Double podium caps off Darwin delight for Penrite Racing

A double podium on Sunday afternoon has capped off a hugely successful weekend at Hidden Valley Raceway for Penrite Racing, with rookie Kai Allen enjoying a breakthrough weekend and Matt Payne moved closer to 2nd place on the Repco Supercars standings.

With the three races making up the betr Darwin Triple Crown, both drivers were able to secure a pair of podiums throughout the weekend, as Payne picked up top three finishes in Races 17 and 19, while Allen’s impressive results were highlighted by his maiden Supercars podium in Race 18 before claiming a career-high runner-up finish on Sunday.

Both drivers didn’t have the fastest of Fridays, as Payne ended up with the 12th and 13th fastest times on the timesheets in each practice session, while Allen was a bit further down the line with 19th and 20th.

However, when it came to Saturday, the team clicked into gear as smart strategy helped both drivers notch up solid results across both qualifying sessions and races.

During the morning’s qualifying sessions, Allen’s raw talent was on display as he put the #26 Ford Mustang inside the top 10 with 7th in Race 17 Qualifying 1 and 4th in Race 18 qualifying – a remarkable effort considering this weekend was his first ever visit to the Darwin-based circuit.

Payne also finished the morning’s session with decent times, qualifying 3rd and 13th respectively.

Saturday’s first race began with pure chaos as the safety car was called on the opening lap, but each driver avoided the drama, and despite facing a challenge from Cam Waters, Payne eventually found himself on his lonesome in third.

Allen had a tougher outing as he lost multiple places following his pit stop and wasn’t able to recover, ultimately placing 11th by the chequered flag after a number of gruelling battles with other drivers.

That’s as bad as it got for Allen for the rest of the weekend though, as an electric start off the line in Race 18 saw him slot into 3rd. Although he dropped back to 5th following his pit stop, the teenager worked his way back into 3rd to secure his first podium in the Championship.

Payne’s race was a bit more dramatic as he moved up and down the field – an early stop helped him into 3rd with 15 laps to go before he slowly lost a handful of places to eventually cross the line in 8th – a total of five places gained capping off a great recovery run for the Kiwi.

Although there were plenty of positives to come out of Saturday’s action, the team stepped up to another level on Sunday, with Allen and Payne occupying the third row after qualifying 5th and 6th.

The team adopted different strategies for each driver, which paid dividends as Payne’s dual undercut strategy saw him snatch a podium place, while Allen’s long stint helped him to an unlikely podium – the youngster’s first long stint proving pivotal to the 2nd place finish and the Hidden Valley lap record.

As a result of his incredible weekend, Allen has leapfrogged a number of drivers to jump up to 12th in the standings – less than 50 points off the top 10.

Penrite Racing itself edged closer to 2nd on the team standings, with just 31 points separating them and Walkinshaw Andretti United.

With the betr Darwin Triple Crown being Supercars’ Indigenous Round, Penrite Racing contested the event in a dedicated livery, designed by Melbourne Indigenous Transition School (MITS) students Ella and Jamelia, with the artwork serving as a symbol of partnership, celebration of culture, and empowerment through education.

Penrite Racing was thrilled to be able to produce such a successful weekend in Larrakia Country, and having the girls on site at Hidden Valley enjoying the results.

The Repco Supercars Championship now has a two-week break before heading to North Queensland for the NTI Townsville 500 from 11-13 July.

It was an awesome weekend up here in the NT, Payne said.

Last year and the year before, we really struggled here, so it’s really gratifying to come back here and have some good speed and get podiums.

It’s definitely an awesome feeling to finally be consistent here, which is really cool. We got good points across the board this weekend and we’re closing up on second place in the championship.

I think the team is doing a really good job of analysing what the car needs. And I think a lot of it has come down to our ability to tune the car during the weekend.

We haven’t always rolled out the strongest, but our ability to tune the car to where it needs to be with the balance of what we want has been really good.

Obviously executing the races with the strategy and things like that have been one of our strong points as well. So I guess it all adds up to one and it’s been delivering us the results.

Matt Payne -#19 Ford Mustang

What a weekend we had. I didn’t really expect it to be honest, Allen said.

The Penrite Racing guys absolutely nailed that strategy today and I was given such a good car.
Overall it was an unreal job as a team. We’re absolutely nailing it. We’re just chipping away bit by bit and hopefully we can keep getting more podiums like today.

To break the lap record and get the results we had – It was a good way to sign off my teen years.

Things are really clicking now. I think there’s been glimpses of pace and bits and pieces here and there. But this weekend has been great. Even Qualifying 1 was good on Saturday, but the race didn’t go to plan; I was able to regroup and unlocked the pace when I got the podium.

And then today, I just trucked on hard and I showed aggression when I was passing, but obviously I had the tyre on the car to do it, but overall it was really good and I am stoked.

Kai Allen – #26 Ford Mustang

It’s been an awesome weekend for everybody at Penrite Racing. To have a second and third today was an incredible achievement for the team. Cauchi said.

Kai getting his first podium ever in Supercars and then backing it up with a second one today was incredible. So thanks to everyone for all for their support.

It’s been a while now since we have been back home because we’ve been on the road since Perth, so we’re looking forward to getting back to the factory, unloading all of our trophies, recapping and regathering before going again.

David Cauchi – Team Principal, Penrite Racing