Triple Eight had not stood on a Supercars podium for seven races, its longest drought since the end of 2006. Broc Feeney ended it at Wanneroo on Saturday evening with a move that owed as much to timing as to pace.
Feeney started Race 24 of the Perth Super 440 alongside championship leader Matt Payne, who had swept both Saturday poles. For the first stint he had nothing for the Grove Racing driver, and spent his time fending off Kai Allen and Thomas Randle instead. Payne pulled clear.
The race turned after the compulsory stops. Payne rejoined ahead but caught traffic at Wanneroo's awkward pit entry, baulked behind Aaron Cameron as the Blanchard Racing driver came in for his own stop. Feeney went down the inside on the run to Turn 1 at the end of Lap 27 and was gone, taking his 31st career win by 1.5833s.
"It's probably just more of a relief to be honest," Feeney said on the broadcast. "We've been searching a bit, the last couple of rounds have been really tough and it's certainly not due to a lack of effort. This team has been putting in so much hard work, so this is absolutely for everyone here at Red Bull Ampol Racing and Triple Eight Race Engineering."
It was his fifth win of 2026 but his first since Tasmania in May, and he did not expect it to come this weekend.
"I didn't expect to be sitting here. Matt was in a league of his own, especially in that first stint," Feeney said. "I felt like I was really struggling there, came in for the pit stop, put a different set of tyres on and the thing came alive. So had heaps more speed, felt super comfortable again in the car."
"I've obviously been vocal about trying to get back to the front and it's been hard though, because you're trying to give the team a direction, one race it's this, the other race it's that," he said. "A lot of the time they have been fixing what I've been saying, but then it causes more problems. They've done a really good job this weekend."
Payne was left to rue circumstance rather than speed. He had the quicker car for the first half of the race and knew what was coming once he lost track position.
"Oh, absolutely. I would've done the same thing if I was in his position," Payne said when asked whether he expected Feeney to pounce. "It just was a shame. I think we just got caught out with lapped traffic at absolutely the wrong time. I don't really think there was anything I could've done."
"If I passed that car up the inside, he would've switched me back. So, what can you do, you know? Just some things don't go your way, and then got caught behind him for the rest of that and just understeered too much. Unfortunate, but still great points."
The frustration had been audible on the radio, where Payne told engineer Jack Bell he was burning his front tyres running in the Triple Eight car's wake. Bell's reply was to point at the bigger picture: "Matty, you have the superior car, you can do this, we are well and truly in it." Payne apologised afterwards.
The more interesting explanation for Triple Eight's turnaround came from managing director Jamie Whincup, who was trackside at Wanneroo after missing Townsville for promotional duties at the Goodwood Festival of Speed. He put the recovery down to internal resourcing rather than any technical breakthrough.
"It's just allocation of time. That's all it comes down to," Whincup told Speedcafe. "She's a big business Triple Eight Race Engineering, there's plenty of plates and I've been running around trying to keep them all spinning. The performance plate was getting a little bit wonky and about to fall off, so the last three weeks we've had to get that one spinning a bit more at the cost of everything else."
Triple Eight expanded to three cars in 2026 alongside a switch to Ford that brought homologation duties and the Blue Oval's Supercars engine supply with it. Ford took the manufacturers' title on Saturday, its first in six years.
"We didn't think we would lose the performance as much as we did, but when you look at it holistically, it makes complete sense," Whincup said. "You've got to remember, we've built a brand new engine shop. We haven't built engines, ever."
He was not claiming the team is back where it wants to be. "We're still a long way from being the quickest team in pit lane, but it's nice to get a little bit of a reward for the dedication of time that we've done the last three weeks in particular."
On the championship, Whincup was content to concede Grove's current form. "It's a good battle. Motorsport is all about the battles and these guys are doing a really, really good job. For the last 15 years, you're fighting one team, you run over here, you're fighting another. We seem to be the people in the middle, always trying to keep whoever is the quickest honest."
Allen completed a double podium for Grove in third, ahead of Chaz Mostert and Will Brown. Payne takes a 107-point lead into Sunday's final race at Wanneroo, with Grove's teams' championship advantage out to 179.
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*Originally published on [Motorsports Global](https://motorsports.global/article/feeney-ends-triple-eight-s-longest-drought-since-2006-in-perth). Visit for full coverage.*