THE team which lured Marcos Ambrose back into V8 Supercar racing has admitted it did not provide him with a competitive car.
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And DJR Team Penske managing director Ryan Story believes delivering more reliable machinery could yet entice the Launceston driver back to the category he dominated a decade ago.
‘‘I think what we’re far more conscious of now is not so much the need to get Marcos up to speed, as it is for us to give him a car he can do a good job with,’’ Story said.
‘‘We haven’t done a good enough job, no doubt about it. Our biggest failing here is we allowed him to step out of the car in the first place. It should’ve been clear to us, even at an early stage that it wasn’t him.’’
Story said Ambrose’s dramatic decision to withdraw from his status as No.1 driver exposed the issues facing the team.
‘‘It is the course of action that he’s taken that has made it abundantly clear that the issue was with the car, and it’s an action that wasn’t in vain – but it shouldn’t have been allowed to get that far, and that’s the biggest failing on our part.
‘‘So we want to make sure we work through these issues and when we have the car where we think it should be, and when we’re competitive like the other FG X’s and Prodrive, that will be a time for us to reassess and look at putting Marcos back in the car.’’
Story told v8supercars.com.au that the team will use its one remaining test day for the year on Thursday to give Ambrose and his replacement Scott Pye more time behind the wheel of its Ford Falcon.
After his outing at Symmons Plains last month, Pye’s feedback was much the same as Ambrose’s, and now the team is focused on improving the car and shifting closer to the FG X run by fellow Ford team Prodrive Racing, which has three of its four cars in the championship top 10.
The decision to test was not made lightly, as Story wanted to ensure there was a full program to work through, before sacrificing the chance to test before the enduros.
‘‘It’s not an exercise in getting miles for Marcos – both drivers will drive, but it will be to the program we have set,’’ Story said.
‘‘The reality is, we don’t want to go down a path where we are changing drivers now for the sake of it. We want to get to the bottom of the issues we’re having, get competitive and then assess the situation from there. We want to see Marcos back in the car, and that’s the way we’re going to do that.’’
Erebus Motorsport V8 will also be on-track at Queensland Raceway on Thursday, utilising a rookie day for Ash Walsh.