L&H Auslec Ford Rising Stars duet on song for Queensland
Release Date: 18/07/2007

Grant Denyer will return to his seat in the L&H Auslec Ford Rising Stars Racing Team Falcon at Queensland Raceway this weekend.

With an unbelievably busy schedule of television commitments Grant has only had one V8 race this year and looking forward to joining Michael Caruso in their two car Ford Rising Stars duet for the next round of the Fujitsu V8 Supercar Championships.

While Grant has had more V8 miles than his younger team mate, Michael is the one with the long history in motor sport. “Michael has won races in Formula Three, V8’s and has a great record in karting”, Team Manager, Jim Morton said today. “However it is Grant with a couple of Bathurst’s under his belt and a top ten finish last year whose experience has been missed early this year”.

In exciting news for the team and its partners, L&H – Auslec Ford Rising Stars Racing has announced its has purchased a new Falcon and engines from Ford Performance Racing. This car will be driven for the rest of the year in the development championship by our Michael Caruso. While Grant Denyer will move into the ex Stone Brothers BA for the Queensland round where the car ran in the top three during the races last year.

The team has been looking forward to the next few rounds after racing at Winton for the first time at the last round, a track where most of the Victorian teams test.

“We have pretty good data for the rest of the rounds and in Michael’s case we are looking to close his point’s gap on the series leader. Michael is in a clear second and he really likes the next few tracks so hopefully this might balance up things for us”, Jim Morton said.

“In Grant’s case it is hard when you don’t get the miles in these cars. He has had plenty of racing this year in all sorts of cars but very few V8 miles”, Jim Morton said. “With four rounds to go in this year’s Fujitsu V8 Supercar Championship he will get plenty of laps and become a strong factor”.

Ford Rising Stars Racing Team is the only two car V8Supercar team operating in Sydney and looking forward to the two rounds yet to come in NSW at Oran Park and Bathurst. Our partnership with Ford has already paid dividends to the main series V8 teams with Michael Caruso driving for WPS at Sandown and Bathurst and Grant to announce his plans shortly.

While the obvious focus for the team is developing young driver talent, the team’s two young engineers spent the weekend with Ford Performance Racing at Eastern Creek to broaden their knowledge.

“Tim Stone and Josh Riddle are both Engineering graduates looking to build careers in motor sport”, Team Commercial Manager, Kim White said today. “For the guys to spend a weekend helping the FPR Engineers was great for the team. Rather than us grab experienced people from other teams we have been trying to find young talented and offer them a grounding in the sport”.

Just like the team’s major commercial partner, Lawrence & Hanson / Auslec, it recognises that great people are the key to its success. With over 180 branches nationally, employing over 1,300 staff that service over 50,000 customers they are focused on attracting and retaining the best people in their organisation.

Both Ford Rising Stars Racing and its partners recognise that great people are ultimately the key to their success.

“Creating an ‘inspiring workplace' which attracts and retains highly skilled people who are innovative, passionate and energetic is not a goal restricted to a race team” L&H / Auslec Group Marketing Manager, Martin Dench said. “Our people benefit from accredited training, support and career development opportunities across a range of specialities, just like our race team”, he said.

“Exposing our people and our customers to how a race team operates has been a bonus to our involvement with the Ford Rising Stars Programme”, he said. “Race teams operate in a critical timeframe environment where trust in one another’s decisions is just as important as analysing information and acting on it. The way race teams operate is a very interesting business lesson and the strong, passionate focus that the teams are able to develop is something all businesses would like to replicate”

See the L&H/Auslec/Summit/Geist Ford Rising Stars Team will next be seen at the Queensland round of the Fujitsu V8 Supercar Championships on the 20th/21st and 22nd of July.