Whincup’s Bathurst call in past for boss

It was the big talking point of the Bathurst 1000 but Red Bull Racing’s Roland Dane says all is well between him and star V8 Supercars driver Jamie Whincup.

Team owner Dane was livid after Whincup ignored orders to pit at Bathurst and passed a safety car, relegating him from second to the back of the field with 20 laps left in this month’s great race and he finished 18th.

Compounding the error, Whincup also ignored team orders last year at Bathurst and ran out of fuel on the 161st and final lap while leading.

Dane says while there was obvious disappointment, he and Whincup’s engineer Mark Dutton had cleared the air with the six-time champion and were moving forward at this weekend’s Gold Coast 600.

“To be honest, I can see some of it, as can Mark, from Jamie’s point of view,” Dane said.

“There was a couple of things that were not done correctly from a race management point of view.

“The safety car deployment wasn’t ideal in where it was positioned, the green lights were on a lot longer than they should have been and the safety car boards and flags were missing at the critical point of time where Jamie would have seen them.”

Earlier in the week Whincup said he was frustrated at being portrayed as a “villain” following the Bathurst bungle.

Dane said while it was clear the team would have preferred Whincup to have obeyed the pit-in call, it was time to move on.

“We would have still liked him to come in when we asked him to but there are mitigating circumstances around the whole thing,” he said.

“Onward with the business here.”

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