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MANAMA - There was massive drama a day before racing even started in Bahrain when four V8 Supercars were damaged after the truck transporting them was involved in an accident.
A flat top truck carrying the Commodores of Holden Racing Team's Mark Skaife and Todd Kelly as well as the Falcons of Ford Performance Racing's Mark Winterbottom and Steven Richards, was forced to brake heavily, causing the cars to shift and make contact with each other.
Two of the cars slipped off the back with the cars of Skaife and Winterbottom suffering the most damage.
"This isn't the way you want to start a weekend, repairing a car, especially after my team has worked its bum off getting it ready after Indy," said Skaife, who crashed in the final race of the Gold Coast round two Sundays ago.
"I suppose these things happen with the different logistics required (for a flyaway round). From all accounts, the damage isn't too bad so Team Red will be ready when the green flag drops."
The incident happened at about 9am local time when the carrier was forced to come to a sudden stop on the Shaikh Khalifa Bin Salman Highway - the main stretch of road from Bahrain International Airport to the Bahrain International Circuit.
Another vehicle had pulled out in front of the carrier, causing the accident which caused major traffic delays in the area.
Winterbottom's car suffered substantial panel damage, but he too was expected to line up for tomorrow's opening practice session at the Desert 400.
Winterbottom has had a terrible run of luck, crashing out when he led Bathurst before being stripped of his pole position at Surfers Paradise after the team was found guilty of a technical breach.
"We said it it couldn't get worse and then we get shunted before it started," a frustrated Winterbottom said.
"What can you do? We didn't even get in the car so you can't even blame anyone.
"We'll fix it and it'll be ok. It's just hard for the guys because they have to go back to work before we even start."
- AAP
