Articles by Craig Lowndes

I classify this as one of the hardest races for fitness, mechanical sympathy - because we bash over all the kerbs and chicanes that we can _ and a driver's mental strength.Most drivers get through Saturday pretty much unscathed, everyone's pretty fresh. But then to recover Saturday night, redo it all again Sunday for the same distance, same strategies _ that's when soreness comes in and drivers start to fatigue.So you try to survive Saturday to make sure you're in good shape for Sunday, try not to put the team under too much pressure Saturday night in the sense of repairing cars. You don't want them to be tired going into Sunday's race and fatiguing.So it's definitely a big, big, weekend for team, driver and car.  Generally the one that comes out with a win here goes on to have a pretty successful championship. I don't know why, but it definitely starts the championship off well.It gives the drivers a lot of confidence in surviving a street circuit like this. This one's quite a demanding track, ninety per cent of the corners are blind and it's a very challenging circuit.The car set-up here translates to other V8 Supercar street races and we spent a lot of time at Sydney's Homebush last year trying to perfect a street circuit style of set-up. That'll put us in good setup for this weekend.Adelaide's a tough, bumpy circuit. The driver with good car speed here is one that has confidence that the car will turn, especially in the blind corners but it also needs to ride the kerbs, needs to put its power down well. And you need to try and do all that with the least amount of effort, you want it to come easy so you don't fatigue.It's a softer set-up than for a permanent circuit so the car rides the bumps and makes it easy on your body.  It's a tough weekend and a big team effort, strategy will play a big part this year because of fuel consumption. And if the temperature continues in the high 20s it'll be difficult fitness-wise.There will be six to eight good, competitive cars this weekend - HRT, the FPR cars have shown to be reasonably good around here, Garry Rogers cars have been extremely quick on street circuits, Jamie will be quick and the Stone brothers have got three good, competitive cars.I've won here before a couple of times but it's been a little while.

It was the first event for our new line-up with Dane down the back of the pits and former DJR guy Adrian Burgess up front calling the shots with our race engineers.  The boys have commented that they've now got two voices calling out at them.I think the new line-up went quite well.  Roland is there to see that the team is running at the level he wants and I didn't see him too displeased at the end of the day; bar the race results, of course.  He can be quite vocal at times, but I think Adrian took it all in his stride.Adrian was calm and made good, collective decisions with the engineers. I think he knows just what to do to make it all work.  Three of our team have been over in Germany at the Sachs factory checking out developments in shock absorbers and clutches that we use and distribute.There was my race engineer Jeromy, Adam who works on our suspension and Neil who does our customer cars.  It was helpful having face-to-face meetings with the engineers instead of having to deal with issues via emails and pone.It was also handy for them to be able to explain to their engineers about our unique style of race car with its weight and horespower configuration. It's quite different compared with lightweight European race cars as I found out when I raced the Audi R8 in the Bathurst 12-Hour.  One of the key elements is the Sachs clutch we use.I haven't had any issues with it, but our heavy race cars make it difficult to get them off the line so the clutch has to be tailored to those demands.  I see a recent survey says that more than of all Aussie motorists flash their lights to warn oncoming drivers of radar traps.That's something we see quite often out in the country, usually warning of speed cameras rather than police hand-held radar guns.I don't disagree with the practice, but I don't encourage it either. People who habitually speed should be caught.  But warning people of a camera serves to make drivers more alert and pay attention.I think it's particularly helpful in the country where drivers can lose concentration on a boring stretch of road and not realise they have drifted over the speed limit.I'm taking the family off to the beach for some fishing and a bit of a last-minute vacation before the season starts in earnest in Adelaide later this month.  I'm not much ofa fisherman, but it's going to be the last time I get a chance to relax before a busy year ahead with V8 Supercars and the Australasian Safari.

