Ford gives shakedown to future Falcon

Ford Performance Racing’s Car of the Future completed its shakedown at the Winton circuit this week.

The leading V8 Supercars squad put in four installation laps in its 2013 challenger on Monday before its drivers Mark Winterbottom and Will Davison completed the permitted 20 laps on Tuesday.

The team then undertook some long runs at the request of the championship’s technical staff to help evaluate axle cooling options.

Team Principal Tim Edwards hailed the shakedown of the new Falcon model as a success.

“It has been an unbelievably successful day and everything ran as well as we could’ve planned, if not better,” said Edwards. “The rest of the shakedown this morning went fine and Will got his first chance to drive the car before we did 80 laps for the category so they could evaluate some transaxle cooling options. This information will be passed onto the other teams and I must say all three options ran successfully and potentially could all be used at the first race next year.”

Winterbottom added: “The great thing about our team is they gave me a car which was perfect ergonomically so everything was positioned correctly allowing me to make the most of the limited time with the car. I was immediately able to concentrate on learning how the car handles differently though I must say I was instantly happy with the gearshift and the brakes are a lot better so we made the most of our shakedown today.

“I also did two long runs so it is pleasing to know from the outset the car can do a lot of laps without issue. The additional laps we did for the category will provide them with information which will benefit all the other teams and assist with their development so it was well worth waiting to do our first runs with the final specification package.”

FPR will now conduct its first full test with the car next Monday at Winton.

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Peter Allen