V8 Supercar Fujitsu Series driver Geoff Emery rockets down the hill in his VZ Commodore at Bathurst on Saturday.By Stuart Teather
GEOFF Emery’s first crack at Bathurst in the V8 Supercar Fujitsu Series almost ended in disaster, with the Narre Warren driver’s weekend ending prematurely with a shocking crash in race two.
Having finished qualifying on Friday in 21st position, Emery ripped through the field in the 14-lap race one later that day to finish 15th, putting him in a good position to attack in race two on Saturday.
Emery got out to a good start in the second race and was battling for 12th place with Matthew White on lap five when it all went wrong.
Coming through the Skyline corner near the top of the track White clipped Emery and spun him around, leaving Emery a sitting duck with his VZ Commodore sideways across the track.
As Emery tried to get his car to safety in the sandpit on the side of the track, Andrew Fisher came over the crest leading into Skyline and T-boned Emery, smashing into the passenger side of the car.
Emery said when he was sitting across the track he thought about a crash at Bathurst in 2006 involving Fujitsu Series driver Mark Porter, where Porter was T-boned on an earlier section of the hill in a collision that cost him his life.
“That’s pretty much why I wanted to get out of the way,” he said.
“I proceeded to try and get the car out of the line of traffic, and as I pulled forward to go into the sandpit Andrew Fisher came straight across under double yellows (safety flags) and ran into me in the sandpit.”
Luckily Emery escaped serious injury but he said two days on he was still feeling the crash.
“I probably got hit about 140km/h in the side… I’m a bit sore, bit of back pain and a big headache,” he said.
His Commodore will require a significant amount of work before it is ready for the final round at Oran Park, on 4-7 December.
Emery said his car had good pace once he got used to the track but he suffered from an interrupted qualifying session.
“We struggled in qualifying it was basically red flag after red flag in qualifying and we only ended up with 13 laps in the whole lot and not having driven this car around there before it was hard to get on the pace quickly,” he said.
“The car was good – I just needed more laps around the track — the more laps we had the better we got.”
Emery still managed to pick up 60 points for the round and currently sits in 16th position overall on 624 points, 38 behind Sam Walter in 15th.
