Dylan o’keeffe

O’Keeffe’s Bend TCR Weekend Highlighted by Race 1 Charge

An inspired charge through the field in Race 1 was the highlight for Dylan O’Keeffe in Round 4 of the Supercheap Auto TCR Australia Series at The Bend Motorsport Park on the weekend.

After qualifying a disappointed 11^th, O’Keeffe maximised the long run race pace of his Autoglym Lynk & Co to carve his way through the field, finishing fourth at the conclusion of the 30 minute affair.

Despite managing a minor technical problem, O’Keeffe brought the car home eighth in the reverse-grid Race 2, before improving from seventh on the grid to finish fifth in Race 3.

O’Keeffe said his Lynk & Co’s long-run race pace was its biggest strength.

“The weekend started well – we were really fast in the wet weather practice sessions on Friday – but once the track dried out for qualifying, we were having some challenges with switching the tyre on, which meant we didn’t qualify as well as we hoped,” O’Keeffe said.

“However, when it came to the races, the car got better and better compared to everyone else as the race progressed, and I was able to make up a lot of positions, especially in the first race.

“In the second race, we were managing an issue which meant we didn’t have full turbo boost all the time, but I managed to avoid the chaos and salvage a respectable result.

“We fixed the problem in Race 3 and the car was really good again; I made up a couple of places, and probably had the speed to gain a couple more spots but ran out of laps.”

Heading to the next round at Queensland Raceway, O’Keeffe said the main challenge will be to improve the qualifying performance.

“With these front-wheel-drive cars, there’s a specific technique for warming up the tyres and extracting the maximum performance from them over one lap, which is something we’ll work on for the next round,” he concluded.

Round 5 of TCR Australia at Queensland Raceway takes place on 12-14 July.