it’s our best oil yet... www.castroledge.com.au 12th JuNe 2013Volume 3 - issue 11

team edge eVeNt PreView: V8 suPercars - skycity triPle crowNCastrol-backed crews are all set for one of the most exciting rounds on the V8 Supercars calendar when the championship heads to Darwin this weekend for the Skycity Triple Crown at Hidden Valley Raceway. Ford’s Pepsi Max Crew is prepared for action after completing a busy yet successful day of testing at Winton in northern Victoria where all four of the factory Ford teams Endurance Cup co-drivers got to sample their new rides for 2013.

Nissan Motorsport’s ever-improving four-car V8 Supercars team is looking forward to its next challenge at Hidden Valley Raceway with the factory Nissan outfit heading to Darwin on the back of its best race weekend to date, which saw Jack Daniel’s-backed star Rick Kelly finish inside the top 10 in all four races.

“Darwin is a really exciting destination and you can’t turn up there that weekend and not know we’re in town

and I can’t wait to head up this year,” Rick Kelly said. “I’m not sure if I’m going to have the chance to stay over for a day or two, but certainly I’ve enjoyed it in the past, having a look around and doing a bit of Barra fishing, it’s certainly a different place for us and one we quite enjoy. I’ve got mixed feeling heading into the weekend as far as where we’re going to be, but the important thing for us is to carry the momentum that we’ve gained in Texas through the Darwin event, as we head towards the enduros.”

During FPR’s Winton test Mark Winterbottom was absent from the day so his co-driver Steven Richards had the car they will share almost exclusively to himself aside from a handful of laps for FPR rising star Chaz Mostert who assisted with pit stop practice. All eight FPR drivers worked across an extensive program of developments while the crew took part in numerous pit stop simulations

throughout the day in preparation for this weekend’s Hidden Valley event.

After just five events of the V8 Supercars Championship in brand-new race cars, Rick Kelly’s impressive results has elevated him into 12th place in the championship – just over 100 points outside of the top 10. Norton 360-backed driver James Moffat sits just one place behind Kelly in the title having claimed six top 10 results so far in 2013.

Castrol-backed Supercheap Auto Racing’s Russell Ingall also heads to Darwin this weekend as ‘The Enforcer’ looks to climb back up the leaderboard after a lacklustre round in the USA last month. The Skycity Triple Crown will be held on June 14-16, with four practice sessions on Friday, followed by the return of the 60/60 Super Sprint format on Saturday. Two qualifying and two races will be run on Sunday.

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SKYCITY TRIPLE CROWN DETAILSCircuit: Hidden ValleyLocation: Darwin, NTCircuit Length: 2.9 kilometresQualifying Format: 20-minute qualifying Saturday; two 15-minute qualifying sessions SundayRace Format: 1 x 120km race on Saturday separated by 15-minute interval after 60km; 2 x 100km on Sunday

WEEKEND SCHEDULETimes below are Australian Central Standard Time (UTC + 9:30 hours)

Friday 14 June 201310:25am - 10:55am: Practice 112:00pm - 12:30pm: Practice 21:35pm - 2:05pm: Practice 33:15pm - 3:45pm: Practice 4

Saturday 15 June 201311:00am - 11:20am: Qualifying for Race 171:00am - 1:30am: Top 10 Shootout3:10pm: Race 17 part 14:05pm: Race 17 part 2

Sunday 16 June 20139:55am - 10:10am: Qualifying for Race 1810:20am - 10:35am: Qualifying for Race 191:15pm: Race 183:45pm: Race 19

2013 Championship Points

Pos Driver Points

1 Jamie Whincup 1217

2 Craig Lowndes 1075

3 Will Davison 1004

4 Fabian Coulthard 954

5 Jason Bright 945

6 Shane Van Gisbergen 907

7 Garth Tander 888

8 Mark Winterbottom 861

9 James Courtney 825

10 Jonathon Webb 768

11 Scott McLaughlin 695

12 Rick Kelly 651

13 James Moffat 638

14 David Reynolds 619

15 Alex Davison 619

16 Alexandre Premat 558

17 Russell Ingall 527

18 Dean Fiore 497

19 Tony D’Alberto 489

20 Lee Holdsworth 451

21 David Wall 435

22 Michael Caruso 434

23 Tim Blanchard 398

24 Tim Slade 391

25 Scott Pye 366

26 Todd Kelly 303

27 Chaz Mostert 252

28 Maro Engel 246

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Jari-Matti Latvala has claimed his first ever win in Castrol EDGE-backed Volkswagen Motorsport colours with victory on the Acropolis Rally of Greece - Round 6 of the FIA World Rally Championship. Latvala was never threatened on the final day of competition as he cruised to victory by 1m50s over Citroen’s Dani Sordo with Qatar M-Sport driver Thierry Neuville scoring his second ever podium result in third.