I've always said he retired way too early.  He still has the ability, the speed, attention to detail and is great with car set-up.  That's why we're pairing up again this year for the enduros. He's comfortable now with his situation and his media career but he still loves driving in good cars, so he has said he will continue to compete in the enduros just so long as it's in a competitive car in a competitive team. He didn't get a drive at Abu Dhabi, but we're hoping he will be at our next test day and that there will be a lot more opportunity for him during the year to get behind the wheel of our car and keep his mind sharp and his skills up. We are in a five-week break between Abu Dhabi and our next race at Adelaide, so there is plenty of time for teams to fix the carnage from Abu Dhabi. My car copped a bit of damage, but not a lot, from when I ran into the back of Russell Ingall's car. It was my fault and I apologised and now our teams need to get in and straighten it all out. This weekend I'm down in Melbourne for the opening round of the World Superbikes at Phillip Island as a guest of Suzuki.  Hopefully veteran Aussie Troy Corser can get up there on the top of the podium for the Aussies and finally do it for the BMW team. They had good bike speed toward the end of last year's season, so let's hope they can continue this season.  I saw Troy and his team at Eastern Creek the day before our V8 Supercar public test day last month. To see him lapping the Creek on that bike was pretty impressive.  It was also interesting to see Troy do some starts and listen to all the electronic aids at work to help launch the bike and control wheelies. It sounded just like an F1 car.  Our next team outing is one of our allocated test days. So we'll be out at Queensland Raceway next Thursday  tinkering around with a few things, but nothing major. It will be good to break up the down time between the first two rounds and keep myself and the car in tune.  Other than that, I've got no major plans for the long break other than catching up with the family, the team and some much-needed farm work after a summer of natural disasters.

It certainly wasn't on the pace at Abu Dhabi last weekend.  It caused a lot of confusion and possibly danger when it dribbled along at 40km/h with the field in disarray behind it and cars flying out of the pits at full bore.There has been a lot of talk in the industry about the speed of the safety car and its procedures. We need more than talk. We need to sort this out.From what I can gather Frosty came out in front of the pace car and could have put the whole field a lap down if he'd continued.  However, I think he was taken a bit by surprise that the safety car was beside him and going so slow.Every now and then we have this problem with the safety car getting out of sync with what's going on in pit lane.  With all the pit stops that go on during a safety period, it's often difficult for race control to figure out who's leading the race.So we ended up with all that soap opera about race order and Steve Johnson not letting Jamie in.  It was just another incident in a surprisingly chaotic race meeting on the Yas Marina Circuit.I was a bit excited when I got pole for the first race. It was my first pole since 2009.  It all sort of unravelled from there when I stalled it on the starting line.The track had cooled off from the afternoon and grip had improved.  I used the normal starting procedure, but the soft tyres had so much grip, when I let go of the brake button, it stalled.I ended up seventh for the race, which was all I could salvage after that start and with a car that wasn't quite balanced right.  Jamie and I swapped places for race 2, but it was still an all-TeamVodafone front row.I had a much better start to race two even though I lost a spot to Frosty.  But then the fun and games began.  We were one of the big incidents in the race when I went in too deep under brakes into turn 10 and locked the rear tyres.I turned myself around, lost control and slid into the back of Russell Ingall's car. Unfortunately, his car sustained much heavier damage than mine.I went over and apologised to Russell after the race. Quite obviously he was not too happy as he was having a great run.  It's a little hard to swallow when a crash is not your fault, but we've both been around this game for a long time and agreed it's one of those things that happen every now and then.I apologised and now we'll move on.  We weren't the only incident. There was more carnage in that second race than I've seen in four races at Abu Dhabi.It is amazing that we have a track so wide and smooth with so much run off yet we have so much contact and damage.  In the end, the second race came down to an economy run.We had the best pace of the field, but Courtney had the better fuel strategy.  You can't discount Courtney in the series, but that win was more about strategy than car and tyres. The real standouts from the weekend for me were Alex Davison and Tim Slade.  Keep an eye on these guys this year.Abu Dhabi was the first event for our new line-up with team principal Roland Dane down the back of the pits and Adrian Burgess up front calling the shots with our race engineers.  The boys have commented that they've now got two voices calling out at them.I think the new line-up went quite well.  Roland is there to see that the team is running at the level he wants and I didn't see him too displeased at the end of the day; bar the race results, of course.He can be quite vocal at times, but I think Adrian took it all in his stride.  Adrian was calm and made good, collective decisions with the engineers. I think he knows just what to do to make it all work.At the end of the weekend, we can come away with a lot of positives.  We had the front row of the grid in both races, had a lot of car speed and had some good strategies.  It was just a shame we couldn't completely capitalise on our strengths.We've now got a five-week break before the Clipsal 500 in Adelaide, but I'll be back racing again this weekend.  No, it's not another safari or enduro; I'm racing go-karts in Toowoomba to raise money for flood relief.Like most racers, I started in karts and I always love to get back into them, plus it's for a really good cause.

