BATHURST TITLE

coffee this week.

“Sleeping is still going to be difficult,’’ he said.

“I always have trouble on these sort of weekends. I will just have to calm myself and stay right away from stimulants like caffeine.’’

Reynolds has revealed he knocked back offers from three rival teams to stay loyal to his band of brothers.

Declaring his crew the “best in the business’’, the Bathurst champion admitted it was this rag-tag crew of mechanics, engineers, and rattle-gun men that inspired him to sign a record breaking 10-year deal with Erebus Motorsport.

“I have never been with a team I have enjoyed so much,’’ Reynolds said.

“I am a bit of an oddball and I fit here. I have never been able to fit a mould but for whatever reason I fit here.

“I walked in here and felt at home straight away. They get me and that is a big deal for someone as strange as I am.’’

Reynolds and his crew have been part of one of the remarkable V8 transformations.

Down-and-out battlers when Reynolds quit heavyweight outfit Ford Performance Racing to join Erebus four years ago in a V8 bombshell, they are now a Bathurstwinning team and a championship threat.

“This was probably the worst team in pit-lane when I joined,’’ Reynolds said.

“Their performances were not very good to be kind. To see everything grow in the last four years, I am proud to be a part of that. I was third in the championship and left to come to a team not in the top 15.’’

Among the favourites to win this week’s Bathurst 1000, starting with practice today, Reynolds credited the 22 people that work on his car for giving him his Mount Panorama chance.

“I am nothing without my team,’’ Reynolds said.

“In this sport you are only as good as the people behind you, and I am lucky to have some very good people.

“I heavily rely on the guys around me and I would like to think that they rely on me sometimes. I see myself as someone that is able to inspire a bit of confidence and I think that is what you have to do as a driver.

“We also get each other. They know what I want, and I know what they want. We also have some good times. We are always having a laugh. We try and make work addictive.

“We have assembled the best people and built a fence around them. We want them to want to stay here and we don’t want any of them poached.’’