After the disappointment of Phillip Island, the Equity-One Motorsport team of Dean Koutsoumidis and James Winslow have put their Trophy Class championship assault back on track after three strong results on the streets of Townsville, the first time either driver had seen the popular V8 Supercar venue.

It had been a busy six weeks since the frustrations of Phillip Island where team-boss Koutsoumidis was unceremoniously dumped off the circuit mid-race and hard into an earth embankment necessitating a fairly major front-end rebuild.

“The Melbourne Performance Centre [MPC] team though did a sterling job and had the car ready to go inside a month,” Koutsoumidis explained. “We weren’t able to shake the car down before Townsville, but it was faultless in opening practice.”

Just two weeks after the Phillip Island round, Koutsoumidis joined Winslow at the 24 Hours of Le Mans for his team-mate’s prototype debut in the LMP2 class. Despite a string of challenges including technical and mechanical issues and a crash by his team-mate which limited qualifying time, Winslow drove brilliantly to be one of the fastest LMP2 cars on track during his opening session in the car, but sadly another crash in changeable conditions eliminated the car just after the two hour mark.

Winslow though had done enough to attract the eye of rival teams and the two-time Australian Formula 3 champion was quickly on the radar for a number of top teams as planning begins ahead of the 2015 event.

Whilst clearly pumped to have shown just how quick he is on a big international stage, Winslow’s focus soon returned to Australian GT and on gaining some more valuable points on the teams Trophy class rivals.

“Le Mans was exceptional, and I’m already planning next year, but right now, Dean and I have a championship to win,” he admitted matter-of-factly.

The opening round winners were quick through practice, but the opening session was held on a slippery ‘green’ surface which gave no real indication of their true pace, however by session two they were sixth and leading Trophy class car.

Qualifying saw Koutsoumidis kick off the session on new rubber, before Winslow jumped back behind the wheel at the end of the session, the Englishman shaving almost a full second off his practice best to claim a fourth row start, two spots back from team-mate Nathan Antunes in the Rod Salmon Audi.. it was game on!

“I didn’t get a perfect run in the end,” Winslow admitted afterwards. “There’s a lot of traffic out there – I was up four tenths on Antunes through the first couple of sectors, but then hit traffic. We’re in a good position strategically though having to stop five seconds less than Rod and Nathan during our compulsory pit stop [CPS], so as along as we keep them in sight, we’ll be right there.”

Koutsoumidis started the opening race on Saturday morning, the 2012 Trophy class champion hanging on to Salmon early despite dropping a position to Phillip Island round winner Theo Koundouris.

As the compulsory pit stop window opened, Koutsoumidis pitted to hand over to Winslow, whilst much of the field stayed out, ultimately taking advantage of a Safety Car period for MPC team-mates John Magro and Steve McLaughlan who had made heavy contact with the wall at turn one on lap 18.

By the time the Safety Car had picked up the leader towards the end of the 13-minute interlude, the #71 Equity-One Audi was a lap down on the leader, negating any chance of a battle for position with their Trophy class rivals, Winslow ultimately crossing the line in tenth place.

“That was frustrating, but what can you do,” Koutsoumidis lamented post-race.

Winslow was back behind the wheel in the cool morning air of Sunday morning’s second race, and quickly through onto the tail of Antunes in the Skwirk Audi, pitting from fifth position to hand over to Koutsoumidis who stayed out of trouble to record an eighth placed finish and second in class. Whilst there was no victory, Winslow did set the fastest Trophy class lap, and the sixth fastest lap of the race.

“The pace was good, but Dean got caught up in traffic and played it safe and clean because at the end of the day, the only way to build a championship is to score points regularly, so there was nothing to gain by risking the car and a potential DNF,” Winslow explained.

Koutsoumidis started the final 40-minute race, but he was quickly swamped off the line as some of the outright cars came through the field from the rear after suffering failures during race two. He held on to the tail of the top ten before pitting to hand the car back to Winslow, and whilst he was again one of the fastest cars on the circuit and managed to pull Antunes in ahead of him across the closing laps of the race, the Equity One team was once more forced to settle for second in class and eighth outright.

“We wanted the win, no question,” Koutsoumidis admitted post-event. “But we also needed some solid points to put our championship back on track after the disappointment of Phillip Island, and we achieved just that.

“There’s still a long way to go, and we’re heading to some circuits where we know we’re quick – Eastern Creek and Sandown where we’ve won already – so we’ve just got to keep pushing. James drove brilliantly again, and the car was flawless, so we’ll press on and take the fight to our team-mates and rivals in Sydney!”

The fourth round of the championship will be held at Sydney Motorsport Park on 22-24 August, again alongside the V8 Supercars with two 30-minute races, and one 60-minute race.