Supercars Darwin: 20-year-old Kai Allen wins again

Kai Allen has taken Grove Racing and Ford to the top step of the podium at the second Supercars race at Hidden Valley in Darwin.

The rising star of Supercars celebrated his 21st birthday a week early when he rose from sixth on the opening lap to pick off the cars in front, including team-mate Matt Payne. Allen managed to track down early leader Cam Waters, who started from pole position in the Tickford Ford Mustang. But Waters, the winner of Friday’s race, had no answer to the leader’s pace, running wide on lap 41, and came home in second place.

By the chequered flag Allen had run away, pulling a lead of nearly nine seconds over the final 20 laps of the 70-lap journey. It was his fourth podium finish in five races at the Hidden Valley circuit.

“I knew I had something early in the race,” said Allen, who gained early track position with a short fill in his opening pitstop.

“Once I got out on those fresh tyres and got past Cam, I knew we could pull away. It was not easy going from fifth but I managed to do it. I could see Cam moving around on Matty, and the boys made the call and I got past.”

Over the final laps of the race Waters had to fight hard to hold off Brodie Kostecki. The Dick Johnson Racing Ford driver was feeling the effects of flu for the second day in a row, but his cause was aided somewhat when Payne had to serve a five-second time penalty at his first of two pitstops, after behind adjudged to have crept at the start.

Waters admitted that his Mustang did not have the speed to take a second win on the weekend.

“I was happy to get another podium, I am happy to maximise what we had then, we still got a trophy when the car was not perfect,” he said. “We have taken a big step forward this weekend.”

Kostecki was quite physically distressed after the race, with much hotter conditions than experienced on Friday amplifying the effects of his ongoing ’flu and a failing drinks bottle making things even worse. While he was being treated by medical staff his trophy was accepted on the podium by race engineer George Commins.

Completing the Ford sweep of the top five placings was the Triple Eight Mustang of Will Brown. He had to put on an early charge after starting outside the top 10, while team-mate Broc Feeney was better than he had been on Friday, starting sixth and gaining a position on the opening lap. But the blue cars were again not quite as sharp as their Ford rivals and he lost a place to Chaz Mostert with a dozen laps to go.

Mostert put in the drive of the race. After running with the leaders he was unlucky to find some power steering fluid (ironically dropped by Walkinshaw TWG team-mate Ryan Wood) and run off the track, dropping from sixth to 14th. From that point he was on a mission, gaining positions lap by lap and eventually restoring that sixth place.

Anton De Pasquale was the best of the Chevrolet Camaro drivers in eighth place. The Team 18 driver started a lowly 20th on the grid after finding that he had a lack of grip in Qualifying, but a dogged drive lifted him right onto Feeney’s rear bumper at the end of a tough race.

Feeney’s points lead has been further reduced, dropping from 59 pre-race to 36, with Payne second.

The Supercars and drivers will return to the track on Sunday for another 70-lap, 200km race.

RACE2

All Stats

1	K. Allen Grove Racing		Ford Mustang S650	70	1:21’19.0509
2	C. Waters Tickford Racing		Ford Mustang S650	70	+8.6157 1:21’27.6666	8.6157
3	B. Kostecki Dick Johnson Racing		Ford Mustang S650	70	+9.1641 1:21’28.2150	0.5484
4	M. Payne Grove Racing		Ford Mustang S650	70	+10.1770 1:21’29.2279	1.0129
5	W. Brown Triple Eight Race Engineering		Ford Mustang S650	70	+13.2645 1:21’32.3154	3.0875
6	C. Mostert Walkinshaw TWG Racing		Toyota GR Supra	70	+15.8552 1:21’34.9061	2.5907
7	B. Feeney Triple Eight Race Engineering		Ford Mustang S650	70	+21.3064 1:21’40.3573	5.4512
8	A. De Pasquale Team 18		Chevrolet Camaro Mk.6	70	+21.6175 1:21’40.6684	0.3111
9	J. Le Brocq Matt Stone Racing		Chevrolet Camaro Mk.6	70	+29.2033 1:21’48.2542	7.5858
10	J. Ojeda PremiAir Racing		Chevrolet Camaro Mk.6	70	+32.1074 1:21’51.1583	2.9041
11	J. Golding Blanchard Racing Team		Ford Mustang S650	70	+32.7314 1:21’51.7823	0.6240
12	T. Randle Tickford Racing		Ford Mustang S650	70	+38.8472 1:21’57.8981	6.1158
13	R. Gray Dick Johnson Racing		Ford Mustang S650	70	+39.5887 1:21’58.6396	0.7415
14	A. Heimgartner Brad Jones Racing		Toyota GR Supra	70	+49.7766 1:22’08.8275	10.1879
15	D. Fraser PremiAir Racing		Chevrolet Camaro Mk.6	70	+50.3555 1:22’09.4064	0.5789
16	M. Jones Brad Jones Racing		Toyota GR Supra	70	+51.6971 1:22’10.7480	1.3416
17	D. Reynolds Team 18		Chevrolet Camaro Mk.6	70	+52.9156 1:22’11.9665	1.2185
18	C. Murray Erebus Motorsport Penrite		Chevrolet Camaro Mk.6	70	+55.7913 1:22’14.8422	2.8757
19	C. Hill Brad Jones Racing		Toyota GR Supra	70	+1’01.0623 1:22’20.1132	5.2710
20	J. Walls Triple Eight Race Engineering		Ford Mustang S650	70	+1’03.1176 1:22’22.1685	2.0553
21	A. Cameron Blanchard Racing Team		Ford Mustang S650	70	+1’07.1460 1:22’26.1969	4.0284
22	Z. Bates Matt Stone Racing		Chevrolet Camaro Mk.6	70	+1’20.8970 1:22’39.9479	13.7510
23	J. Stewart Erebus Motorsport Penrite		Chevrolet Camaro Mk.6	69	+1 Lap 1:21’30.0497	1 Lap
24	R. Wood Walkinshaw TWG Racing		Toyota GR Supra	4	+66 Laps 4’47.2414	65 Laps	Retirement

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