“I’m absolutely thrilled and I’d like to dedicate this win to the whole Volkswagen team,” said Latvala. “The new season got off to a very difficult start for me, but the team always believed in me and supported me really well. I’m delighted to see so many happy faces now. Winning the

latVala secures First wiN witH castrol-backed VolkswageN wrc

Rally Acropolis also means a lot to me because it’s extremely tough and it’s a real classic. Ever since I entered the event for the first time here at the age of 18, I’ve dreamed of winning it one day. The last stage felt like the longest and hardest for a some time – I felt every single stone and jolt in the car and couldn’t wait for the finishing line to come into sight. Today is a day for celebrating!”

The battle between VW’s Andreas Mikkelsen and Ford’s Nasser Al-Attiyah continued into the final four stages on Sunday with the young Norwegian getting the better of the more experience Qatari to take fourth by just over 16s. Despite an incident filled rally for several competitors, Mikko Hirvonen showed tremendous grit to claw back

from as low as 17th to finish the event seventh, claiming the position on the last special stage by a mere 0.5s over Martin Prokop.

Ex-Formula 1 driver Robert Kubica claimed the biggest success of his rallying career so far as he won the WRC 2 class on the Acropolis Rally of Greece. Mikkelsen was also the star of the Sunday show winning three of the four special stages with teammate Sebastien Ogier wining the final and ‘Power Stage’ by over 9s. Despite retiring from Day 1 Ogier clawed back to finish 10th overall, picking up one championship point and a further three for his ‘Power Stage’ win. Ogier remains in the lead of the overall WRC standings.

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2013 WRC drivers’ standings

Pos Driver Points

1 Sébastien Ogier 126

2 Jari-Matti Latvala 74

3 Sébastien Loeb 68

4 Mikko Hirvonen 63

5 Thierry Neuville 50

6 Daniel Sordo 47

7 Mads Østberg 46

8 Evgeny Novikov 31

9 Nasser Al-Attiyah 30

10 Andreas Mikkelsen 25

11 Martin Prokop 25

12 Bryan Bouffier 10

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castrol-backed bmw celebrates Historic oNe-two-tHreeCastrol-backed BMW has claimed an historic one-two-three finish in Spielberg for the latest round of the DTM Series. At the end of 47 laps, reigning champion Bruno Spengler crossed the finish line first in the BMW Bank M3 DTM to win the third round of 2013. Marco Wittmann (Ice-Watch BMW M3 DTM) came home second, just 1.550 seconds later. He was followed by Timo Glock (DEUTSCHE POST BMW M3 DTM), Wittmann’s BMW Team MTEK team-mate, who completed the first one-two-three for BMW since returning to the DTM in 2012.

It was also the first appearance on the podium for the two rookies, in only their third race. This was the tenth time in

the history of the DTM that the podium had been completely monopolised by BMW drivers, while BMW Team Schnitzer celebrated its 13th victory in the popular touring car series. Spengler, who started the race from pole position, climbed onto the top step of the podium for the 14th time in his career. The Canadian dominated the race from the off and moved to the top of the Drivers’ Championship on 53 points courtesy of his first win of the season. In addition, Wittmann set the fastest lap of the race in 1:25.505 minutes.

Augusto Farfus in the Castrol EDGE BMW M3 DTM and Dirk Werner in the SAMSUNG BMW M3 DTM also picked

up valuable points, coming home sixth and eighth. Martin Tomczyk produced an excellent opening lap to move up to fifth after the first few corners. After a number of fierce duels with rivals and his first pit stop, he was spun by Mercedes driver Roberto Merhi, who was subsequently penalised.

Tomczyk retired from the race on lap 30 with a damaged car. Joey Hand had to park up his BMW M3 DTM on the 11th lap when the front-left wheel came loose after his first pit stop. Andy Priaulx, starting from last place on the grid, was unable to make the progress required to finish in the points, ending the race in 19th in the Crowne Plaza Hotels BMW M3 DTM.

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2013 DTM standings

Pos Driver Points

1 Bruno Spengler 53

2 Mike Rockenfeller 41

3 Augusto Farfus Jr. 33

4 Marco Wittmann 32

5 Christian Vietoris 25

6 Dirk Werner 22

7 Gary Paffett 22

8 Mattias Ekström 16

9 Joey Hand 16

10 Robert Wickens 15

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Castrol-backed Honda Civic drivers have collected trophies on the podium 10 times from the 12 races run so far in this year’s FIA World Touring Car Championship with number ten achieved this weekend by Norbert Michelisz in race 1 at the Moscow Raceway. It was also Michelisz’s fourth consecutive podium appearance as both he and Gabriele Tarquini collected more points towards their Drivers’ championship tally.