But the whole Bathurst 12-Hour experience was fantastic and I'm now even more hopeful about my prospects of driving in the Le Mans 24-Hour race.  It would be great to take an Aussie team to France for the race and I'd be more than happy to go with my teammates from the weekend, Warren Luff and Mark Eddy.We had a great Audi team result with a 1-2 finish less than a second part. Our car was right on the pace and set a new GT Production lap record of 2:09 which is a second faster than Tony Quinn in the Porsche GT3 R last year.And we could easily have won the race except for some of the tactical calls our crew made during safety car periods.  It was mainly because of a lack of communication back and forth between the drivers and the German crew who were just getting to know each other, but we also had some bad luck.In one case I was just coming through the Chase when the safety car came out and it was too late to slip down pit lane.  We may not have come first, but I still had a few personal firsts in the race like the first time I'd driven a race car with ABS and stability control and my first rolling start in 20 years.The Audi R8 LMS GT3 race car was great to drive.  It is about 25km/h slower in terminal speed than the V8, but it is the quickest I've ever been across the top of the mountain.  The car is really well balanced with great aero and I held it almost flat across the top.  We dialled out the ABS and stability control at first as a caution, but as the tyres wore down we dialled it back in.With stability control on you could come out of the Cutting and basically just put your foot hard on the throttle and let it do its job.I wouldn't mind if they introduced electronic driver aids like this in V8s. It would make the car easier to drive because it does a lot of the work for you.  The next time I'm at Bathurst could be in an F1 car.Team Vodafone is trying to stitch together a deal where I drive Jenson Button's F1 car and he drives my race car at Bathurst in the lead-up to the Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne next month.  I'm not sure yet if it's 100 per cent confirmed, but it would be a great opportunity.I have never driven an F1 car before. The closest I got was racing Formula 3000 in Europe.  Jamie Whincup drove an F1 at Albert Park in Melbourne last year and has been raving about it ever since.I'd be delighted with the opportunity, but I have concerns about taking it around Bathurst.  There are safer paces to drive an F1 car.Bathurst is a circuit we drivers hold in high respect and I'd be concerned about damaging the car; even just clipping a wing would be quite expensive.Speaking of F1, I'm in Abu Dhabi for the first round of the V8 Supercar season this weekend and by the time you read this we should have visited Ferrari World.It wasn't finished when we were here last year and I want to ride the roller coaster that goes from 0-250km/h in five seconds. It's supposed to be the same acceleration as an F1.Team Vodafone blitzed the field here last year with a brand new car and we're keen to do it again, but there will be one major difference. This time the whole event is being run on soft tyres.That's practice, qualifying and two races on softs.  It's an unbelievable smooth, fast and flowing circuit but the sand drifts across and acts like sandpaper rubbing the tyres away quickly.It will be a real challenge to get the tyres to last and extract the best out of them.  Tactics will be important because of the big speed differential between worn and fresh rubber.That should lead to lots of passing opportunities, plus the fact that the extra grip of a new soft tyre means you can dive in under brakes and carry more corner speed to pass.Interestingly we qualify in the heat of the day and race at night, so the race pace will potentially be the same as, or faster than, qualifying.  Lap records should tumble.My race engineer, Jeromy Moore, was at the Bathurst 12-Hour and he saw the way they stiffened that car up; we might do the same on our car for this circuit with the combination of soft tyres and a smooth track.

