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Blanchard Racing Team battling

Courtney and Cameron in pits

By Thomas Miles

Blanchard Racing Team needs a “major form turnaround” after a tough Taupo Super440 lacking pace from start to finish.

Whilst Mustangs dominated the trip to New Zealand winning all three races and filling eight of the nine available spots on the podium.

But one Ford team that was not anywhere near the front of the field was unfortunately Blanchard Racing Team.

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The highest either veteran James Courtney or rookie Aaron Cameron finished across the three races was 20th.

But qualifying was the biggest area of concern, with the BRT teammates filling the last row of the grid on all three occasions.

The margins were big as well with the closest the team getting to the next slowest car two tenths in Sunday morning’s session.

It has been a tough start to 2025 for the inexperienced team and team owner Tim Blanchard admitted more promise needs to be shown.

“We’re really struggling at the moment. It was a very challenging weekend,” he said.

“I feel like we made some small improvements on Sunday, but it was too little and too late.

“We’ve got a bunch of work to do, and we need a major form turnaround.

“There is not much time before Tassie but there is still a fair bit we can achieve.”

Courtney was even more frank, labelling it is “worst ever” weekend, a big call given he is a veteran of 260 rounds and 588 races.

Image: Mark Horsburgh

Taupo Super440

Practice 1 – 1: A. Heimgartner 1:26.8830 2: Anton De Pasquale +0.0258 3: Matt Payne +0.0830

Practice 2 – 1: Ryan Wood 1:25.9778; 2: Brodie Kostecki +0.0435; 3: Thomas Randle +0.0838

Race 8 Qualifying – 1 Matt Payne 1:25.7006; 2 Brodie Kostecki +0.0705; 3 Cameron Waters +0.1646

Race 9 Qualifying: 1 Brodie Kostecki 1:26.3482; 2 Chaz Mostert +0.0712; 3 Broc Feeney +0.1939

Race 8 (37 laps) 1 Matt Payne 2 Cameron Waters 3 Ryan Wood

Race 9 (37 laps) 1 Chaz Mostert WAU 37 56.14; 2 Will Davison DJR 37 +6.4763; 3 Brodie Kostecki DJR 37 +9.1911

Race 10 Qualifying 1 Brodie Kostecki 1:25.6303; 2 Cameron Hill +0.0122; 3 Anton De Pasquale +0.1009

Top 10 Shootout 1 Brodie Kostecki 1:25.7052; 2 Anton De Pasquale +0.1677; 3 Ryan Wood +0.1947

Race 10 (61 laps) 1 Matt Payne 2 Cameron Hill +3.1941 3 Chaz Mostert +8.2887

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