Nissan Shows Improvement In V8 Supercars

 2013 ended up being a lost year in terms of ROI for Nissan Motorsports in Australia and their V8 Supercars effort.  The four cars they fielded in '13 were viewed as underpowered and not possessing a proper aero package.

The offseason saw a retooling of the engine as well as an entirely new aero design in hopes of getting the Nissan Altimas to the front of the V8 Supercars field.

The first event of the V8 Supercars season was this past weekend at the Clipsal 500 in Adelaide, Australia.  The V8 Supercars racing weekend is quite a bit different that say NASCAR here in the States.  There are actually three races on the weekend.  Two shorter races on Saturday and one long race on Sunday.

The changes Nissan made in the offseason seem to have paid off.  While not yet in the winners circle, Nissan certainly saw an improvement in their performance and produced some solid, consistent finishes.  Split between the Jack Daniels and Norton teams, Rick Kelly seems to be the #1 driver of the bunch finishing 6th, 11th and 5th in the three races and sits in 4th for the overall standings after the weekend.  Additional encouragement comes from the fact that the four cars saw only a single DNF on the weekend with that coming in the last race while Rick's Nissan teammates put together a number of other top 10 finishes as well.

Its not perfect, but its a lot better so far than 2013.

http://www.v8supercars.com.au/