Obviously I was very happy beating Skaifey's 1999 record by about half a second and coming out first thing with a car that still has plenty of speed from last year. But that was Eastern Creek and we don't race there, so a lot of the set-up work could be wasted and things we learnt may not be able to be applied to other tracks.We believed a base set-up in the car would work, which proved to be 95 per cent right, but there are always areas you can improve.My race engineer, Jeromy Moore, and I are working as good as ever and it looks like the changes of personnel in the team such as my new number one mechanic, Nick from DJR, are also working well.On the other side of the garage, Jamie (Whincup) was a bit disappointed with his car speed, finishing up 12th in the times. Even further back was James Courtney but that's no surprise. It'll take time for him and Will Davison to settle into their new teams, but they will still be forces to reckon with this year.The new concept of a mandatory pre-season test day was an outstanding success with a big crowd turning out. Not sure of the crowd numbers, but it's a lot more than footy teams get along for practice.We've struggled in recent years to get a fan base for Eastern Creek race meetings. While it doesn't look like we'll be returning for races anytime in the future, it was still good to hear that millions of dollars is being invested into the Sydney circuit.Most people know I am a big supporter of circuits for a multitude of uses, especially driver training. Eastern Creek is going to get a lot more facilities as well as four different tracks on two independent circuits. That's fantastic news for driver education and road safety.Eastern Creek is a fantastic facility and it's in the right place, especially since Sydney lost Oran Park.I hear that the boss of Subaru in Australia has claimed motorsport in Australia is irrelevant to our market and of no interest to youth. While there's always room for new motorsport categories, I disagree that V8s are irrelevant. The category has established itself over many years as an iconic series, not just something representative of what motorists are driving.You can invent a new category but you can't invent history and that's what V8s has in spades. And if you look at our fan base our demographic covers a huge age range. I'm sure Subaru would be happy to be a part of it if the company can come up with a vehicle to race when we introduce the car of the future.My immediate future is driving the Audi R8 in the Bathurst 12-Hour this weekend. I'm not nervous about it, even though it's a completely new team and the first time I've driven a race car with paddle shifts, ABS, stability control, left-hand drive and indicators.I had Audi Sport Team Joest email me the cockpit layout, switches and controls and I've been studying them. The first thing I have to do is learn the car, the team and most importantly figure out what I'll do about ABS and stability control. I'll have to get my head around how they work and how sensitive they are, but I'll probably start by turning them off.Some people have asked how I'm able to drive an Audi, but they don't realise I'm not contracted to Holden. I'm contracted to Triple 8, so there are no issues. It's actually the first time in my career I've had no direct connection with a manufacturer.I don't know whether this will lead to anything with Audi, but I do hope it leads to competing in the Le Mans 24-Hour race. The June race doesn't clash with any V8 round, so there's always a chance for this year. I'd love to think that if not this year then definitely next year.There has been a lot of talk about selling off half of the V8 Supercars Australia. It's an interesting move and I'll keep a close eye on how it develops. While there is a real danger of it being sold to foreign interests, HRT, FPR and Triple 8 are all foreign owned and that hasn't done any damage to the series.

I hadn't driven with Mark Skaife for 10 years when we paired up last year for the enduros and what a pairing that turned out to be, winning Philip Island and Bathurst.  Now we're back again for the enduros this year, but with a distinct advantage of time.Last year we announced the pairing much later in the season, giving us little time to prepare.  This year we'll be much better prepared and with Skaifey at every round for his TV commentary duties, we'll be able to get him in the car much more often.That means we'll be able to keep him sharp and on the pace which is important because each year the competition gets tougher and tougher.Also, Skaifey should be able to help us develop the car throughout the season.I'm absolutely delighted. Skaifey was always my first choice as co-driver.  He's also rapt and looking forward to the challenge.He says the surroundings are familiar and the car is the one he wants to be in.  Of course, the only problem is that with him on six Bathurst wins and me on five, if we keep drving together on the mountain, I'll never be able to catch up or beat his wins.But hey, I wouldn't be too disappointed if after Bathurst this year I've got six and he's got seven.  We have a whole new team structure and some new people this season so it'll be interesting to see how the new team dynamic shapes up.Our first test will be at Eastern Creek in Sydney this weekend when all the V8 Supercar teams will be present for a shake-down and fan day.  It should be a very special occasion, even though we don't race at Eastern Creek in the V8 calendar. That should make it a neutral base for all the teams, no matter what manufacturer or where the team is based.We have to use the hard tyre up until lunch time, then we swap to the soft tyre in the arvo so we get an opportunity to test both set-ups on the one track.  Because we are returning this year with basically the same car as last year plus a few minor tweaks made over the break, we will just be sorting out the plumbing and working on any problems that arise.There won't be any testing for lap times or speed as the track is not relevant for that.  