PWR's pace hidden by dramas at the Valley.

PWR Racing left Darwin's Hidden Valley Raceway disappointed after a mixture of bad luck, mishaps and mechanical gremlins combined to blunt the outright speed shown by both cars during the weekend's three races.

The weekend got off to a good start with Jason Bright easily topping the time sheets in the practice and qualifying sessions, and only a minor braking error on his Top 10 Shootout lap relegating him to starting from third position on the grid. Weel, meanwhile, was trialling a new set-up and qualified 21st.

Bright challenged strongly for the lead in Race 1, only falling out of contention and finishing 4th when a locked brake caused him to run wide with two laps to go, while Weel struggled to come to terms with an understeer problem to finish 17th.

Race 2 saw Bright become the victim in some else's accident, sandwiched between Marcos Ambrose and Todd Kelly in a first-lap shunt and forced to make an extended pitstop to repair panel damage which saw him rejoin the race at the back of the field to eventually finish 17th. Weel, meanwhile, was making his now-trademark charge through the field to an outstanding 8th-place finish.

A good result for the weekend looked possible as Race 3 wore on, with Weel running as high as 6th and Bright employing a different strategy to the rest of the field by delaying his compulsory pitstop as late as possible. The move looked likely to improve his track position by at least 10 places as Bright pitted, only for a cross-threaded wheel nut to cost valuable seconds and relegate a disappointed Bright to finish in 10th place. A few laps later Weel's car rolled to a stop at Turn 1, the victim of an apparent electrical problem which ended his race.

Although disappointed, Bright was philosophical about the result. "We haven't lost too much ground, but we came here this weekend intending to make up ground on the guys in front of us in the championship, so from that perspective the weekend hasn't been successful," he said.

"It really demonstrates just how difficult it is to win a race in this championship because we had great pace all weekend and it was only a couple of very small things which let us down and stopped a much better result."

Weel said the source of the problem which stopped his car would not be identified until the cars had returned to the workshop and been stripped down. "The way it stopped felt like it had to be electrical, although there was no cough and splutter or any signs before it just stopped," he said. "The car had worked pretty well up to that point - we passed and drove away from Mark Skaife in Race 2 which was a pretty good sign that we were on the right track."

The weekend netted Bright 10th place for the round and 136 points, retaining 5th placing in the V8 Supercar Championship standings, while Weel's meagre haul of 82 points relegates him to 11th position in championship standings.

The next round of the championship will be held at Perth's Barbagallo Raceway from June 11-13.