Kiwi supercars ace Scott McLauglin is suffering from a serious case of deja vu, as the championship heads into the final straight.
The DJR Team Penske driver lost the 2017 championship on the final lap of the season, after leading comfortably heading into the year-ending enduros.
A poor result at Bathurst last year ultimately proved costly for McLaughlin, as he was run down by Holden's Jamie Whincup.
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The 25-year-old had dominated the 2018 season right up until the last round at The Bend in Adelaide, where two poor results have seen him lose his lead to fellow Kiwi Shane Van Gisbergen.
The Red Bull Racing driver holds a slim 19-point advantage heading into Sandown next month, with McLaughlin keen to rectify last weekend’s disappointment.
The Hamiltonian feels less pressure this year, after the nail-biting culmination of 2017.
"I'm a lot more mature and understand it more from that aspect," McLaughlin told Newshub.
"Last year, I was absolutely freaking out about losing the championship lead. Now I understand that there are a lot of points on offer over the course of the next few rounds and we can just get on with it.
"That was the reason for wanting to build such a handy lead.
"Shane had a similarly bad round early on the season and I jumped ahead, and now it's evened itself out. We have been fairly even with those guys all year, so I I'm expecting it to be a very even fight right up until the end."
McLaughlin maintains his slip-up last time out was an aberration, with the team identifying a technical issue they had during the weekend.
McLaughlin finished sixth on Saturday and a demoralising 10th on Sunday, while teammate Fabian Coulthard also struggled with two 14th-place finishes.
"I think we all look back at that as what could have been," McLaughlin said.
"We came back and had a bit of a debrief and certainly there was something fundamentally wrong there with our car.
“But it is nice to come out of a weekend where we struggled and know where we went wrong, and hopefully come back strongly the next round.
"We have had some good speed the last few rounds, but we haven't had any luck strategy-wise.
"Shane has been on a real roll recently, but I think we can bounce back and take some of that momentum from him."
The Enduro Cup begins at Sandown on September 16, with Bathurst a fortnight later on October 7.
Newshub.