Apart from giving the teams a chance to set up their cars for the year, it will also be a great opportunity for the fans to see all the new liveries and get some autographs.The event should attract a huge crowd as we don't get to Sydney on a permanent track throughout the year.  I'll also be making a mental note of who is driving what and the new colour schemes so I can pick them out in the rearview mirror.I'm sure the drivers will also be happy to get in behind the wheel again after a long break and shake out some of the cobwebs before we get to Abu Dhabi in a couple of weeks.In the meantime, I'll get another hit-out in the driver's seat when I compete in an Audi R8 in the Bathurst 12-Hour.  I couldn't be in a better team. The Audi Sport Team Joest is the most successful Le Mans team of all time with 11 wins under its belt.Even though the car will take some getting used to, at least I know the track very well and should make a good impression.  Could it lead to something else? Who knows?This is just a first step for me and we'll see what we can deliver.  Hopefully I can forge a relationship with the team that could lead to something bigger and better like a Le Mans 24 Hour race.Roland was good enough to allow my race engineer, Jeromy to come down to observe the race.  It will be a great learning experience for him to see how one of the world's greatest motorsport teams operates.He'll also be able a help to me in the sense that it will be a familiar face and he might also be able to interpret any problems I have with car setup to the other engineers.  He may also be able to give them an insight into how we operate.I spent Australia Day picking up my neighbour and motocross training partner, George Knight, from the hospital after he crashed his dirt bike.  It's a good sport to help me train for racing, but his crash is a warning. Crashing is one of those things I'm always very conscious of.I always thought it would be me having an accident not him with all his experience.  I wish him a speedy recovery as well as V8 driver Jason Richards.I got an email to say he's seeking treatment in the US for his cancer.  You hear about people getting cancer, but when you get someone fairly close to you in the industry it hits home pretty hard.  I'd love to see him back on track for the sake of his family, but also because he's a great competitor.

I was away in Melbourne with the family visiting dad when the floods hit.  We got back last Saturday and ever since I"ve been busy cleaning up the mess, helping neighbours transport vehicles over washed-out gullies and bridges and getting petrol. The town has nearly run out what with all the generators running to keep power going.It's been a sad start to the year.  V8 Supercar drivers, race teams and staff have helped with various methods of raising money for the victims, many of which are avid V8 supporters. Team Vodafone is auctioning off some hot laps with me and Jamie Whincup.  It was also great to see a lot of other sporting codes contributing manpower to the clean-up and keeping the morale up.But it was devastating to hear that Peter Champion's museum of Brock race cars at Yeppoon is closing because of what the floods have done to the state's tourism industry.Peter's done a wonderful job of resurrecting Brocky's cars and historical memorabilia and displaying them in a single area. I spoke to him at Homebush at the last round and he was thinking about relocating. I certainly hope so.From a team perspective, the floods have had very little impact. We had no flood waters at the Banyo workshop and minimal disruption to staff.Our first outing is at Eastern Creek next weekend for the mandatory test day for all V8 teams.  It's a track I love and it's a real shame we don't have it on our race calendar any more.However, that makes it the perfect neutral place for al the teams to test and for the fans to have their first look at the new livery cars and driver line-ups.  Usually there's a bit of change with drivers moving between teams in the off-season, but this time there has been a team merry-go-round, mainly among race engineers.Happily, I still have Jeremy Moore as my race engineer and while some teams like DJR have been broken up, ours has stayed together. We've even expanded with Williams F1 engineer John Russell now heading up the team.I can understand race engineers changing teams with the drivers, because you develop an important relationship and bond.  If I was to move, I would want to take my engineer with me just like Valentino Rossi did with Jeremy Burgess.It's like a marriage. You develop an understanding of what you want from the car and how you translate that to your engineer and how he translates that into changes on the car.At the moment most of my planning is going into the Bathurst 12 Hour race next month.  Unfortunately, we don't get a chance to test  the Audi R8 race car before the event, so it will be a matter of going to Bathurst - which we know fairly well - and trying to get to know the car and its traits as quickly as possible.The car will have different aero to what I'm used to in a V8 Supercar and a totally different feel being mid-engined, so there is a lot to get my head around very quickly.  We're lucky to have co-drivers like Warren Luff and Mark Eddy who are also veterans of the Mt Panorama circuit, but it remains to be seen how quickly the German team come to terms with the mountain.Still, I reckon we're in with a good chance to challenge the favoured Porsche 911s for outright honours.  I didn't get to watch any of the recent Dakar Rally, but after competing in and winning my first Australasian Safari I was obviously very interested and kept up with progress on line.My Safari co-driver, Kees Weel, also kept me up to date with the rally because his company supplied the radiators to the VW Touraegs that finished 1-2-3.  I heard about Bruce Garland dropping out with broken vertebrae. That's a shame as he was running quite strongly and had a really good shot at the top 10.Hopefully one day I'll get to compete in the Dakar, but I was quite happy to have a break over Christmas.  It's been the first Christmas in a few years the whole Triple Eight team has been able to shut up shop, have a break and not build a race car.We're all heading back into HQ this week to go through the changes we've made and Jeromy tells me the car has more finesse.  Because we've had so few changes, the team is much better prepared than we were this time last year when we were scrambling to finish off the new Holdens.Having said that we hit the ground running with a 1-2 in the first race in the Mid East, so we really can't do much better than that this year.

