Supercars team owner Brad Jones hopes to see his lead driver, Nick Percat, claim a spot in the top four of this year’s Supercars Championship.
Speaking to Supercars.com, Jones outlined the ambitious goal he’s set for 31-year-old Percat. The South Australian driver currently sits fifth in the series standings on 915 points — 57 points off Walkinshaw Andretti United’s Chaz Mostert and another seven points off Shane van Gisbergen in third.
“This rapid-fire racing every weekend — it’s hard to know how it’s all going to wash out. But our target was to try to get Nick into the top four in the championship, and that’s still our plan,” Jones said.
“Hopefully we can get a little further along but really, let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves. We got another podium, we’ll go to Townsville and see what we can do there.”
If Percat manages the feat, it will be the highest any driver from the Albury-based outfit would have finished in the series. The best team’s best result in the driver’s championship was the sixth-place finish Fabian Coulthard accomplished in 2013. Jason Bright finished one spot back in seventh.
Percat is one of only three drivers to win more than one race in the season so far, having claimed two victories at Sydney Motorsport Park. He then backed that up with a convincing podium at the final race of Darwin’s dual-event double header.
With the Supercheap Auto Bathurst 1000 also on the horizon, Jones is hopeful to challenge for victory there, too.
“I feel like we’re in a pretty good spot. We’ve been to a number of different types of circuits, and we’ve been able to perform really well at all of those,” Jones added.
“I feel like the team is in pretty good form and obviously I have got one eye on Bathurst so I can’t wait to get up there and see what we’re capable of doing.”