THE low-key piece in the puzzle aiding Shane van Gisbergen and Trackhouse Racing’s NASCAR success in Chicago was stalwart Supercars engineer Andrew Edwards.
Edwards is in his second season as van Gisbergen’s race engineer at Triple Eight – their first campaign together in 2022 produced a record-breaking 21 wins – following a 17-year stint at Brad Jones Racing.
He made the trek over to Illinois to assist with van Gisbergen’s transition and offer insight into how Supercars tackles street circuit racing, an opportunity which he opened up about on this week’s Castrol Motorsport News Podcast.
“It’s a bit of a surprise, the whole thing: Trackhouse kind of reached out and were asking me some questions about Shane and a little bit about how we might look at street tracks and things like that in Supercars,” said Edwards.
“We kind of got chatting from there and then they offered to bring me over and help, in a small way, and bridge the gap between Shane and the engineers.
“And also it was just an amazing learning experience for me, just to see how they operate. It was an incredible opportunity.”
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With the #91 team led by championship-winning crew chief Darian Grubb, Edwards did his best to downplay his role with what he described as “quite a different car”.
“I didn’t get involved in the set-up to a large degree, it was really kind of philosophical conversations, Trackhouse did all that work,” he said.
“I guess for them it was just thought provoking on what we do and the set-up.
“They hadn’t done anything like this before and it’s a real departure from how they set up their car normally, because it’s a very high downforce car but this track is very bumpy so it was a new challenge and they hadn’t been to that place before.
“I can’t say that I helped them but at the same time if it gave them some confidence to try to go down a road, then I think we got a bit of that.”
Edwards further spoke in the podcast of the differences between how Supercars and NASCAR teams operate, and assessed van Gisbergen’s race-winning drive.
Edwards and van Gisbergen will be back in action this weekend at the NTI Townsville 500, practice for which begins Friday.