The original word was that he was going to stay with Ford and had a handshake deal to go to FPR.  Now he's changed his views and apparently is signing up with HRT.  I suppose it's not called the silly season for nothing.I've been there and done that myself, so I can't say I blame him.  He's naturally looking for the best opportunities for himself and his sponsors to win races next year and he feels he has to look outside his team because of the internal strife they've had this year.There are a few other movements around the pits, notably Will Davison apparently moving from HRT to FPR.  For both Will and James it will be interesting times swapping manufacturers, but it won't be anything like the controversy that I've experienced in my two switches.There are a lot more manufacturer swaps among drivers these days and they will become more common as drivers look for the best opportunities and as more and more fans follow a driver or team, rather than a manufacturer.The season couldn't have finished in more bizarre circumstances with the two red flags at Sandown in the second-last round and then the top five crashing out in similar circumstances in last Saturday's race.Some people say that race should have been red flagged like the Sandown races and that might have yielded a completely different championship result.  But I think it was the right decision to allow the race to continue under a safety car and then re-start.They managed to clear the circuit very quickly, the track wasn't blocked and there were no safety issues, so there was no need for a red flag.The crashes happened because teams and drivers made the wrong decision on tyres. Bright and a few others made the right decision and they benefited, so good luck to them.I had radioed my race engineer Jeromy (CORRECT) Moore and said we should get the wets ready but I didn't imagine it was that wet at the time.  The previous lap the track hadn't changed condition, but on the restart the rain had come down at that corner and it was like a river.I nudged the wall but got around the corner without any major damage only to find James stopped right in front of me with no way to avoid him.  I aquaplaned right up the back of him but it didn't do as much damage to his car as mine because the back of these cars is basically cosmetic, not structural.On Monday night we had our annual awards night in Sydney. It's the one time each year I actually get dressed up!  But it was quite strange this year for me because it was the first one I've been to without my wife, Nat. She's been recovering from an illness and couldn't make it.It was still a great night and our engineers gave an inspiring speech when they accepted the best team award.I've also thought about my own choices for awards.  Best and fairest driver award went naturally to James, but I would split the award into fairest which would probably be Frosty and best which would be my teammate Jamie just going by his race wins and pole positions.We won the best team award and I think we deserved it from then number of wins, poles and enduro round victories.  Most improved driver and team award went to Paul Dumbrell and his team which is fair enough, but I'd also like to recognise Alex Davison, Tim Slade and Tony D'Alberto and their teams.The best event award went to Townsville which I thought put on a great show. I think an award should also go for the best race and that should be the last race at the Gold Coast. The closing stages with Shane van Gisbergen chasing Jamie were incredibly exciting.I'd also like to give a best track award to Abu Dhabi for the great facilities.  If I could give an award for best passing move it would be James's move on Jamie at Winton around the outside on turn two.Biggest crash award would have to go to Fabian Coulthard for his massive roll at Bathurst. It was amazing to see him get out and walk away from that crash. It was a testament to the safety in our industry.  And finally I'd give an award to the stewards. Normally we bag them for being inconsistent but largely they did a pretty good job this year.For me, it was one of my best years yet, despite finishing fourth in the championship.  I've achieved what I wanted to achieve this year winning both of the enduros and staying in championship contention for much of the season, while winning the Australasian Safari was an unexpected bonus.I didn't expect to have an opportunity to race in the Safari, let alone win it.  For me the season has finished on a higher note than it began.If you look back on the whole year, it shows I need to be more consistent at the beginning. There were no problems with the back half of the season, only some bad luck.  Also, there have been occasions where we could have finished the race with some points instead of not finishing at all. That certainly hurt my chances.This is my last column after a very long and hectic year that started in February in the Mid East and finished just before Christmas in Sydney and included the Safari and the release of my first book.So over the Christmas holidays I'm planning on doing absolutely nothing.  Basically I'm going to sit at home and spend some time with family and friends, especially Nat who I haven't been able to spend near as much time with over the past few months as I would have liked.I hope all my fans also get to spend some valuable time these holidays with the people they love.

