Grant Sherrin and Iain Sherrin have teamed up to take the X Class victory and the outright runner-up spot in this weekend’s three hour Sherrin Rentals Fight in the Night aboard the #27 Sherrin Rentals BMW M4 at Queensland Raceway.

The brothers shared the #27 for this event and will for the remainder of the Meguiar’s Australian Production Cars season after the damage to Iain’s #72 Sherrin Rentals BMW M4 at the last round at The Bend proved too much to repair once the car was back at the team’s workshop.

While the Sherrins took out the class victory, they also came exceptionally close to pulling off a Fight in the Night outright double, with only 2.4 seconds separating them from the outright winners at the close of the three-hour nighttime enduro and keeping them from back-to-back outright victories.

The #27 had been the one to beat all weekend, topping every practice session as well as qualifying and the qualifying Shootout ahead of Saturday evening’s race.

Come the race, they led the way there too, being the leaders for the majority of the race, right up until the 2 hour 20 minute mark, where a late race fuel stop was required to ensure they could make the end of the race.

Unfortunately, this was something that Sherrin Racing’s nearest rivals at that point – the #9 Ford Mustang of Hadrian Morrall and Tyler Mecklem – were planning to avoid, meaning that over the final 39 minutes of the race, Grant had a full minute margin to make up if the #27 was to resume the lead.

A valiant effort saw that margin drop significantly lap after lap, however time would run out for the Sherrin Racing team with 2.4 seconds still separating them from the leaders.

While disappointed to not go back-to-back with outright victories, 2nd outright and the Class X victory are still strong results which saw the team smiling at race’s end, even if they did lament not having an extra lap up their sleeve – especially so when they discovered the #9 had only two litres of fuel onboard at the finish line.

“It was a good race – I did the first stint for us and got out to a minute lead, but unfortunately the safety car then came out a lap or two before we were going to do our CPS so that brought us back to the field. But we still got it done and everything was good through there and I was pretty happy with my stint,” Iain said.

“Grant got in and was doing quite well, he had got to about a 20 second lead on the Mustang and we came in for our last refuel – we didn’t see them (the #9) do another refuel so while we went back out a minute behind we thought we were still pretty safe as we thought they had to do another fuel stop. We still got Grant to keep the pace on as we thought they would probably run as late as they could and do a splash and dash.

“He was keeping the pressure on and bringing the margin down nearly two seconds a lap for that last stint, and then with about 20 minutes to go when they were going past us on the main straight we could hear that they were conserving, and we realised they were going for it!

“That caught us out a bit, so Grant just pushed on as hard as he could and unfortunately we missed it by just two seconds, so maybe with another lap we would have had them! Talking to them after the race, they only had two litres of fuel left so with another lap they probably wouldn’t have made it!

“It was really close and exciting racing, and a great effort by all the team. Grant did the fastest lap on the last lap which was an amazing 1:17.8060.

“All in all, it was a great race and a great event, it was a shame we weren’t quite there and just two seconds off in the end, but they had a great strategy and they did an amazing job, so all credit to them.”

For Grant, the race was exciting from start to finish.

“It was quite an exciting race with a few lead changes throughout and safety cars coming at the right time and also sometimes at the wrong time for us,” Grant said.

“The first one hurt us a bit, we had over a minute lead at that point, but the next one came at a time where we had just got in to do our CPS, so we were able to do that under safety car, so that was quite good.

“The car was just a dream to drive again and nice and consistent so you could punch out those fast laps.

“The team did really well, and Iain drove superbly in the first part of the race also. We were very close to backing it up, it was a case of so close but so far, but as well as 2nd outright we also won X class, so that was good too and we have to be happy with that.”

Sherrin Racing will next be on-track for round four of the 2024 Meguiar’s Australian Production Cars season at the Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit across August 23-25.

Sherrin Racing is supported on-track by Wirtgen Group, Spaceframe, Hi-Tec Oils, Custom Plastic Fabrication, Industrial Protective Coatings Qld (IPCQ), Action Mechanical Specialists, Welding Solutions, Symmetry Engineering, Brisbane Isuzu, Hydraulink Brisbane North, Dynapac CEA, Clark Equipment, Great Whites Lighting, Sherrin Rentals and Sherrin Equipment. For more information, visit www.sherrinracing.com.au

PHOTO THANKS TO SPEED SHOTS PHOTOGRAPHY