Being a first-time entrant in the Bathurst 1000 can be a daunting prospect, but cousins Jake and Brodie Kosteki are pumped to tackle the iconic Mount Panorama event.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
The covers were lifted off the #56 Boost Mobile Kosteki Brothers Racing ZB Commodore on Wednesday afternoon to a cheering crowd after lots of hard work for the small family team.
"It's been a lot of hard work getting to this moment, building and preparing all of our own cars ourselves, to have Boost on board is quite a big achievement to us. Hopefully when it does come Sunday, we mean business," Brodie Kosteki said.
The Kostekis Brothers' Commodore is one of two wildcard entries for this year's 1000. They will actually share a garage with the other debutants - Alexander Rossi and James Hinchcliffe in the NAPA Commodore.
Both Brodie and Jake say that the task of getting ready for this year's race was huge, but they will hold nothing back when they hit the track.
"Blood, sweat and tears has gone into that thing," Brodie said.
"Hopefully we can build on a good platform [in practice] and go from there."
The team's focus is to finish the iconic endurance race, which they feel would be a huge achievement for the small organisation.
"We are a little team, there is only four of us in the workshop full-time, we have a fly-in crew that come to the weekend and it's a long race, it's 161 laps, and anything can happen so we will see how it goes," Jake said.
"Our main focus is to finish the race. As you know it's not easy to do that, so we will do that first and then anything can happen after that."
Jake currently sits fifth in the Super2 championship - the second tier category - with a best result of fourth at the last round at Queensland Raceway.
Brodie is not a regular in that series, but picked up a victory at the season opener in Adelaide.
The pairing also drove in the Super2 enduro race at Bathurst last year, with both recording DNF's.
Despite championship points on the line in Super2, Jake says that his focus was always the 1000.
"We are focusing on the one event, the 1000," Jake said. "It's obviously a big task to do. It's our team's first 1000 and for myself, so I just have to focus on the one.
"I have learnt quite a bit over the last couple of years in Super2, but we are moving on to the big horse, and see how we go."
While they are Great Race rookies, Brodie and Jake have grown up watching the race and are thrilled to be in the 1000 as competitors.
"We all grew up as kids watching the 1000, now being here is starting to sink in how big of a task that we've taken on. But we all believe in ourselves and worked really hard to get to this point and we are pumped," Brodie said.