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TCR privateer excited to mix it with top teams
It’s the age old story of David vs Goliath and it features regularly in Supercheap Auto TCR Australia Series due to the number of privateer teams nipping at the professional squads heels.
Zac Soutar became the first privateer to win a Supercheap Auto TCR Australia Series race outright as a privateer realising a dream many fellow self-supported teams hold and one of those is Braydan Willmington, who with his father Garry can lay claim to having smallest.
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The term underdog is not unfamiliar to the Willmingtons as his father was a plucky touring car privateer from the 1970s until the early 2000s and now has returned through their latest program in Supercheap Auto TCR Australia.
It’s this challenge, which has the next generation of Willmington excited to be part of the series.
“It’s so competitive,” Willmington remarked. “Again, just 1.8s separating first to 20th in qualifying and it’s just insane the level of competition.
“It’s awesome racing, there are battles all the way through the field. That’s the sort of stuff I like and that’s what this series is.
“I think we’ve got the smallest crew in the field and we’re out here competing against Wall Racing, Melbourne Performance Centre and Garry Rogers Motorsport. There are some guys who throw some serious dollars at this stuff, and we’re doing it on a shoestring budget without the shoe!”
Willmington’s Phillip Island didn’t end the way he wanted, but there were plenty of positive signs as he prepares to undertake his first racing laps at a place his father travelled to consistently for 30-years.
“I improved every time I went onto the track and knocked some time off everywhere we could, so by the end of the weekend we were pretty competitive,” Willmington reflected.
“I felt we were pretty decent and it was good to come here as it is a very good track.”
A final race mistake caused damage to the front and rear of his Alfa Romeo, halting an otherwise weekend of improvement.
“It was a shame,” he lamented. “I feel we were fast in that last race and we definitely had pace to move forward from where we started. I definitely wasn’t going to finish 16th. I ended up getting knocked off on lap 1, but I still managed to pass some cars.
“I got off line at Turn 1, so the thing swapped ends and I hit the wall.”
Not only is the team working hard to get the Alfa prepared for its trip to the Mountain, but Willmington is also still on the search for increased support for his maiden Supercheap Auto TCR Australia campaign.
More than 70-entries have been received for this year’s Hi-Tec Oils Bathurst 6 Hour in what is the ultimate production car event, which is joined by the third round of the Supercheap Auto TCR Australia and Turtle Wax Trans Am Series, the MRF Tyres Australian Pulsar Racing Association, NSW Historic Touring Cars and NSW HQ Holdens.
All of the action will be live, ad-break free and on demand exclusively on Stan Sport in Australia.
CLICK HERE to secure your tickets to the Hi-Tec Oils Bathurst 6 Hour.