JUDE Bargwanna feels “the proof is in the pudding” with his Anderson Motorsport deal to run in the 2023 Kumho V8 Touring Car Series.
Bargwanna leads the standings after two rounds, having won five of the six races to date.
While grid numbers aren’t yet where they’re desired to be for the reborn category, the son of 1992 Bathurst 1000 starter Scott Bargwanna believes he has acquitted himself well.
“Obviously along with everyone else in the category, we’d love to see more numbers and they’re really pushing to get more numbers,” he told V8 Sleuth.
“It would be a really good sign to have some more younger competition too.
“But we can’t control that, we’re running our own program and we’re ticking all our boxes on our end and just getting comfortable in a Supercar.
“We’re progressing really well. The car was really fast at Winton.”
So comfortable at Winton was Bargwanna that he ended up only using one set of green tyres, as opposed to two sets run at the Phillip Island opener, to save rubber for Round 3 at Queensland Raceway in August.
That also helped him put into practice some recent Paul Morris lessons on tyre management.
“I went and spent two days up at Norwell with Paul Morris before Winton and that was one factor we really spent a lot of time working on, was adapting to different tyres and just working with the longevity of the tyre and saving it, and driving the car on the edge when the tyre is quite worn,” said Bargwanna.
The teenager is already eyeing his next steps, being potentially a cameo in Super3 later this year and ideally a move straight into Super2 for 2024.
“The next step is looking like Super2,” said Bargwanna.
“It all obviously comes down to budget and how much money you can bring because as everyone knows it’s an expensive sport and it’s just getting more expensive as the years go on.
“I would love to jump in a Super3 car at maybe some stage this year and have a run with those boys and just see how we fare.
“But 100 percent, Super2 is on the horizon for next year potentially depending on what happens.”
The FG Falcon he is currently racing is also Super3-eligible, but Bargwanna noted a debut in the third-tier would hopefully come in newer machinery given he’d be up against the likes of Nissan Altima-shod Cameron McLeod, Jett Johnson and Mason Kelly.
All in all, Bargwanna believes the Kumho Series has been a good starting point for his Supercars journey, aided by the experience of Anderson Motorsport and its personnel such as race engineer Brendan Hogan.
Hogan also engineers Anderson Motorsport’s Super2 title-leading driver Zak Best.
“One of our biggest goals for this year was to join a team that had that experience and jump into a race-winning car so I could jump straight into the series and be competitive like we have,” said Bargwanna.
“The proof is in the pudding.”
