Team Specialised Performance Garage makes a big impact at the season opener

After months of car preparation and off season testing and development Team Specialised Performance Garage has quickly shown it will be the team to beat after Round 1 of the Tasmanian Drift Series, held at Baskerville Raceway on Saturday.
The event saw undoubtedly the highest quality driver field ever witnessed in a Tasmanian drift event with a number of Drift Australia and fellow mainland competitors in action against Tasmania’s finest drifters.
Team SP Garage stood out from the field of nearly thirty entrants with the team cars’ eye catching exterior livery backed up by the lightening car speed of both vehicles curteousy of two brand new engines built and tuned in the off season by Nick Summers from GT Garage.

Car #1 driven by Ben Purtell, last year’s state champion, endured a near faultless event with only a missed gear change stopping Ben from placing higher than his fifth placing. After a three month full car build up from a bare shell Car #1 is right in contention for back to back state titles.
“I am extremely disappointed with the small gear shifting mistake, however considering this is a brand new car where every nut and bolt has been replaced and only limited testing before today I cannot complain with a top five finish in the car’s first event. The car feels unbelievable and with further testing over the next month I know the car will be able to compete against any car in the country”,  Ben said at the conclusion of the event.
Earlier in the day Ben had shown he required little time adapting to the new car during morning practice and just missed out on the top spot in qualifying, settling for second place.

In the top 16 Ben battled Burnie’s Andrew Considine in his Nissan S14 Silvia and showed superior car speed throughout both runs to breeze past the northerner with a clear win. In the top 8 Josh Priseman would await in his recently completed RB30 powered Nissan Sileighty and the car’s were evenly matched in the opening battle, until the misshift by Ben which led to Josh slipping up the inside of the Team SP Garage car. Ben was unable to perform a landslide defeat of Priseman in his chase lap to progress through to the top 4.

Team SP Garage car #2 driven by Drift Australia competitor and South Australian Paul “Aussie” Austin was unfortunately plagued by cooling issues throughout morning practice and qualifying. The frustrating decision was made during qualifying that the car would pull out of the event, the risk of damaging the new engine was deemed too great. The car did however display an immense amount of promise during the limited track time the car obtained in the morning sessions, with car speed and setup appearing as good as the front runners in the event. Much is expected of this car and driver combination for the remainder of the year with further testing and development.

“It is extremely frustrating to have to pull out of the event with these minor issues, however the risks are too great. During the time on track the car felt very strong and with further seat time I am sure I can make a big push for the top podium position at the remaining rounds of the series”, said Austin.

Specialised Performance Garage director and Team Owner Jonathan “Barnzy” Barnes at the conclusion of the event; “After months of preparation it was great to finally see both cars out on track and having a series tilt at the state title. We have extremely high expectations as a team for the year and with further testing and development between now and the next event we will be pushing to place both cars on the podium,” Barnzy explained.

The next event for the team is Round 2 of the Tasmanian Drift Series, which will be held at Symmons Plains Raceway on May 7.
Keep an eye out for the launch of the Team Specialised Performance Garage web site (www.teamspg.com.au) in the coming days!
Regards,