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News Power Rankings Richard Craill August 24, 2020 (Comments off) (1013)

POWER RANKINGS: LEX KELLY EDITION / DARWIN II

A DARWIN DOUBLE was won by Lex Kelly.. err.. Scott McLaughlin. Find out what else ranked highly, or needed improvement, from Darwin 2.0 in the latest edition of the TRT Power Rankings, powered by Yellow Cover.

WORDS: Richard Craill, Mark Walker, Dale Rodgers, Tony Schibeci + Top Secret contributors + TRT Socials
IMAGES: Mark Horsburgh / Supercars

HOT

1. LEX KELLY’S SEGMENT

MANY asked, Supercars Media delivered. Lex Kelly was back and in a single three-minute segment wrapped the entire sport around his little finger. Give the kid a show now.

2. SCOTT McLAUGHLIN

THREE race wins, two poles and more than 70 points added to his championship lead.. and he offered to shout the bar on Sunday night while also saying he’d be up at Sparrow’s to watch his Penske mates in the Indy 500. On track and off it, this guy is the benchmark. Another weekend like this one in Townsville and he could have this thing wrapped before Bathurst.

3. DARWIN

LOTS of stress, delayed, a second-round pushed back to clash with a big footy game and an election and what did Darwin do? They did what they always do up there in the Never Never.. wen’t ‘She’ll be right mate’ and just went about it. Yes the crowd was well down for round two, but who cares.. Darwin delivered two very special weekends critical to Supercars salvaging this 2020 season.

4. TEAM 18

WELL, well, well.. what a performance from Charlie’s boys and girls. Beat the factory team in customer machinery and have scored three podiums from the last six races, storming to fifth in the team’s championship in the process. If they can continue this form they’re going to be threats from hereon in. Improved week-on-week, did things differently with strategy and had sensational race pace on old tyres which helped Pye grab the podium in R17. Weaknesses? Their shootout pace isn’t superb, but in the 10-minute qualifiers they were outstanding. Really impressive.

5. FROSTY ON VAN GISBERGEN

THIS is what we want. Hard, raw Touring Car racing. Little bit of contact, great defence from SVG and Frosty measuring his opportunities before pouncing. We’ll pinch the phrase ‘Great Exchange’ here, because it really was.

6. 10 MINUTE QUALIFYIG SESSIONS

SO much better than Saturday’s eliminator, which as we noted last week does not work anywhere near as effectively when there are only four and then five cars knocked out in each phase.

The 10-minute dashes, however, are brilliant; full of intensity and loads of moments that build and build to the flag when Scott McLaughlin collects the pole cheque.

7. BJR BOUNCEBACK

SHOCKER last weekend, but Brad Jones Racing’s efforts to turn Nick Percat around to a legitimate second position by the final race this time around deserves enormous praise. Nick has been hugely impressive this year, but BJR has also raised their game in what is essentially the non-McLaughlin battle.  

8. ANTHEM, AGAIN

DARWIN has set a benchmark for national anthem performances that will be very hard to topple at future rounds. Right now, every single promoter between here and Bathurst are scratching their heads to try and work out how Darwin did it two weeks in a row. You’d have to get Meatloaf to create as much an impact, though the reason wouldn’t be as good..

9. FABIAN’S RACE 17 START

LAUNCHED, and sent it around the outside, on a day where good starts were a thing from that side of the road.. yet he made the most out of it.

10. WE INFLUENCE CHANGE!

WE don’t pump up our own tyres that much, but if you cast your mind back to last week’s power rankings and note everything in that, and then compare to this week.

We wanted more Lex Kelly. Check.

We wanted the podium fixed and turned to face the crowd? Fixed.

We wanted Tickford to turn things around? They had a much better weekend.

We noted how sick the fans were of Time Certainty.. Not a single race cut short all weekend.

We put BJR in the ‘NOT’ for perhaps the second time ever.. came out and grabbed a podium the next time out.

We put the Saturday qualifying format in the ‘NOT’ list: Supercars confirmed the Top-10 shootout would return for Townsville, rather than 15.

