouldn't see cars going three wide into the first corner.
"It will be a slight change, and it will look the same and feel the same, but the end result will be 28 cars getting through a corner and not eight getting taken out or whatever it was.
"You have to look at it from a danger point of view and as soon as there's a safety risk you've got to put your finger on it.
"As a driver you have your opinion on it, but I never liked it. With sport you do have to trial things, but when you do have a safety risk, you can't wait and you just have to change it, and they will get a better result for it."
While Winterbottom admitted that rule would not likely have a similar impact on Tasmania's V8 circuit, there had to be a uniform rule across the entire series.
The 33-year-old Pepsi Max Crew driver from Sydney, who finished fourth in last year's championship, endured a frustrating opening weekend, with two fourth places on the Saturday and dramas in the pits contributing to his 12th place finish on the Sunday.
Winterbottom heads into this weekend's round at the Australian Grand Prix sixth in the championship with 189 points, 93 behind Red Bull Racing's Craig Lowndes.
The philosophy for Melbourne is to get some momentum back and regain confidence in a category he said was now very even, considering the number of manufacturers on board, before he returns to one of his favourite tracks at Symmons Plains, where he finished third, sixth and second last year.
"I like the fact that there is only a few corners," he said.
"Every corner has so much importance. If you compare Tassie to Bathurst, Bathurst has got 20 corners, so if you mess one up you've got 19 to make it up. At Tassie a corner is worth 20 per cent of a lap, so you have to get every corner right.
"I like that pressure of perfecting a lap, and that's what makes Tassie so tough, and then there's the hairpin, the tightest corner on the [V8 Supercars] calendar and with the long straight as well it is a really cool track.
"I just love it and we've always done well there."
The Tyrepower Tasmania 400, which will feature two 42-lap races on the Saturday and an 84-lap race on the Sunday, will be from March 28-30.