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Positive start for TanderSport at Eastern Creek |
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Sunday, 03 February 2008 |
 TanderSport has hailed it’s
first weekend as a two-car team a success following a positive weekend at the
first round of the 2008 Kumho Tyres Australian Formula 3 Championship, at
Eastern Creek Raceway.
Running one car in the Championship Class and one
in the Opes Prime National Class, TanderSport drivers Leanne Tander and Chris
Reindler both raced at the front of their respective classes’ and immediately
justified the teams’ substantial program of expansion carried out throughout the
off season.
Leanne Tander (#42 TanderSport Dallara F307 Mercedes) qualified on pole position
for the first race of the 2008 season after setting her best time early in the
session, scoring the top spot by two-tenths of a second. She then went on to
finish the race third after a slow start saw her shuffled down to her eventual
finishing position on the podium.
However, a competitive performance that
saw the #42 car race in the midst of the leading group of four cars was a
promising debut for the teams’ brand-new Dallara F307 / Mercedes chassis and,
importantly, a better start to Tander’s championship campaign foe 2008 compared
to the horror weekend experienced the same time last season.
Tander set
fourth-fastest lap of the race after running just behind James Winslow and just
in front of Earl Bamber for all of the 13 laps, finishing less than a second
behind second position.
Chris Reindler (#52 TanderSport National Class
Dallara F304 – Spiess) made a stunning debut, scoring a first-up Pole position
in the National Class after only one day of testing prior to the round.
A hefty crash just moments after setting his time, however, left the
TanderSport team with a huge job ahead of them – the team working miracles to
get the car repaired in time to give Reindler a chance to place the car on the
grid for the second race before ending the second session 5th - despite the car
only having a basic setup in place.
The 18-year old then raced strongly
to finish third on debut despite a seatbelt problem throughout the race that
caused him substantial pain in fast corners. Despite the ailment, Reindler was
able to gain F3 race experience thanks to several close dices with National
Class rivals en route to his strong finishing position.
Unfortunately,
neither driver was able to improve on their race one results after the second
race was cancelled after four laps behind the safety car, due to extreme wet
weather conditions.
Both TanderSport drivers sit third in their
respective championships’ following the first round of the series.
The
team will next be in action at the 2008 Clipsal 500 Adelaide in three weeks
time.
More information about TanderSport can be found at
www.tandersport.com
Leanne Tander - #42 TanderSport Dallara F307
Mercedes Benz
”That was an up and down weekend for us, but I
think it shows that the team will be strong this season.
”It was great to
get the first pole position of the season and show how competitive our car is
after just two-and-a-bit days of testing before the round. We know the car is
competitive and it’s just the start that let the results down for the weekend.
”In the race the car had good pace and I was able to stay with the two
in front, but it’s very difficult to pass so I had to be content with third.
Given we started on pole the result is disappointing but there are positive
points about it, especially we are only a few points of the championship lead.
It’s a good start to what can hopefully be a good season.”
Chris
Reindler - #52 TanderSport Dallara F304 Spiess Opel (National
Class)
“I got a really good start, which I was extremely happy
with, considering it was my first start in Formula 3.
”I was leading the
class then, but got muscled out of the way a couple of times which dropped me
back to third. After that I had seatbelt problems, which made it very difficult
to drive, so I was happy that the race ended. Overall I’m really happy. It was a
really positive weekend for us and I’m really pleased with what I learned about
the car.”
Garth Tander – TanderSport Team
Manager
”It was an Up and down weekend for us. I was really,
really pleased after qualifying one for us to have both cars on pole for both
classes. We worked really hard over the off season to make the cars competitive
and it paid off. It was obviously disappointing for Chris to have his crash but
it was a really good test for our team to be able to repair it – I’m not too
sure how many other teams would have been able to repair it in that time.
”Chris was incredibly impressive. Before qualifying we had calculated
that he had done about 85 laps in a Formula 3 car, ever – and only 60 here – so
to put it on pole was an outstanding effort. He’s going to be a really, really
good driver – obviously it’s in his genes! He’s very young and willing to learn
and we’re very keen to work with him in the future.
”It was
disappointing that we didn’t get the race win for Leanne with a bad start, but
both cars had the speed to do it. I think a lot of people had doubts that we
would be able to do it but we’ve proved them wrong this weekend.”
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