Pioneer presses on
Sole sister in Supercars is still setting the pace
THE first and so far only woman to land a full-time drive in the world’s toughest touring car championship, the Australian Supercars, Simona de Silvestro describes her first two seasons in the category as the worst of her career.
Yet the 30-year-old Swiss wonder woman is determined to fight hard to get her Nissan more towards the business end of the field this season and is hoping she can make inroads at Round 3 at Symmons Plains on April 5-7.
De Silvestro finished last season with a 10th place at the final round at Newcastle, giving her increased confidence heading into this year.
“It’s definitely, I would say, the worst two seasons I’ve ever had in my career,” she said. “It just shows it’s a really tough championship and you really have to be on top of everything in each race weekend to be right there because it’s so close.
“I wouldn’t have come here just to come and do three years. I think it was a big step for me in general to leave Switzerland and move down here and I really committed to this. For me, I definitely see a long-term thing here.”
Pit-lane speculation was that De Silvestro was being targeted by powerhouse Triple Eight Race Engineering as their replacement driver for retiring veteran Craig Lowndes. With Kelly Racing set to lose Nissan factory support from this year on, a move to the Holden-backed Triple Eight looked a no-brainer.
In the end, however, de Silvestro is behind the wheel of her Nissan Altima for a third season and she believes the loss of factory backing won’t affect her team too much.
“Losing the Nissan backing is maybe not so great but it’s a bit different in Australia compared to anywhere else in the world,” she said. “The Nissan backing is usually just a monetary support and I think the team has great sponsors on board at the moment … but for sure we’re competing against the Triple Eights, the Penskes, and things like that.
“They’re really big teams who really put a lot of effort into it so our team has to do the same and us drivers as well — come with our A-game every time we go to the track.”