Gold Coast 500 race report

The city of palm trees, beach and sun welcomed the V8 Supercars last weekend for the annual Gold Coast 500. Although the weather wasn’t its usual self, it didn’t dampen the anticipation for the weekend to unfold. Gold Coast 500 being Chaz’s home race, he couldn’t sit back and let it pass. Chaz turned up rocking his slightly faded pink hair from Bathurst a few weeks ago.

GC500 also brought new upgrades for all the Ford team cars. Over the course of the season, the Camaro’s have been noticeably more dominant, from a race and qualifying pace as well as reliability, and most importantly, safety standpoint. This forced Ford teams, including Walkinshaw Andretti United (WAU) to protest, resulting in Supercars bringing new upgrades to all Ford cars, hoping to improve these issues.

The weekend started with two Friday practice sessions, with both Chaz and Nick placing in the top 10 in each session. With the rain settling in for the day, the drivers had to adapt to the new conditions, with many drivers having not driven the tricky streets of the Gold Coast circuit in the wet.  Although Chaz claims to “hate the cold and wet weather”, he managed the change well with his on-track performance improving each session!

Saturday happened very quickly, with a 15-minute qualifier with only the top 10 going through to a shootout to see who would take out the top spot. Saturday’s pole sitter was a fellow Ford Mustang driver Cam Waters, with WAU driver Chaz setting a lap time earning himself 6^th on the grid for the first 250km race of the weekend.

Lining up 6^th on the grid put Chaz in a great position for the attack at the start of the race, which is exactly what he did! He drove aggressively, making an overtake on the first corner moving him into 5^th. Chaz protected his position until the first stop for fuel and tyres, where he dropped down the field, but ready to carve his way up once more. Upon doing this, the tricky kerbs of the unique street circuit caught Chaz out, meaning a 5-second time penalty would be added at the end of his race, leaving him to finish 8^th after the gruelling 85 lap race.

The sun was out for the final day of the weekend, bringing new hope for similar conditions to previous years, however with the new generation cars, it was new territory for all teams. Another qualifying session and top ten shootout for Mobil 1 Optus Racing meant Chaz started the race two grid slots up in 4^th. After another great turn 1 overtake Chaz was in the podium places, continuing with that until the first pitstop, after which the race pace seemed to have disappeared. To add to the disappointment, another 5-second penalty was added after the race and Chaz dropped to 13^th.

Although the results weren’t what the team had hoped for, the weekend showed great qualifying pace improvements compared to race pace, which strangely is the complete opposite to the rest of the season! Whether it was the nature of the circuit or the changes to the cars that brought the different car conditions, the team will know soon enough at the final round for the year in Adelaide. “The Bend” in Adelaide is Nick’s home race and also his final race with WAU before moving to Truck Assist Racing for the 2024 season.

Here's hoping the team can put together their sizzling qualifying pace from the weekend, and their excellent race pace from the rest of the season. If they can, we can hopefully look forward to a repeat of last year’s race where Chaz and Nick finished 1^st and 2^nd to round out the season – let’s go WAU!

Read Ella’s previous report of the Bathurst 1000 race.

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Ella Dingwall is a high school student with dreams of becoming a motorsport journalist.