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A first race victory for Tyler Everingham provided MW Motorsport a great return to competition after Dunlop Super2’s two month break, however it ended in disappointment on Sunday.
Everingham entered the weekend second in the standings and closed further following his win in the opening Saturday encounter, but an incident at the start involving his title rivals resulted in retirement for him and the series leader.
Thomas Maxwell again impressed by taking a top five finish, while an excellent comeback highlighted Angelo Mouzouris’ weekend.
It was Everingham leading the way in practice, topping the first session and finishing second in the next set up a good start to the weekend.
Continuing this form into qualifying, Everingham scored second and a great start led to victory in the opening encounter to bolster his title challenge.
Sunday began with Everingham scoring third in qualifying for Race 2, but another great start failed to produce another win as he tangled with Zac Best and Matthew Payne at the start resulting in retirement.
Everingham is still in the title chase, sitting third.
Maxwell enhanced his rookie standings position as a consistent run on Friday ended in eighth as 11th was the result in qualifying for Race 1.
He maintained 11th during Race 1, but returned on Sunday to qualify ninth and avoid the drama in front to take fifth in the final, his best result in Super2.
Enduring a tough start, Mouzouris finished strong in Townsville.
Finishing the Friday practice in fifth was a strong start to his weekend, but qualifying yielded 12th.
Stuck in the pack, there was contact on the opening lap damaging his MW Motorsport Altima’s steering resulting in it heading into the tyre wall at Turn 5 resulting in a retirement.
The MW Motorsport crew, including Mouzouris worked hard overnight to repair and it was duly rewarded as although he qualified 15th, he charged through to finish seventh in what was a tough conclusion up north.
MW Motorsport now prepares for its home event at Sandown Raceway on August 20-21.
QUOTES
Tyler Everingham
Blue Ribbon Legal/MW Motorsport Nissan Altima
“We were off to a great start in practice with P1 and P2 in the second, so we were looking pretty strong, plus happy with the car,” explained Everingham.
“Townsville hasn’t really been a strong track for us, so it was good to get some performance back here and really push it.
“We rolled into Saturday qualifying on the front row in P2 and managed to get the start to get the race win.
“Today, we qualified P3 and unfortunately we had some incidents at the start, so it was disappointing not to finish that race. It would have been good to get some points because we were looking strong.
“We’ll press onto the next round and recover.”
Thomas Maxwell
Spitwater/MW Motorsport Nissan Altima
“Awesome weekend here in Townsville,” Maxwell remarked.
“Driving the Spitwater Nissan Altima for MW Motorsport, we had a good weekend to finish in fifth in the final race.
“I struggled early as we couldn’t find pace on new tyres to turn it on in qualifying, which is something we’ll need to improve.
“Really happy with the final race and had a bit of a points recovery as I managed to pick up a couple of spots.
“Hopefully we can press on into Sandown and get back to where we should be pace wise.”
Angelo Mouzouris
Pitbox.io/MW Motorsport Nissan Altima
“So we ended Townsville on a pretty good note,” reflected Mouzouris.
“It didn’t start off strong, I struggled in qualifying in the Supercar.
“In Super2, during the opening race I hit a competitor and had a failure in the front steering as I lost it at Turn 5 to hit the wall. The team had to work pretty hard to get it fixed for today.
“Qualifying 2 didn’t work out as I failed to maximise the lap, so started 15th, which was a bit of a shame. The race was awesome, we moved up to seventh in what was a tough race.”
