SUCCESS breeds success is a phrase which can be applied to Dick Johnson Racing’s ever-improving 2023 season.
There’s no hiding from the fact it was a dismal start to Gen3 for the Stapylton squad, and even as its pace picked up, results continued to evade them.
That is, until a mid-season test at Queensland Raceway on June 1.
Since that outing, DJR has been on upward trajectory, collecting podiums in three successive rounds.
“We started the year terribly,” team principal Ben Croke admitted.
“The first two or three times that we ran the new cars were days that were just littered with issues so we got no effective testing in.
“We turned that around and we sort of fixed our problems throughout the first few events and had a really good test day in June.
“Since that test day then, there was a podium in Darwin for Will (Davison), Anton (De Pasquale)’s win in Townsville, and then we managed to do it again (on Sunday).
“So there’s some confidence, and it starts making sense now, and we’re not having those issues that we had earlier on in the year.”
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De Pasquale’s charge to third in Race 2 of the Sydney SuperNight was especially impressive, as he combined better tyre life with a series of stellar overtakes – the last of which saw him nab third from Broc Feeney on the final lap.
“The car was obviously a lot better than yesterday and the undercut worked for us on a few cars and I was just able to keep the rear on it a couple of laps longer than Broc which got me here,” the #11 Shell V-Power Mustang driver said post-race on Sunday.
“It’s a pretty good feeling when you’re really nowhere on the Saturday and you can turn it around and we have done that a couple of times this year, so we’ll look into that.
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“We have got a couple more base points of understanding the car with a couple of different tracks now so hopefully we can go to the next few ones and roll out a little bit stronger and progress from there.”
Having run as low as 20th in the championship early last month, De Pasquale is now 13th, two spots behind Davison.
