Brodie Kostecki remains calm despite losing a major chunk of his championship lead in Darwin, while a potential drive in America may not be far away.
Kostecki arrived at Hidden Valley Raceway with an 87-point lead over Erebus Motorsport teammate Will Brown.
But after three eventful races and Erebus Motorsport’s first winless round since the opener at Newcastle, car #99’s advantage has been trimmed to just 59 after a P26 alongside Brown’s sixth in the final race.
Kostecki started the weekend strong with a pair of P4s in the first two races, with Saturday particularly impressive having started down in 11th.
But when car #99 again lined up on grid position number 11 on Sunday it came unstuck.
First lap contact with Anton De Pasquale at the tight hairpin in the “valley” shattered Kostecki’s front right steering arm.
The damage saw the front right tyre going in all sorts of directions and the championship leader limp back to the safety of the pits.
After quick work from the Erebus pit crew, Kostecki returned to the track albeit three laps down and he was last when the chequered flag fell, but importantly collected 18 points.
Reflecting on the incident, Kostecki admitted he could not say for certain why what appeared to be relatively light contact inflicted so much damage.
“I am not really sure what happened,” he said on Fox Sports.
“I got a pretty decent start and was just following Shane (van Gisbergen) through.
“Shane went to the inside at the hairpin and there was a two to three car length gap on the outside so I tried to go around there and get the inside for the next corner.
“Then I am not sure what happened with the Shell car if Anton missed a gear or locked up but he just parked it at the hairpin.
“Wheel to wheel contact ripped open on the steering arm which put us out.”
Despite seeing his lead get trimmed, Kostecki is far from panic stations, having been pleased by Erebus Motorsport’s race pace and is keen to get stuck into it at Townsville where his has one top 10 finish from seven starts.
“It is our worst weekend this year but we will get back together and see how we can move forward in Townsville,” he said.
“I think we still made really good steps this weekend. It was strange because we went to so many different circuits and we came up here and we were a little bit off.
“We were awesome in race trim, but qualifying was not our strong suit which put us in this place.
“It is so tight in qualifying and I did not maximise it and unfortunately this is the result we got.
“But there is no pressure. I will just take it race by race and there are plenty more to win.”
Away from Supercars, Kostecki and other Erebus team members including Will Brown ventured off to America to attend a NASCAR Cup Series race at St Louis with Richard Childress Racing.
There have been rumours that Kostecki is potentially looking to resume his American racing career with an appearance in future.
The Coke Camaro star raced as a youngster in the NASCAR K & N Series East in 2013 and 2014.
But his manager Nathan Kazer has hinted to Neil Crompton on Fox Sports an announcement could arrive within a week.
“It looks good, so hopefully in the next week we have something locked away which is exciting for the young fella,” he said.
“I think it is in his blood, so it is just a matter of time until we get him in one and I am sure he will make us all proud.”
Before the next Supercars round in Townsville, Shane van Gisbergen is going NASCAR Cup Series racing at Chicago.
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