Canberra racing driver Cameron Hill has confirmed he will return for a third season in the Porsche PAYCE Carrera Cup Australia, and believes all the ingredients are in place to shoot for ultimate glory in the competitive one-make category.
Hill’s Porsche GT3 Cup race car will once again be prepared by his family-owned CHE Racing Team at their Queanbeyan workshop.
The Canberra racer said the focus for 2020 has been on incremental gains rather than drastic changes.
“There’s no need to do anything too radical, our results last year showed we were heading in the right direction,” Hill said.
“There were some rounds where we arrived at the track with a car that was fast enough to run at the front, and we were able to chalk up our first pole position and race win in Darwin.
“There were other weekends where we were a little off the pace to start with, but the most encouraging aspect of those events was our ability to tune the car. The best example was the Gold Coast, where I qualified seventh but finished on the podium.”
Hill identified two main reasons for his upward trajectory in results: a technical alliance with the Sydney-based GWR Australia team, and the introduction of former Olympic triathlon coach and ACT Brumbies manager Ben Gathercole as the team’s Performance Manager.
“There’s no doubt the GWR relationship was enormously beneficial, working with their engineer Dejan Ninic and having the benefit of more data to pull from, we really started to understand how to unlock the speed in these 991.2 Cup cars,” Hill said.
“Ben’s experience and expertise at optimising the human performance of everyone on the team also made a huge difference, especially when it came to dealing with high-pressure situations at race meetings.
“Heading into a new season, it provides a lot of stability to continue our relationship with both Ben and the GWR outfit.”
Hill has already completed some testing ahead of next week’s opening round at the Adelaide 500, and highlighted a rule change as an area of improvement for everyone.
“The ABS braking systems have been completely removed from all the cars, and I see that as a positive,” Hill said.
“In the last couple of seasons, the Pro drivers like myself were not able to use the ABS unless it was raining, but our cars were still fitted with the ABS module, which definitely impacted the brake pedal feel.
I’ve driven the car without the ABS module, and I feel a lot more confident using the brakes now.”
The 2020 Porsche PAYCE Carrera Cup Australia will again head to some of the country’s highest profile events, including the Australian Grand Prix and Bathurst 1000.
2020 Porsche PAYCE Carrera Cup Australia Calendar
Round 1 – Adelaide 500, 20-23 February
Round 2 – Australian Grand Prix, 12-15 March
Round 3 – Townsville, 26-28 June
Round 4 – Hidden Valley, 17-19 July
Round 5 – Sydney Motorsport Park, 28-30 August
Round 6 – Tailem Bend, 18-20 September
Round 7 – Bathurst, 8-11 October
Round 8 – Gold Coast, 30 October-1 November
