Surfers Paradise, Queensland, October 27, 2024  – Saturday was a successful day for the Mustang runners at the Gold Coast 500 as Cam Waters added another win to Ford's 2024 championship tally, leading home his Tickford teammate Thomas Randle for an impressive 1-2 finish.

Youngster Matt Payne added fourth in his Mustang with Grove Racing, while Richie Stanaway and Anton De Pasquale also finished inside the Top 10 at the conclusion of the weekend’s opening 250-kilometre stoush.

Sunday was tougher as the mean streets on the glitter strip took a heavy toll on the Ford fighters, with damage up and down the garages.

Waters was first again of the Mustang runners but the best he could manage was fourth place after a heavy hit on his car’s left-front corner, with Randle again following him home in team formation and Richie Stanaway chipping in with eighth for Grove.

The Mustangs were rapid through practice and qualifying on both days, with at least one driver from each team appearing in the front half of the field at time, but changing weather conditions and poor starting spots on Sunday cost them dearly.

“It’s a super-tough track. You have to bring you’re A-Game,” said Payne.

Meanwhile, Waters had high praise for his Tickford team following his win on Saturday.

“It’s the best car I've had here,” he said.

But the Mustang runners are already looking ahead to the final round of the 2024 Supercars championship, at another street race in Adelaide, as the teams battle for Blue Oval bragging rights.

Tickford is currently best of the Ford horde, ahead of Walkinshaw Andretti United and Grove Racing, as Mustang teams sit solidly in second through fifth spots in the teams’ championship.

The 2024 Supercars championship reaches its climax with the Adelaide 500 in South Australia from November 15-17.

Top Ford Race Results

Race 1

Top 10 Shootout:

Cam Waters – 1^st

Richie Stanaway – 2^nd

Chaz Mostert – 3^rd

Thomas Randle – 5^th

James Courtney – 7^th

Matt Payne – 9^th

Race:

Cam Waters – 1^st

Thomas Randle – 2^nd

Matt Payne – 4^th

Richie Stanaway – 9^th

Anton De Pasquale – 10^th

Race 2

Top 10 Shootout:

Chaz Mostert – 4^th

Matt Payne – 6^th

Cam Waters – 7^th

Richie Stanaway – 8^th

Ryan Wood – 10^th

Race:

Cam Waters – 4^th

Thomas Randle – 5^th

Richie Stanaway – 8^th  

Matt Payne – 9^th

Team Owner/Principal Quotes

Rod Nash, Tickford Racing

• “Awesome stuff. It was a great weekend. And it was great to get a big win for Ford.
• “It doesn’t get any better than the 1-2 finish on Saturday. Both of our drivers delivered, with Cam Waters out in front and Thomas Randle racing up the grid.
• “Fourth and fifth on Sunday, and the first Mustangs home, consolidated where we sit in the championship standings.
• “We didn’t get things quite where we wanted for qualifying on Sunday, but Tom was solid and the team got creative with the strategy for him.”

Carl Faux, Walkinshaw Andretti United 

• “We’re smiling. Everyone is super happy with Chaz Mostert’s performance all weekend, and Sam Scaffidi and Terry Kerr in the garage did an amazing job.
• “Things were looking good with Chaz on Saturday, but then we had a sensor failure on the gearbox that meant we lost 28 seconds in the pitstop. Maybe Supercars needs to look at a failsafe to stop that happening again.
• “So, we missed out on a surfboard trophy on Saturday, then on Sunday another one went begging with a fuelling problem. There was nothing wrong with the engineering and strategy.
• “Ryan Wood had splendid one-lap pace but is having to learn from his mistakes. He is getting more and more experience and will eventually nail it.”

David Cauchi, Grove Racing

• “There are plenty of positives from our qualifying pace but the race pace wasn’t good enough this weekend. We need to go back and look at that, to find out where we need to improve.
• “So, we’ve got work to do, but we grabbed a good haul of points and we’re back to fourth place in the teams’ championship and that is good for us.
• “Looking to Adelaide, it’s another street circuit where we’ve had success in the past, so we're looking forward to finishing the season strong.”

Dr Ryan Story, Dick Johnson Racing

• “We always come to our home race with high hopes but this just wasn’t our weekend.
• “We didn’t have the one-lap speed to start at the pointy end and when you’re back in the pack things are never going to be easy. It’s chaos.
• “We’ve got one last chance to do something special at the Adelaide 500, so we’ll be doing everything possible to finish 2024 on a high.”

Tim Blanchard, Blanchard Racing Team

• “Not a bad weekend. We’ve definitely got a few positives to take away this time.
• “We had a bit more pace in James Courtney’s car on the weekend and it was great to make the Shootout on Sunday. So the car pace was a step forward, but we got caught up in a couple of incidents.
• “It’s been pretty tough season, so at this stage we’re already focussed on building the team and getting momentum to take us into next year.”

Ford Driver Championship Standings

3. Chaz Mostert,  2463 points

4. Cam Waters, 2344

5. Matt Payne, 1863

7. Thomas Randle, 1792

9. Will Davison, 1623

11. Anton De Pasquale, 1603

16. Richie Stanaway, 1447

17. Ryan Wood, 1366

21. James Courtney, 1142

24. Aaron Love, 943