Tiago Monteiro drove skillfully in both races to gain many places from his lowly starting position, following technical problems in qualifying, to finish his races in 12th and 13th place. Michelisz in the Zengő Motorsport Honda had started the initial race from the second row and was running in third place at the red flag. He resumed this position at the restart and put in a very

mature performance for such a young driver to hold off several challenges to retain his position to the finish.

Tarquini started the Castrol Honda from the third row and used all his experience to battle for 6th place in Race 1. The top ten positions in qualifying are reversed for Race 2 which placed Tarquini and Michelisz together on row 3 of the starting grid. Tarquini made the best start of anyone this weekend to dive into 3rd place on the first corner after the standing start and battled hard with Pepe Oriola at the next turn but held the third position at the end of the first frantic lap.

Five cars crossed the start/finish line side-by-side on lap 3 with the crowd on their feet as the fast turn 1 loomed in front of the field. The inevitable melee resulted in a major shuffling of the pack, some cars eliminated and

mixed eFFort For castrol HoNda iN moscow

2013 WTCC Standings

Pos Driver Points

1 Yvan Muller 246

2 Gabriele Tarquini 133

3 Michel Nykjaer 127

4 James Nash 113

5 Robert Huff 107

6 Norbert Michelisz 90

7 Tom Coronel 88

8 Tom Chilton 87

9 Alex MacDowall 73

10 Pepe Oriola 67

11 Tiago Monteiro 60

Tarquini squeezed down to 8th. Both Civics improved before the chequered flag to finish 5th and 7th whilst Monteiro demonstrated his determination to again drive through much of the grid to finish 12th overall.

The WTCC now heads to Portugal for the final European event of the season with the Castrol Honda Civics striving for podium positions at every race.

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Team Castrol EDGE showed tremendous speed to claim victory in Round 4 of the Prokart Endurance Series hosted by Bundaberg Kart Club. Despite no pre-event testing at the new Bundaberg circuit team Castrol EDGE were able to again claim pole position in each of the 3 F1-style qualifying sessions in their MS Kart. With Nicky Laskazeski starting the 1hr Saturday race from Pole Position she was able to take an early lead until slipping in behind Ian McMah from Team KNK.

During the first of the compulsory driver changes a lot of time was lost through the long Bundaberg Pit Lane while handing over to Alan Gurr, giving Gurr the job of bridging the gap back to the leaders. With 1 stop remaining Gurr had

team castrol edge coNtiNues Prokart eNduraNce series wiNNiNg streak

reclaimed the lead and pulled an eight second gap over 2nd place. With a more efficient stop while handing over to Simon Ham for the final stint, the Castrol EDGE team led the sprint to the flag.

The intense battle between the KNK of McMah and the MS of Ham had everyone watching. As they crossed the line to take the flag Ham took the win by 0.5 seconds over McMah after having to hold him out for the final 3 laps. With Sunday consisting of a 6hr race, Team Castrol EDGE knew that it was going to be a tough battle all day. Getting through traffic and strategy was going to be the deciding factor.

The team decided to make a last minute change to their MS kart for the race

with the aim of making it easier to get through the slower traffic. Again the battle continued all through the day with only one second separating the 2 karts for the majority of the laps with the lead changing constantly. It came down to the 90 minute sprint home from the last fuel stop with the 2 teams holding a three lap advantage over 3rd place.

With Ham starting the assault, a strategic early pitstop was done, as passing at the Bundaberg circuit was difficult. This put Gurr in clean air to try and build a gap over the #5 KNK kart. With a little over 30mins left in the race Gurr pitted and handed over to Laskazeski with a 13 second lead over their competition. With both teams watching the clock count down and the

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team castrol edge coNtiNues Prokart eNduraNce series wiNNiNg streak

gap vary between 10-15 seconds, traffic became an issue.

Laskazeski was able to manage the gap perfectly to bring the Castrol EDGE backed MS kart across the line for their 4th consecutive win with Team KNK only 13 seconds behind in 2nd place after 6hrs of hard racing. This gives Team Castrol EDGE an extra 10 points to add to their championship lead over the #5 KNK kart.

With the next round heading back to Ipswich in early July, preparation and changes will be carried out on the #153 MS Kart as the team look to a track they have previously scored solid results.

