Cameron Hill has extended his championship lead and recorded his sixth successive win in the opening Porsche Paynter Dixon Carrera Cup Series at the NTI Townsville 500 today.
It was another race where Hill’s closest rivals ran into trouble, while the Canberra driver executed a measured drive to the chequered flag.
After qualifying in position three for the third-consecutive round, Hill was forced to take evasive action at the start when pole sitter Matt Payne stalled on the grid.
“The race start was unfortunate for Matt to stall and very fortunate for me to avoid it,” Hill said.
“My initial plan was to go right if anything happened, but I was already angled to the left, so I just managed to squeeze through; it was not ideal.”
After running in third position for the opening stanza, Hill briefly assumed the lead when the two leaders, Cooper Murray and Aaron Love tangled at turn two. Although he was overtaken by Murray on the track and crossed the finish line in second position, a penalty for Murray enabled Hill to score the race victory.
“There were lots of intense battles around me, so I focused on keeping my nose clean; a couple of cars ran into each other and it ended up working to my advantage,” Hill said.
“When I took the lead, I was under pressure from Cooper and I elected to not fight him too hard, knowing he was likely to receive a penalty.
“I’m looking forward to starting on pole tomorrow for the enduro race, the car feels good now. After practice yesterday, we were lacking a bit of pace but we made some positive changes for qualifying and I’m now very happy with our package.”
Races two and three or the Porsche Paynter Dixon Carrera Cup will take place tomorrow at 8:40am and 12:45pm.
