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D’Alberto Converts Through Two Starts to Win Race One
It took two attempts, but Tony D’Alberto has converted from pole position to win race one of the weekend at Symmons Plains in the Supercheap Auto TCR Australia Series.
The Honda Wall Racing driver’s initial launch was queried for a jump start, but was cleared by the stewards. The strong start catapulted D’Alberto out front by the time the field reached turn one.
Further back there as significant drama, with contact between Brad Harris and Ryan Casha sending the latter into the Armco on the run through turn three. The hit tore a significant chunk of Casha’s left front assembly out of the car, and he eventually came to a stop deep in the runoff at turn four with the Garry Rogers Motorsport driver unable to slow the car.
The race was immediately neutralised under the red flag, with the field stopping on the grid. With less than one lap completed, the race was resumed some time later with another grid start where drivers returned to their original starting positions.
Josh Buchan got the better launch off the front row this time around, but D’Alberto hung tough to hold the race lead out of turn two. Brad Harris settled in to third and the top three ran nose-to-tail before Harris locked up and found himself lodged in the gravel at turn four.
The Safety Car ventured out once more, leaving the field to complete a short dash to the finish after the restart. The remaining GRM trio were nose-to-tail with Aaron Cameron backed up into the HMO Customer Racing Hyundai of Tom Oliphant.
The pair made contact a number of times before Oliphant was sent spearing off the road at turn one, before re-joining behind Cameron.
D’Alberto greeted the chequered flag to win his first TCR race on Tasmanian shores, from Buchan in second and Zac Soutar in third, who earns his first podium of the season for Tufflift Racing.
Full results are available here.
Race two, featuring the reverse top 10 grid, takes place at 12:25pm AEDT tomorrow. Dylan O’Keeffe will be on pole position, alongside Will Harris.