Erebus Motorsport’s David Reynolds has finished 17^thafter a trying start at The Bend SuperSprint, while teammate Anton De Pasquale recovered to 24^th.

David bolted off the start line, passing five of his competitors and rising to 12^thafter his 17^thplaced grid position. Heading four-wide through his second lap, Dave slot in behind James Courtney and yielded to 14^th.

Anton was going the opposite way to David, though. The rookie made a great start gaining two spots, but it looked like Anton would be facing another afternoon of rotten luck when there was contact with Jack Le Brocq immediately after the start. The #99 Erebus Penrite Holden locked a brake heading into the first turn and was unfortunately a passenger when he unintentionally hit the other rookie off track.

The race’s sole pit stop came sooner than anticipated for majority of the field, as Garth Tander was stranded on the start of pit straight, deploying the Safety Car.

With a double-stack to endure, a quick stop was needed to send David swiftly on his way. The crew did a fantastic job, bolting on just rear tyres before Anton appeared behind him.  The #99 driver only waited momentarily when David stalled the car, trying to re-enter the fast lane.

It was a bitter blow for David, who lost a lot of time and some spots, re-joining 16^th. Anton, meanwhile, made his sole stop and re-joined 25^th.

Racing resumed with fifteen laps to go and it wasn’t until the second last lap that Anton produced his fastest lap of the race. The #99 driver moved up one spot to produce 24^th, while David went wide on the last corner and fell down to 17^thbefore the chequered flag.

DAVID REYNOLDS: Started 17^th, Finished 17^th

“It hasn’t been one of our best days. I really should have been better in qualifying, I gave away 0.4-seconds and ended up 17^thwhen I should have been 10^th, which would have been a much better starting spot.

“I passed a lot of cars at the start and it was going well, making up a lot of spots until I made that error in the pit stop. I didn’t have it in gear and when they dropped me I sat there for a few seconds and lost a lot of spots. It was really hard to make up spots from there and unfortunately we weren’t able to recover.”

ANTON DE PASQUALE: Started 20^th, Finished 24^th

“It’s been a very average day as far as performance goes, our cars haven’t shown much pace during the day, both on new and old tyres. Its been a very tricky circuit to drive and understand because each corner is so different.

“Unfortunately in the race I locked the brake early on and caused contact between Jack and myself, obviously it’s never intentional but it happens in racing and you just have to try recover the best you can. Today we only managed 24^thbut we’re going to sit down and rethink it tonight.”