ANDRE HEIMGARTNER RACINGB A T H U R S T 2 0 1 4

A H R R E P O R T

Just before leaving home I received a cool email from Scott Dixon, wishing me luck at Bathurst. Nice surprise!Flew to Sydney on Tuesday to help FPR set up Superblack. FPR are a huge outfit of about 60 people and Superblack got our own seasoned crew. I billeted and eat with FPR. I brought my own physio/hydration/massage guy who was a life saver for both us drivers. Ant particularly who ended up on drips in the medical centre at one stage.Fortunately my DVS team and Superblack were within 25 meters of each other which made life easier. The Superblack(SB) B Train trailer was amazing. An engineering office, private driver’s lounge, main lounge and kitchen, storage room, garage

for car, and a covered viewing platform with soft furnishings! SB haven’t bought it yet but are hoping to raise money to make it part of the program.The track had just been resealed and lap times were faster than ever before with Murph’s “lap of the gods” being well and truly broken.Unfortunately the track over the mountain started to break up and became very dangerous. I am sure one or two corners may have had less camber than before which didn’t help? Many teams paid a heavy price in damage. THURSDAY 2 OctFlat out practising. Two DVS and two Main Game. My DVS car felt good from the get go and was quicker at the outset.

The SB car wasn’t stable and was a shaky platform on which to build much needed speed. Paul our engineer didn’t want to change from the standard FPR set up preferring to focus on our driving skills. I was disappointed as we appeared to hit a performance barrier well short of a competitive time.Eventually I dug my toes in and argued the point for engineering changes which after a meeting to compare all FPR cars lead to radical changes. FRIDAY 3 OctWe quickly carved 2 seconds off our lap times. We were looking like racers now!DVS qualifying was a disaster with so many safety cars and a red flags that I couldn’t get into a rhythm. Put it on P8.

IMAGE: MATTHEW HANSEN

BATHURST 1000. 8/12 October 2014

More SB practice which lead to more engineering changes in the quest for speed.An average start in the 250Km DVS race and I had my work cut out making my way toward the sharp end. Two incidents stand out in my mind. Firstly, I got stuck behind two quick drivers who in fighting between themselves were holding me up. Coming down Conrod at high speed, one of those cars pulled up a long side the other but didn’t look as though he would complete the pass. With a much quicker exit from Forest Elbow I was catching them very fast, but there was no room to pass. I decided to help one of the cars by bumping him from behind giving him the speed to make the pass. It worked well and I stuck to his bumper and sneaked passed myself! On another occasion I was chasing down Jacobson, a very accomplished driver, unable to find a fault to exploit. Eventually

decided to drive around him into the cutting which was risky but looked doable as he tended to stay tight at that point. I made the pass but had to carry too much speed which made my car over-steer wildly between the concrete barriers. It didn’t look good as I struggled to regain control, eventually straightening up pointing exactly where I need to be! That was replayed on the big screen a few times giving my sponsors good exposure. I handed the car over in 3rd place. Steve Owen my co driver is very quick so all was going according to plan. A good finish in this triple points race would potentially give me the championship lead.You don’t want to hear this…..we got a drive through because one of our crew had touched the car wearing only shorts during our driver change…..that spelt the end of our championship chances!!!

SATURDAY 4 OCTIMAGE: MATTHEW HANSEN

I had to remind myself several times to stop and savour the atmosphere. My first ever main game drive and it’s at Bathurst!The drivers parade and pit lane pre race was magic, I wish you could have shared those moments with me.The racing was furious, like a 161 lap sprint race. The track by now was seriously breaking up and there were multiple accidents eventually leading to a red flag and an unprecedented 70 minute stop to repair the track.I did 2 stints and Ant 2 before taking the car back to the track in 13th place to bring it home. I was gaining confidence and speed, we definitely had a good car with no issues. With pit stops and a couple of overtakes found myself in 9th with 10 laps to go. I was hard on the heals of Percat and Winterbottom(Frosty) when Percat made a move, I tacked hard onto Percats

bumper and got passed Frosty! A couple of laps later Frosty and I had a braking dual into the last turn, he got in front but went a little too wide. I made an under pass move through the corner and was in the right place to take back the spot on turn 1. Dad said the SB guys were going off their heads. I managed to stay ahead of Frosty and am confident I could have held him off for a 6th place finish.You don’t want to hear this…….my fuel light came on with 2 laps to go. My last fuel load had been miss calculated!!!!!Finished 11th and was so pissed that I couldn’t talk for a while when I got back to my garage. CONCLUSION The team felt that Ant and I had performed beyond expectations so overall we had to be very happy. Incredibly both my DVS car and the SB car came home without a scatch!

I was 2nd fastest when compared only to co drivers and 15th fastest when compared only to main game drivers. I was 0.748sec outside the fastest lap time which was set by Shane VG. I did my fastest lap on lap 157. While I set the team’s 3 fastest laps Ant was every bit as quick and we made a great team…thanks Ant!We celebrated in the FPR garage with Chaz Mostert and my good mate Paul Morris who had won!A huge thanks to Tony and Andrew for making this happen, incredible!What a day, what a weekend! Next up Hampton Downs 1/2nd November followed the week after by an endurance drive in a GT3 Porsche at Highlands.There is life after Bathurst! Sincere regards,Andre

SUNDAY 12 Oct. THE BIG ONEIMAGE: MATTHEW HANSEN

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