Words with Cam Waters: "The longest 15 minutes of my life"

What a weekend in Western Australia!

It was an awesome day on Saturday. The rain had been coming and going all day, so heading into qualifying we all knew the conditions were going to be tough.

It was going to be about getting the best from the out-lap – that was going to determine P1.

I managed to put a decent lap together, and that was it – my first pole. Not that it was clear straight away; I had to wait almost 15 minutes to see if the conditions would improve and anyone else would go quicker.

It was a case of getting out of the car, helmet off, helmet back on, back in the car… It was probably the longest 15 minutes of my life. I just wanted it to keep raining.

Luckily the track didn’t dry out too much and the time stood.

The conditions played their part, no doubt about it, but it was still a great feeling to get my first V8 Supercars pole.

Leading the way

I have to say I was happy with the race on Saturday as well. Starting from pole was really cool, and in the lead-up I really wasn’t that nervous. And then it started to rain, just to make things a little more complicated… getting a V8 off the line in the dry is harder enough, let alone in the wet.

But my start was actually pretty good. I had some good pace in the lead in the wet, so I was hoping it would keep raining. But it dried out.

We went for a really long stint on the tyre; nobody really knew how the degradation was going to work. It’s funny, my car and Chaz Mostert’s car both suffered really bad – with about 15 laps to go it really started to get difficult. And backwards we went.

Still, I learnt a lot from that race. The result wasn’t perfect, but if you can take something away from the race that’s a good thing.

Rogue rubber

Sunday definitely didn’t end the way I would have liked. I reckon we were probably on for a Top 10 finish before I had that brake lock-up.

I’m not really sure what happened, to be honest. That tyre never seemed to have grip from the moment it went on the car. It never came up to temperature, and in the end it cost me pretty big.

It was a disappointing way to end what was a pretty cool weekend.

Positive signs

The one big positive to take away from Sunday is Mark Winterbottom’s win. ‘Frosty’ won thanks to good tyre life, which is encouraging given that Chaz and I both struggled with deg on Saturday and Sunday.

Hopefully, it’s a sign that we’re getting closer to sorting that out and we can convert our qualifying speed, which is really good, into some even better race results.