Whincup not giving up just yet

HOLDEN star Jamie Whincup insists there is still plenty of time to mount a championship fightback, vowing to take another “big swing” at his Ford rivals at Winton this weekend.

Whincup will equal fellow Holden great Mark Skaife for Supercars round starts (220), but the numbers he is focused on are the results next to his name.

After slipping to ninth in the standings after dismal results at Symmons Plains and Phillip Island, Whincup produced a turnaround at the Perth night races last round.

It pushed the seven-time Supercars champion back up to sixth in the title race.

“There have been plenty of times over the last 15 years where we haven’t had the quickest cars, but we are dedicated to turn that around,’’ the Red Bull Holden Racing Team driver said.

“We have given our opposition plenty of head start, but we are not thinking about that. There are still 10 rounds to go, still over 3000 points. First things first, try to make the cars fast.

“We made some big changes for Perth and certainly improved our performance relative to the rest of the field.

“We are going to take another big swing and another big step in the same direction and see what happens again.”

Whincup finished fourth and second in the two Perth races to claim his first podium since the Australian Formula One Grand Prix at Albert Park.

“We were very ordinary at Phillip Island, but great to see we had some pace under lights in Perth,’’ he said. “But Winton is a different track again … we are semi-confident we should be somewhere near the pace in the dry but the weather prediction is that it’s just going to be drizzly and wet all weekend.”