{"id":229327,"date":"2025-10-21T06:45:12","date_gmt":"2025-10-21T06:45:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/229327\/"},"modified":"2025-10-21T06:45:12","modified_gmt":"2025-10-21T06:45:12","slug":"why-cameron-hill-isnt-shattered-about-finals-near-miss","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/229327\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Cameron Hill isn&#8217;t shattered about finals near-miss"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.v8sleuth.com.au\/stats-driver-1703-Cameron-Hill\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">CAMERON Hill<\/a> cut a surprisingly chipper figure for a driver who narrowly missed out on Supercars finals despite having long been perched inside the championship\u2019s top 10.<\/p>\n<p>The battle for the last playoffs ticket went down to the very last lap of the \u2018regular season\u2019 at Bathurst, with just three points proving the difference as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.v8sleuth.com.au\/stats-driver-2726-Kai-Allen\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Kai Allen<\/a> edged out Hill and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.v8sleuth.com.au\/stats-driver-829-Andre-Heimgartner\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Andr\u00e9 Heimgartner<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Had it not been for Allen re-passing <a href=\"https:\/\/www.v8sleuth.com.au\/stats-driver-1568-Aaron-Cameron\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Aaron Cameron<\/a> in the closing stages, it would have likely been Hill in \u2013 although Supercars regulations don\u2019t explicitly state how a tiebreaker is handled in-season (only after the final race does the traditional countback apply per rules).<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s a tough break for Hill, who has won a race in 2025 and ranks ninth on qualifying average.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/superstore.v8sleuth.com.au\/products\/v8-sleuth-magazine-issue-1?utm_source=SRBuyButton&amp;utm_medium=website\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/V8Sleuth-Magazine-1_91f7f282-3ced-4ad8-9031-10de31dcd2de_1024x1024.jpg\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>But the Canberran wasn\u2019t all that heartbroken, truth be told.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt is what it is,\u201d he told V8 Sleuth.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere\u2019s probably 10 different things we can point to now and say \u2018that cost us the finals\u2019. Some of them were me, some of them were the team, some of them were out of our control. That\u2019s motorsport.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI was proud that we were in the fight and I felt like I stepped up a lot this year as a driver, so I\u2019m keen to finish the year on a high and start next year with the BJR guys.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s an exciting project with the Supra, it looked great on track.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Hill dumped a stack of points in three Sunday races across the winter (Sundays being the higher-stakes component during the Repco Sprint Cup), placing 23rd in Perth <a href=\"https:\/\/www.v8sleuth.com.au\/phantom-issue-re-emerges-for-camaro\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">due to a battery issue<\/a>, 24th in Townsville <a href=\"https:\/\/www.v8sleuth.com.au\/the-trail-of-destruction-behind-hills-hiccup\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">due to a brake pad explosion<\/a>, and 24th in Ipswich after <a href=\"https:\/\/www.v8sleuth.com.au\/bates-hill-double-whack-not-really-on\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">his infamous brain snap against Zach Bates<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>He had looked destined to lose more ground when co-driver <a href=\"https:\/\/www.v8sleuth.com.au\/stats-driver-2754-Cameron-McLeod\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Cameron McLeod<\/a> copped a penalty for contact with PremiAir Racing\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.v8sleuth.com.au\/stats-driver-2680-Nash-Morris\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Nash Morris<\/a> during the Great Race, only to remarkably charge from a lap down to finish fifth.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe had a really fast car all week and we just persevered in that race,\u201d said Hill.<\/p>\n<p><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/bathurst-1000-sunday-photo-gallery-7-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-237461\"  \/>The Supaglass Camaro runs off at the Chase. Pic: Mark Walker<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think we made a lot of good calls and made the car better each stint. Top five at Bathurst is my personal best.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cObviously we caught a couple of breaks there with some Safety Cars, as did many others, and we found ourselves in a nice place to race when it really mattered. But that\u2019s why this race is so special, because you\u2019re never done.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Hill will switch from Matt Stone Racing to Brad Jones Racing for the 2026 Repco Supercars Championship.<\/p>\n<p>Three rounds remain this year, starting with the Boost Mobile Gold Coast 500 across October 24-26.<\/p>\n<p>The 14 non-finals drivers, which also includes Hill\u2019s teammate <a href=\"https:\/\/www.v8sleuth.com.au\/stats-driver-38-Nick-Percat\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Nick Percat<\/a> after he was struck down by a Bathurst engine failure, are now unleashed on an all-out quest for event silverware with zero championship ramifications given they now cannot finish better than 11th overall.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CAMERON Hill cut a surprisingly chipper figure for a driver who narrowly missed out on Supercars finals despite&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":229328,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,806,805,803,804,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-229327","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-motosport","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-motor","11":"tag-motor-sports","12":"tag-motosport","13":"tag-motosports","14":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229327","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=229327"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229327\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/229328"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=229327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=229327"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=229327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}