Rookies fast-track their learning Full throttle and loving it
THEY are the rookies of this year’s Supercars championship, and Brad Jones Racing duo Todd Hazelwood and Jack Smith are ready to make their mark.
It has been a rollercoaster start to their careers in Australian racing’s top tier, with the COVID-19 pandemic rocking the racing world and forcing changes to operations.
But neither driver would have it any other way, working together to forge their careers on the track.
Both drivers have already proven their credentials on the track, with Smith taking out the Super3 title for BJR in 2017, while Hazelwood took out the Super2 title in the same season under the Matt Stone Racing banner.
Hazelwood also showed he has the mettle to match it with the Supercars big boys when he qualified fourth at Townsville last year.
The 24-year-old believes that past connection with the Reid Park surface will stand him in good stead for the NTI Townsville Supersprint this weekend.
“It is a happy hunting ground, and being in Townsville and being able to soak up the atmosphere is really exciting,” Hazelwood said.
“For me, being back in Townsville, it is back at a track I really enjoy. Back in my time in the Dunlop Super2 Series we had podiums and wins (at Townsville) and last year we had my personal best qualifying result (in the Supercars).
“Coming to Townsville, it is a street circuit, so there is a lot of different surfaces to manage. That is where the engineers really come into play. They do their homework and that is why I work closely with them.”
The pair are sitting nearby each other on the Supercars championship table, with Smith confident his Team Cooldrive and SCT Logisitics Racing Commodore has been making serious inroads on the competition.
Into his fourth year with BJR, Smith has worked sideby-side with engineer Paul Forgie since the beginning.
It is a bond that Smith believes will be key to unlocking his potential.
“It hasn’t been an easy start, I knew it wasn’t going to be easy,” Smith said.
“It is a challenge I have accepted. The team has been really good. This is my fourth year with Brad Jones Racing and I know the team really well. I have a good support group behind me and we have been making some good gains this year.
“There is hard work that goes on all the time with (the performance and tuning). You always want to be doing your best and there is a lot of work to be done with myself and my driving and there is a lot of work to be done with the car and its performance.
“Any driver would say having these back-to-back rounds is a positive.
“For someone like me, who is new and a rookie in the category, having these back-to-back rounds is a chance to learn and get on with things a lot quicker.”