Barbados’s double-header weekend showed the speed of both BHR Supercars; Patrik Sandell took the top qualifying spot on Saturday and Austin Dyne on Sunday! But the hard fight for positions in GRC did not yield the Final results the team hoped for…
Sandell arrived in Barbados with the opportunity to close in on the points lead. Everything looked to be according to that plan as both the Kobalt Tools and Cuttwood E-Cig Liquids Supercars were the fastest rides on the island. Both cars made the Fast-6 in qualifying; Sandell took the pole and followed it up with a Heat 1A win. Dyne finished third in the heat race.
For the Semi-Final, the results were reversed: Dyne won and Sandell was third. Dyne would start second in Saturday’s final and Sandell fifth. Sandell got a great start and edged Dyne for third.
Dyne got caught in heavy traffic with five other cars fighting for position. After taking the Kobalt Tools Joker Lap to clear the traffic, the Cuttwood car and the #00 car of Steve Arpin both retired from the race simultaneously. Dyne would be credited with ninth.
With the two leaders in sight, Sandell saved his Kobalt Tools Joker Lap for the final lap. When the #18 took it he would merge off the Joker simultaneously with the second place #41 car, and they made heavy contact. Both cars limped to the finish line; Sandell crossed in second and the #41 in third. However, race officials later penalized Sandell for the contact dropping him to the final finishing position, 10th.
Sunday was a new day for teams. Austin Dyne put the Cuttwood car on the pole, his first career Red Bull GRC pole, and exactly .1 seconds behind was Sandell. This was BHR’s first 1-2 qualifying effort in GRC!
Dyne took off in the Heat 1A, with a fast time .4 quicker than anyone else. In Heat 1B Sandell was set to start on pole, but when the green lights flashed on the clutch failed preventing the car from launching. Ken Block, who was gridded behind Sandell, could not avoid the Kobalt Tools car and made contact from behind causing significant damage to both cars.
In the Semi-Finals, Dyne, who was to start on pole in the first semi, struggled away from the line and fell to fourth. The BHR team was able to make quick repairs to the rear suspension of Sandell’s car but with short time between groups the team was not able to fit a new clutch meaning Sandell had to start each of the remaining rounds from a dead stop with the engine switched off. Despite a slow roll away from the line, Sandell fought to catch up to the field and finish fourth in the Semi-Final, missing the automatic transfer to the Final by one spot. Both BHR cars would have to advance through the LCQ to make the Sunday Final.
Dyne and Sandell advanced to the Final with a third and fourth place finish in the LCQ, placing them ninth and tenth for the Final. Dyne and Sandell jumped to fifth and sixth by the second turn of lap one. Dyne would have contact with multiple cars and was pushed back to ninth at one point after contact from Deegan sent the Cuttwood car off course through a row of hedges, he recovered to finish in eighth.
Meanwhile, Sandell would serve a stop-and-go penalty for contact on the start, causing Sandell to fall to ninth. By making the best use of the Kobalt Tools Joker Lap, Sandell would fight his way up to sixth at the checkered flag.
Patrik Sandell on the Barbados events:
“So we had two races on Barbados, and qualified P1 on Saturday. Everything was going very well all day. We were running third in the final, and were trying to squeeze into second the last lap by using our ‘Kobalt Tools Joker Lap’ but got together with the #41 car.”
“I crossed the finish line in second, and Speed in third. Then after the race they (GRC officials) penalized me. I didn’t agree with that…”
“Sunday, we qualified in second ~a tenth of a second behind my teammate Austin Dyne. So, qualifying 1-2 was really good for the BHA team. Then in the first heat, I had a problem with the clutch and didn’t get off the line. So, then we had clutch problems all day and I had to start from the back in the semi-final, LCQ, and final. It was hard to just to get going, but in some crazy way we made it up to sixth in the final. So, we got some points today and I appreciate all the hard work the BHA team did this weekend, and have to thank Kobalt Tools and Deltro Solar for their support this weekend.”
Austin Dyne on the Barbados events:
“Yesterday, I don’t even remember yesterday (jokingly). I can tell you about today…”
“Today (Sunday) we had a really good practice, and we moved into the fast six from qualifying for the second day in a row. We put the Cuttwood car on the pole, my first Supercar pole. Then we won heat one by a lot and the car was really fast. The semi-final should have been an easy win, but we started to have an issue with the launch control; it failed, we stalled, and we got passed by everyone. So, we had to go through the LCQ to make the final.”
“We ended up finishing third in the LCQ, and got the Cuttwood car in the final. In the final, we barely made it launch; some other guys had trouble launching too, so it didn’t hurt us to bad. I ended up getting dive-bombed into the first two and then got hit two more times. But, I made some big passes, and we were up to fourth at one point.”
“Going into turn four in fourth, I came out of turn five in ninth ~there wasn’t a lot of clean driving… Then I got punted and went over flowers and rocks…”
“The Cuttwood team worked amazing this weekend; I need to thank them and of course the sponsors that make this #14 happen: Cuttwood, Castrol and Deltro Energy who joined us this weekend. We finally got the car more to my liking, and we should be real strong in Vegas!”
Collete Davis and the River Racing GRC Lites car had a very consistent weekend, finishing eighth in both days Final events. Davis continually closed the gap to the front-runners, and continues to show improvement week in and week out.
Collete Davis on the Barbados Events:
“It was great to be in Barbados and race this awesome track. I really learned a lot and enjoyed my experience here, and want to thank everyone at River and Rothernberg Ventures for their support. Now, on to Vegas and I look forward to completing my first season in Red Bull Global Rallycross!”
