BATHURST’S Michael Anderson snared the first pole position of his Australian V8 Touring Cars career during the opening round at Phillip Island.
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Anderson finished the round in sixth overall but his highlight from the weekend was the gamble he took to take himself to the front of the grid.
Saturday’s 20-minute qualifying session began with all cars on wet tyres but a red-flag mid-session on a drying track made drivers question whether moving on slicks might be the way to go.
Anderson was one of several drivers to take a chance on slick tyres for the final five minutes, and his choice was correct.
The Bathurst driver shot to the top with a time of one minutes and 45.478 seconds.
Anderson went on to finish third, fifth and ninth across the weekend’s Phillip Island action.
The race one result saw Anderson also finish top of his class.
Tyler Greenbury got by the Bathurst driver in the opening laps and went on to win the opening race. Greenbury claimed race two before Jordan Boys won race three.
Meanwhile it wasn’t the weekend fellow Bathurst driver Dylan Gulson was hoping for in the Toyota 86 Series.
Gulson crashed out in the third and final race of the weekend at Phillip Island, a tough way to close out a difficult opening round.
“The race wasn’t going too badly for us but we got caught up in someone else’s desperate manoeuvre on the second lap,” he said.
“That led to a pile up of about 10 cars. We ended up in one of those situations with nowhere to go.
“We copped quite a bit of a hit in the rear, and on the front too, both on the right hand side. Thankfully the damage hasn’t moved any of the suspension points."
Prior to the weekend’s finale Gulson had finished the first two races in 19th and 18th.
The Bathurst driver had been slowly clawing his way back up the field when the trouble struck.
“We had a bit of a struggle in qualifying. We had a red flag early in the session and we hadn’t managed to bank a lap. We ended up starting the first race from 25th, which was disappointing because I felt like we had the speed to be further up,” Gulson said.
“That really set us back for the whole weekend. Thankfully we slowly moved up the field. At the time of the accident we’d gotten back to about 15th or 16th.”
Luckily for Gulson and his team he will now enjoy a lengthy break to the next round, at Townsville from July 7 to 9.