25th Nov 2003 Brays Upbeat After Season Opening iTel Australian Nationals
Victor Bray Racing’s Castrol Chevrolet Team got off to a promising start at the opening round of the 2003-04 Australian Top Doorslammer Championship at Willowbank Raceway at Ipswich in Queensland last weekend. Run as part of the 38th iTEL Community Telco Australian Nationals, the team’s defending champion, Ben Bray, narrowly missed top qualifying for the event by just one thousandth of a second. He then defeated 2002 Champion Peter Kapiris in the first round before falling to eventual winner Steve Stanic in the semi final with a red lighting foul start.
Team owner, Victor Bray debuted a whole new, larger 521 cubic inch engine combination at the event and was very encouraged with the potential of the new power plant after qualifying sixth and falling in the opening round by just two hundredths of a second.
An upbeat Victor Bray commented after the race meeting, “Some of the key components for my new combination didn’t arrive from the USA until the week of the event so there was no chance to test it beforehand. Combined with the horror week we had getting Ben’s car back together after his testing crash last Sunday the whole team was exhausted and we were worried about how this meeting would go. In the end we both qualified while some very good racers didn’t and Ben was only a thousandth off the quickest time and got the highest speed. He’ll learn by his red light. They’re part of the game and third’s not that bad a place to be this early in the series. I’m never happy about losing in the first round but my car ran 6.3s very easily with the new engine and I’m confident it’s going to be a fast set up with a few more laps to get it fully sorted. There’s seven events in the series this year so there’s still a long way to go.”
In addition to his 60 semi final points, Ben also earned the 5 bonus championship points for the fastest time of the event at 235.48 mph (378.9 kph) which sees him in third position whilst Victor is 25 points back in equal sixth. The next round of the series will be held at Perth’s Quit Motorplex on December 5th and 6th.
2003-04 Australian Top Doorslammer Championship points after one round.
Steve Stanic NSW 100
Brett Stevens QLD 80
Ben Bray QLD 65
Grant O’Rourke WA 60
Andrew Searle QLD 45
Victor Bray QLD 40
Peter Kapiris VIC 40
Robin Judd WA 40
Allan Sarkis NSW 20
Maurice Fabietti NSW 20
Gary Phillips QLD 20
Shane Olive NSW 20
Joe Schembri NSW 20
2003-04 Australian Top Doorslammer Championship Dates
Round 1 November 21-23
iTEL Community Telco Australian Nationals – Willowbank Raceway - Ipswich Qld.
Round 2 December 5-6
Southside Engine Centre Golden State Challenge – Quit Motorplex - Kwinana WA
Round 3 February 7-8
Summernationals – Western Sydney International Dragway – Eastern Creek NSW
Round 4 February 28
Westernationals – Quit Motorplex - Kwinana WA
Round 5 March 12-13
National Open – Western Sydney International Dragway – Eastern Creek NSW
Round 6 April 24-25
Australian Tin Top Titles – Willowbank Raceway - Ipswich Qld.
