Erebus Motorsport’s David Reynolds and Luke Youlden have won the 2017 Bathurst 1000.
Starting off the front row, the #9 Commodore was amongst the front-runners all day, however it wasn’t until the final laps until it all played to their favour.
Reynolds sat fourth on the final restart with just 16 laps to the checkered flag, and capitalized on other’s errors to catapult into the top spot. It was a faultless run from both drivers to the very end of lap 161.
It was much the same for Dale Wood and Chris Pither in the GB Galvanizing Holden, who propelled from position 21 to 4th by the end of the 1000-kilometre marathon.
The pair both dominated proceedings in the wet to sit just outside the top ten with 30 laps to go.
As the sun came out, their pace didn’t stop; the #99 Holden only just missing the podium and eventually crossing the finish in fourth.
The result marks Erebus Motorsport’s best team result, and first win since their switch to Holden over 18 months ago.
It also boosts Reynolds and Youlden to 4th in the Pirtek Enduro Cup standings, with Dale and Wood just behind in 5th.
David Reynolds – #9 Erebus Penrite Racing
“It feels really, really good. As a team we have worked extremely hard over the last year and a half to get to this point, it’s been a massive whirlwind experience. I owe everything to Betty, Barry and Al, it’s not just Luke and I, there’s an entire team of talented people behind us. Since we rolled the car out on Thursday it has been fast. We didn’t have the best pace in the wet but as the track dried out we had heaps of grip out there and it all switched on.”
Luke Youlden – #9 Erebus Penrite Racing
“Right place, right time let me tell you. Little team of rejects as we call ourselves, all working together. Every time I have driven the car this year it has been really fast. I love working with Dave, with Al, Betty and the entire team. My first time here it was very similar conditions, a bit more experience under the belt now and 18 years to get here. I’ve come close a few times but it’s feels surreal to finally be the winners of the mountain.”
Dale Wood – #99 Erebus GB Galvanizing Racing
“Pretty strange day; we didn’t start in a fantastic spot but had really good pace in the wet particularly, and then the car was really strong in the dry as well. It’s so funny how a day like today pans out. You just keep getting in and punching out the fastest times you can, it’s effectively a 1000-kilometre sprint race these days. The weather gods threw everything at us but we got a good start, good opening stint, Chris did a faultless job and was out here punching out really good time and matching it with a lot of the main drivers, so couldn’t have asked for anything more. We then brought ourselves a ticket to the last few laps and it was all on from there. Finishing fourth, especially at the mountain is good.”
Chris Pither – #99 GB Galvanizing Racing
“Wrapped with the result; we had a few things hold us up early in the weekend with qualifying but we just turned our focus to tuning the car for the race and I think that paid off later when it did dry up. The car was quite fast and Dale did an awesome job when it counted at the end and to pick up 4th is higher than where we were targeting coming into the weekend, so definitely happy with that. I was fighting changing conditions but managed to keep it pretty straight and stay in a position where we could fight for a decent position at the end of the day, so happy with the result and pumped for the other boys and to have two cars in the top four is pretty cool.”