Former factory rivals sharing staff at The Bend
Former factory rivals Walkinshaw Andretti United and Tickford Racing are sharing a pit boom for this weekend's Supercars event at The Bend.
Both squads are fielding wildcard entries this weekend, Kurt Kostecki in a WAU Holden and Thomas Randle in a Tickford Ford.
The two extra cars are garaged side-by-side at the pit entry end of the lane, prompting the teams to combine forces for pitstops.
Tickford has provided the pit equipment while the staff for stops is split between the two teams.
While sharing gear is relatively common in Supercars, the linage of these particular teams makes it an unlikely alliance.
They were both once factory teams on opposite sides of the red/blue divide during the heyday of manufacturer support in Supercars.
WAU was known as the Holden Racing Team from the early 1990s until 2016, when the Holden backing moved to Triple Eight.
Tickford, meanwhile, started out as the Ford-backed Glenn Seton Racing squad before becoming the full Blue Oval factory team, known as Ford Performance Racing, in the early 2000s.
It continued to be known as FPR until Ford pulled its Supercars backing ahead of the 2015 season.
Ford has since returned and provides support to Dick Johnson Racing, Tickford Racing and Kelly Grove Racing.
While there are no clashes with manufacturers this weekend, there were commercial implications to consider through each car's major backer.
Kostecki is running in Mobil 1 colours in Randle with Castrol backing, a tricky clash in terms of signage and clothing.
The teams struck a deal to only use their team logos on the pit boom and for staff working on the car to wear generic team-branded race suits.
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