Joey Mawson wins action-packed S5000 opener at Albert Park
Joey Mawson has held off a spirited last-lap challenge from Aaron Cameron to win the S5000 opener at Albert Park.
Joey Mawson leads the S5000 field off the start at Albert Park. (ARG)
Mawson won by under half a second over Cameron with Zane Goddard completing the podium.
"It was good to finally put on a show for S5000," said Mawson.
"It was a bit in tense from my seat, but it was a good, clean fight,” said Mawson.
Mawson started on pole and held the racing line at the start to maintain the lead.
James Golding made an early challenge for the lead but ran wide on turn three.
As drivers came into the new high-speed section it was turn nine that proved the real issue, as the field struggled to pull up their V8 equipment on the new layout.
Golding spun across the grass but was able to keep his S5000 pointing in the right direction when he returned to the track in twelfth place.
Mawson held a confident lead of 2.5 seconds until lap seven of the nine lap race, when he lost a second of lap time to the chasing Cameron.
"The front wing flag and element came off on the second last lap, and to be honest, I didn’t know how much to push in the medium to high speed corners."
Mawson locked up heavily into turn three and a thrilling final lap battle was underway for the lead.
Cameron mounted a last-second challenge in turn thirteen but was unable to get past, with Mawson taking the race victory.
"On the last lap, Aaron was on me and it was super intense to defend my position and keep the lead without risk.
"But full credit to him, it was clean and fair fight and it’s great to come away within the win."
The opening race of the S5000 weekend was a dramatic test of the new Albert Park layout and a great demonstration for the fledgling category.
“It’s great for the category to finally be in front of the F1 show,” said Mawson.
“There’s quite a bit of emphasis on us because we are the only other single seater category."
"We are the most comparable to F1, so there’s lots of eyes on our show."
“And everyone has been behaving."
"There’s been no safety cars, no red flags and it’s been really good for everyone so far."
“The new track layout is really well suited for these cars too."
"Really fun."
"You can really tell how capable these cars are on the new sections of track."
"It’s great.”
Shae Davies finished in tenth before being handed a thirty-second penalty for a collision with Blake Purdie.
The Nulon Australian Drivers' Championship returns for two more races at the Australian Grand Prix across Saturday and Sunday.
Nulon S5000 Australian Drivers’ Championship Round 3 - Race 1 Result
Joey Mawson
Aaron Cameron
Zane Goddard
Nathan Herne
Tim Macrow
Cooper Webster
Kaleb Ngatoa
James Golding
Ben Bargwanna
Adam Garwood
Conor Somers
Sebastien Amadio
Matt Chahda
Blake Purdie
Shae Davies
James Davison - DNF