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Grand Prix rookie Bryan Staring was the best placed Castrol-backed rider finish 18th at the weekend’s MotoGP round in Mugello. Yamaha’s Jorge Lorenzo closed the gap in the MotoGP title race with a dominant ride to victory in an eventful Italian Grand Prix at Mugello. A crash on Saturday had robbed Staring’s weekend of momentum, but another finish marked continuing progress as he gets to grips with the top class in motorcycle racing.

“It has been a difficult but constructive weekend because I have picked up some very useful experience for the future,” said Staring. “I felt good on the bike but in some sections of the track I couldn’t push it as hard as I would have liked. Still, I am looking on this as a positive experience that will definitely help us next time out.”

Castrol-backed GO&FUN Honda Gresini rider Alvaro Bautista lasted just three

stariNg stars For castrol-backed greNsiNi HoNda iN mugello

corners, the Spanish rider coming into contact with Valentino Rossi as both riders crashed out. Both riders crashed out before completing a single lap and were lucky to escape injury. The next MotoGP round is the Catalan Grand Prix at the Montmelo circuit outside Barcelona in two weeks time.

Castrol-backed teams podium in Portimao

Castrol-backed teams have taken a win a podium result at Round 6 of the World Superbike Championship in Portugal. BMW’s Marco Melandri came out on top in a thrilling finish to the opening encounter that saw points leader Sylvain Guintoli fall just 0.007s short of stealing the victory at the chequered flag. The result marked the fourth smallest margin of victory in WSBK history.

Castrol-backed Pata Honda rider Jonathan Rea took his seventh career podium finish at Portimao by taking third place in race two of the sixth-round World Superbike championship event.

“It’s been a frustrating weekend, yet again, but we have a podium to take away from it and I’m quite happy to get back into the podium way,” said Rea. “I set a really good pace in the first

2013 MotoGP Standings

Pos Rider Points

1 Daniel Pedrosa 103

2 Jorge Lorenzo 91

3 Marc Márquez 77

4 Cal Crutchlow 71

5 Andrea Dovizioso 50

6 Valentino Rossi 47

7 Nicky Hayden 45

8 Alvaro Bautista 38

9 Stefan Bradl 30

10 Aleix Espargaró 28

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2013 SBK Standings

Pos Rider Points

1 Sylvain Guintoli 213

2 Tom Sykes 185

3 Eugene Laverty 174

4 Marco Melandri 156

5 Chaz Davies 133

6 Loris Baz 119

part of race two and the bike felt really good but, as soon as the grip dropped, the electronics were playing havoc. Imola is another strong circuit for us, so hopefully we can be back up here again. I want to thank Chris [Pike – crew chief] and everyone who keeps digging deep and working hard, and all the fans for their support, which means a lot at the moment when we’re finding it tough.”

Rea’s Pata Honda team-mate, Leon Haslam, also retired – a result of the

injury he sustained in a practice crash at Assen in The Netherlands at the end of April. Starting from 14th place on the grid, Haslam had battled up to tenth before pulling into the pits in discomfort, unable to ride his Honda CBR1000RR in the way he wanted. The 30-year-old opted to withdraw from race two to concentrate on improving his fitness for the next round at Imola in Italy in three weeks.

The World Superbike Championship continues at Imola in three weeks time.

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The 2013 Winternationals had to be abandoned due to inclement weather conditions at the Willowbank Raceway over the Queen’s Birthday long weekend. After getting all of the qualifying in over the last three days with only minor interruptions from threatening weather in the area, the heavens opened up Monday morning.

It represents the third year in succession that the Queen’s Birthday Long Weekend epic has been hampered by wet weather. No rain or alternative date has been scheduled for the event. Up until the morning, the Winternationals had been one of the most successful in some time, with huge crowds turning

raiN wiNs wiNterNatioNals at willowbaNk raceway

out on each day of competition.

The fastest fields in Australian history had been established for Pro Stock and Top Doorslammer, with John Zappia establishing a new national record in the Top Doorslammer category. A new national speed record was set in Pro Stock Motorcycle by American-based Australian, Rhett Lougheed. A world record was established in Factory Xtreme by George Rehayem from Castrol EDGE-backed PAC Performance.

“The support shown by the fans over the last three days has been phenomenal, we really must send our

thanks to everyone who has come out to Willowbank Raceway for this event and also to Fuchs and all of our other event, track and category sponsors,” said Willowbank Raceway Managing Director, Steve Bettes.

From an ANDRA Championship perspective, points will be awarded to racers as of the final full completed runs as per the ANDRA rule book. Willowbank advises that Monday ticket holders will be able to use their tickets to their value at Willowbank Raceway across the next six months. Ticket holders are advised to visit www.willowbankraceway.com.au for more information.

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