Photo: V8 Supercars

First Nissan win in Australia since 1992 “a dream” for Moffat

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James Moffat claimed Nissan’s first touring car victory in Australia at Winton this weekend since Mark Skaife crossed the line first with the Nissan Skyline R32 in 1992.
“What a great day for everyone at Nissan Motorsport, Norton and Toshiba. It’s all a bit of a dream at the moment. I’ve worked hard to get to this point in my career and to breakthrough for my first win means a lot,” said Moffat.

The Nissan Norton 360 Racing team showed strong form already in testing at Winton, the test track of the team, further confirming it in qualifying with second and third on the grid for team mates Michael Caruso and Moffat.
“I really tried to come into this event without many expectations. Naturally, if we were going to go well at any circuit, this was the one. It’s our test track, and I was very happy with the way we ended our test day, but I wasn’t getting carried away, because we know how finicky this track can be,” said Moffat.
“We knew we’d come into this event looking better than we have in the previous rounds. We’re all wise enough to know that this circuit has no advantage for the cars with big horsepower. The Nissans have been handling really well and we’ve shown that throughout the year,” said Caruso.

The first 60/60 Super Sprint race saw Moffat getting up in to the lead after the retirement of pole sitter Jamie Whincup and Caruso securing a Nissan 1-2 with second place.
“This result speaks for itself. We’re one-two in both races. Sure, Jamie had a bit of bad luck, but both of us proved we had great pace,” said Moffat.

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The two other races of the weekend at Winton were tougher for the Nissan Altima drivers, with none of them qualifying inside the top ten for the second race and Moffat being the best scoring driver in the final race with ninth in qualifying and eighth position in the race.
“Saturday was a great day for us all, and to be one-two with Michael made it even more special, but today (Sunday), we missed it in qualifying by outsmarting ourselves. We went the wrong way in the first qualifying and ended up in 25th. We went back to the way the car was yesterday and ended up ninth (in qualifying), so that was a huge improvement,” said Moffat.

Moffat has jumped to 13th position in the championship, right ahead of manufacturer colleague Rick Kelly.