Dylan O’Keeffe has returned to victory lane in the Supercheap Auto TCR Australia Series, chalking up his fifth career race win in the category and finishing second overall for the round aboard the Autoglym Ashley Seward Motorsport Lynk & Co.
After qualifying 11th, O’Keeffe progressed to 10th in Race 1 which enabled him to start on pole for Race 2, courtesy of the top-10 reverse-grid format. Taking advantage of his starting position, O’Keeffe pulled clear of his rivals to take the win.
After Race 1 was later declared a non-race due to the 50 per cent distance requirement having not been fulfilled because of a red flag, O’Keeffe found himself returning to pole position for Race 3.
Some early lap skirmishes saw him shuffled down to as low as ninth at one stage, but the pace of the Lynk & Co enabled him to fight back to third at the finish, securing the runner-up spot for the round.
O’Keeffe paid credit to his Ashley Seward Motorsport team for their continued improvements with the car over the weekend.
“Qualifying and Race 1, we weren’t where we wanted to be but Ash and the boys did a fantastic job and unlocked some great performance from the car in the Sunday races,” O’Keeffe said.
“In Race 2, I had some pressure in the early laps but the car was fast enough for me to pull away towards the end.
“The third race was exciting from a spectator’s point of view with all the dicing for position in the first few laps but it wasn’t so fun for me, copping the rough end of the stick and being pushed down the field, but the car was fast enough that I was able to pass cars and fight back to third.
“With the pace I had in the second half of that race, I actually feel like another race win was possible but second overall is still a great result after where we were at Sandown.”
O’Keeffe said the performance improvement is a big confidence boost from him and the team heading to the next round at Phillip Island.
“We learned a lot about the Lynk & Co this weekend and a particular strength was the consistency of our speed over the race distances. It’s definitely put us in a good mindset heading to Phillip Island, a circuit where I’ve had success with the ASM team in TCR before,” O’Keeffe concluded.
The next round of TCR Australia will be held at Phillip Island, 12-14 April, while O’Keeffe will be back on track for the opening round of Porsche Carrera Cup at the Australian Grand Prix this weekend.
TCR Round Results Summary
Qualifying: 11th
Race 1: No race
Race 2: 1st
Race 3: 3rd
Overall: 2nd
TCR Australia – Top 10 Points
- Zac Soutar – 187
- Ben Bargwanna – 184
- Jordan Cox – 184
- Josh Buchan – 179
- Clay Richards – 168
- Ryan Casha – 164
- Dylan O’Keeffe – 161
- Brad Harris – 131
- Aaron Cameron – 131
- Tony D’Alberto – 124
