With the Virgin Australia Supercars set to hit Queensland Raceway in July, Chaz Mostert is determined to make it back into the winners’ circle in the Coates Hire Ipswich Supersprint, at the track where he had his first Supercars win in 2013.
Twenty-four year old Chaz now drives the Supercheap Ford FG X Falcon for the Rod Nash Racing team, and he is looking for Pole Position for the 120 km race on Saturday and the 200km race on Sunday.
Despite being competitive since returning to racing after a horrific crash during a qualifying session for the Bathurst 1000 in 2015 Mostert hasn’t won so far this year, so he is determined to race his hardest in Ipswich.
“I’m doing really well now, with everything healed, so I’m ready for the Ipswich Supersprint,” Chaz said. “I had five months out of the car and I really missed the driving so I’m ready to go at Ipswich.”
Chaz Mostert began his racing career in 2008 at the Formula Ford championship, and in 2010 he won the event. Then in 2010 he got the chance to drive a Miles Racing Falcon at Bathurst in the Fujitsu V8 Supercar Series where he exceeded everyone’s expectations. His success and obvious raw talent lead to Chaz being signed by Miles Racing for the 2011 Season. He has raced with fierce competitive spirit and aggressive driving over the past five years.
The crash in 2015 left Chaz with a broken leg, broken wrist and lots of bruises, ruling him out for the remainder of the season. At that point, he was second in the championship, behind teammate Mark Winterbottom.
Chaz came into Supercars following his boyhood dream of driving fast cars for fun and excitement. “As a boy I wanted to ride a motorbike but mum thought that was too dangerous, so she found out about Go Karting, and I loved it as soon as I started,” Chaz said.
“I did eight years of Kart racing and it just progressed from there.”
Competitive racing isn’t just getting out on the track and driving ultra-fast, although that is what’s needed, it’s the end result of a lot of preparation.
“In a typical week there’s a day in the workshop, there’s meetings, travel to the destination of the race where we go to events, do a track walk and lots of practice and development work with the team. Then on the weekend, we race.”
Supercars racing requires a lot of travelling from one end of the country to the other, and that means a lot of time away from home, friends and family.
“It can be tough, usually I’m only home for two or three days every fortnight, so I have to try and get as much family and friends time in as I can while I’m home,” Chaz said.
“Luckily, my family travel with me a lot but I don’t get to see my friends as much as I would like. At the end of the day though I’m doing a very rewarding job, I’m doing what I love driving racecars, so there’s a good balance there.”
Coming back from such a serious crash has its challenges, mostly recovering physically from injuries but also regaining the mental approach to racing competitively against other super-competitive drivers, but Chaz says that it’s something all racedrivers face.
“The crash didn’t put me off racing at all, I really missed it when I wasn’t driving and I couldn’t wait to get back into the car.”
When Chaz is home and out of his racesuit he turns from racetrack to water sports but it’s still fast and furious.
“I live by a canal on the Gold Coast so I go out on Dad’s boat and I’m just getting my jet ski fixed at the moment. As soon as that’s done I’ll be hitting the jet ski hard again.
Anything to do with the water and being outside.”