So, if you don’t mind, just once we’ll roll out our smug face..

WHAT

LARKO’S POLE

WIELDED IT like a Ninja, which Larko obviously is.

DARWIN’S WEATHER

HOW was the snow in Melbourne, southerners?

TOO MANY TROPHIES

WHO ELSE noted that the Race 17 trophies were handed out on Saturday? We know McLaughlin is good, but he’s not in a Delorean..

NOT

1. PIT EXIT

MARK WINTERBOTTOM will have replays of Darwin’s pit exit merge running though his eyes every time he closes his eyes and goes to sleep for the next week, we’re sure – though is it the merge, or is it the drivers electing to go hard left to block causing the issues? There were several near-misses at 270km/hr and we wonder if it won’t prompt a review – whether it’s of the blend line (extending it further down), or the rules about drivers going hard defensive as soon as they exit the lane.

2. MOSTERT FENCING PERCAT

DISAPPOINTING outcome, this, given Chaz had done so much good up to that point this year. Cost him third in the championship standings and undid what was otherwise another strong and consistent weekend for the WAU charge, let alone Percat who was going along nicely.

Not the way their absolutely belting battle needed to end.

3. TYRE TALK

LOOK, it is always going to be a key talking point given the tyre rules have been written to limit supply and create better racing. And we’re on board with that. But if there was one consistent message we got over the weekend from our TRT commenters on Social media, it was that it’s just too big a discussion topic.

Which, of course, it is; it’s key to everything. But the ongoing ruminating on new / old / green / working side / rears only is, according to many viewers, getting a bit tiresome.

It’s a very difficult situation because it’s so critical to the racing at the moment and trying to explain it is part of exploring the broader narrative of the race.

Hard to have your cake and eat it too but several commenters noted there were more than 65 references to tyres in Race 16 on Saturday alone, which seems like a lot. How do we turn it up and shift the chat to something else, without screwing up the racing product?

This is why the Power Rankings exist..  

4. TODD HAZELWOOD / 14 TEAM

Just as BJR #8 is having a good time of it, BJR #14 was just nowhere in Darwin 2.0. With a series of ongoing issues in the Brut machine. It just looked miserable all weekend fighting down the back of the field with Team Sydney, MSR and the #4 BJR Commodore. Hazelwood must be happy to be on his way out of Darwin, and a re-set for TSV.

5. PENRITE EREBUS

IT wasn’t long ago that the Penrite pair were being spoken about as the next-best behind DJRTP and Triple Eight, but at the moment they’re behind BJR, Team 18 and Tickford on pace and, indeed, results. Take nothing away from Anton’s win last weekend; it was superb, but the irony was they may need more mixed-tyre races to deliver them results because at the moment they don’t have the car speed to challenge on pace.

6. THE INTERNET IN QUEENSLAND

A personal drama for one of TRT’s squad in sunny Brisbane.

7. WATERS ON WHINCUP

AVERAGE, this.

8. FABS ON BRYCE

A LITTLE bit more average, here.

9. FRIENDLY FIRE

TEAM Sydney struggle as it is, the last thing they need is the teammates roughing each other up as they battle for a spot in the 20..

10. CANNED APPLAUSE

WAS IT just us, or did it seem oddly noticeable at the weekend, given the limited crowd..

TWEETS

NOTED

THIS.

HMMM… RELEVENCE?

AJ TAKING OVER!

OUCH II

THE MAN MAKES A POINT

MEME OF THE ROUND

Richard Craill (administrator)

Working full time in the motorsport industry since 2004, Richard has established himself within the group of Australia’s core motorsport broadcasters, covering the support card at the Formula 1 Australian Grand Prix for Channel 10, the Bathurst 12 Hour for Channel 7 and Porsche Carrera Cup & Touring Car Masters for FOX Sports’ Supercars coverage. Pretends to be a PR guy / Journalist and sometimes photographer to make ends meet when not yelling at a television in a padded room.

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