But I won't play dirty and there are no team orders as such.  There has been no discussion yet about team orders or strategies. We'll have to see where Jamie, James, Frosty and I are positioned after qualifying on the Saturday before we even think about that. No doubt we'll cross that bridge when we come to it, but there won't be any orders to play dirty.  I'll do the best I can to help Jamie, but I won't change my style for this weekend.  I will attack James as hard as always and if he leaves a door open I'll put my nose up the inside and have a go. But I won't knock him out of the way. I know how gut wrenching that is after having it done to me at Phillip Island in 2006.  You want to win a championship honestly and on your own merits and not have it handed to you by other people's mistakes. Jamie is in a position where he has nothing to lose and will come out firing this weekend.  He's been doing all the usual PR stuff with me this week in the lead-up to the finale at Homebush, but he's also been very focussed on overtaking James to win the title. Jamie was pretty confident coming out of Sandown where the car was working well for him, but the red flags didn't help our cause.  The media pressure is on both of them, but I think Jamie will handle it a bit better because he's been here before. However, in the past two years he's come into this weekend leading, not chasing, so he'll have a different mindset this time.  I think the weather will play a big part in the two 250km races. It's been raining pretty heavily all week and is expected to continue up to and maybe into the weekend. Rain always mixes things up.  The wet conditions will mean a lot more strategy over the weekend with decisions on wet tyres and slicks.  We know what the track is like in the dry, but we have no idea of its grip levels and characteristics in the wet. For one thing, pit lane is downhill and it might be a bit awkward pulling up correctly in your pit bay.  The surface looks grippy in some sections, but dubious in other sections where we run across some old bitumen. I can only speak for myself, but the idea is to stay off the concrete walls. That will be difficult for Jamie and James who will be in a pretty heated battle to maintain track position.  Courtney won the Sunday race last year and the DJR cars go well in the wet so he will be confident.  But Jamie has also done well in the wet and while he didn't have the speed he wanted last year, he's pretty confident about his car speed now. The team PR machines have been running hot in the lead-up to our series finale.  One thing Team Vodafone has done to get a bit of interest going its to launch a Australia's first V8 fragrance. It's called Eau De Engine, but it should be called Eau De Pit Crew Sweat.  You can't buy it. It's actually just a joke and a marketing tool to raise some interest.  We've made 200 bottles of the fragrance, done some video and photos and we're giving it away to media and VIPs. The idea is you spray it on and smell like a Supercar pit garage with oil and rubber odours. It's quite disgusting. It makes you smell like a grease monkey.  I've also spent a lot of time signing my book which has just gone into its second printing. When I wrote it I didn't know how successful it was going to be. While I'm not yet prepared to write my autobiography yet because I still have a lot of years of racing yet and hopefully some other career in motorsport after that, I can now see that there might be another book or two in me. I could start with a follow up that includes this year's enduro wins at Phillip Island and Bathurst or delve back in history more and do my early days of racing.  There's still a lot to be said about my first shift of allegiances from Holden to Ford.