{"id":28378,"date":"2025-07-28T21:10:12","date_gmt":"2025-07-28T21:10:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/28378\/"},"modified":"2025-07-28T21:10:12","modified_gmt":"2025-07-28T21:10:12","slug":"triple-eight-rookies-impression-on-supercars-champions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/28378\/","title":{"rendered":"Triple Eight rookie\u2019s impression on Supercars champions"},"content":{"rendered":"

IT wasn\u2019t all smooth sailing, but Zach Bates<\/a> overall passed his first big test with flying colours according to a pair of champion teammates.<\/p>\n

Bates spent yesterday at Queensland Raceway getting to grips with Triple Eight\u2019s Supercheap Auto wildcard Camaro, ahead of his solo debut next week and an enduro campaign with Craig Lowndes<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Lowndes and runaway points leader Broc Feeney<\/a> also turned laps in the #888, but the day was about Bates.<\/p>\n

The 2024 Super2 champion had one slip-up when he speared off at Turn 6, but otherwise impressed.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s progressed very well today in the sense of just getting his head around the way the team operate the car and the number of changes that the team gave him to trial,\u201d said Lowndes.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cHis input and feedback was fantastic\u2026 Zach is extremely precise about what he wants, and it gives me a lot of confidence going forward.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reigning champion Will Brown<\/a> told V8 Sleuth: \u201cI\u2019ve been a big believer in Zach and what he can do and I think today he has already done a fantastic job.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think everyone here is very happy with the job he has done today. He had one little excursion but you have got to expect that.<\/p>\n

\u201cHopefully he can prove himself in the wildcard and also over the two enduros with Lowndesy.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo win the Super2 championship last year was a great job. I think this year obviously for whatever reason they\u2019re probably not having the run they want with the Eggleston car right now, in Townsville they didn\u2019t, but hopefully he can bounce back in Super2 as well and maybe get a main game seat next year.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat would be the goal for him.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Pic: Supplied<\/p>\n

Brown also lapped up some brief track time at QR, assisting Triple Eight\u2019s Super2 duo by completing 10 laps in the Commodore of Jackson Walls<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cJumping back into it, you don\u2019t notice how different they are until you drive them again. There are a lot of differences there,\u201d said Brown.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut I was just trying to help baseline the car, see if we can give any input and help the Super2 guys out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bates, 21, meanwhile hopes his work can double as useful intel for the Red Bull Ampol entries at the Ipswich Super440.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was good to have both Andrew (Edwards) and Marty (Short) here as well to crunch through the data with. They\u2019ve got a pretty big interest in how it\u2019s going to go for next week with them, so hopefully I\u2019ve helped them out somehow,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"IT wasn\u2019t all smooth sailing, but Zach Bates overall passed his first big test with flying colours according…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":28379,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,806,805,803,804,85],"class_list":["post-28378","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motosport","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-motor","tag-motor-sports","tag-motosport","tag-motosports","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28378","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=28378"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28378\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28379"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28378"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28378"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28378"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}