RICHIE Stanaway’s Tickford Racing Falcon looked comfortable in Thursday’s wet conditions at Mount Panorama as the Kiwi driver finished top of the time sheets in the last Bathurst 1000 practice session of the day.
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It’s been a tough Supercars season for Stanaway, who sits 24th in the championship and has achieved just a single top 10 result this year, so the success in practice was a welcome result for him and the team.
Stanaway set his time of 2:29.0174 early in the session, seeing off challenges from DJR Penske’s Fabian Coulthard (2:29.1528) and Scott McLaughlin (2:29.5703).
Tickford Racing teammate Chaz Mostert rounded out an all-Ford top four.
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Stanaway refused to read too much into his top time. He even went as far to call it pointless in the grand scheme of the weekend’s racing, especially with warmer weather predicted for the Great Race.
“We haven’t read into the time sheets too much because the forecast is that it isn’t going to be wet [on Sunday],” he said.
“It felt weird just lapping around for no real point but it did feel nice to be at the top of the time sheets in that last session. After the season I’ve had it’s nice to at least top one session.
“For whatever reason we’ve got good cars here in the wet, and we showed that last year as well. It’s something we’ve been reading into a lot to try and find pace in the dry.
“We still haven’t figured it out and today kind of reaffirms that issue.
“I’d love it to rain because we don’t have remotely close to the pace in the dry to get any sort of result.
Shane Van Gisbergen and Chaz Mostert traded blows in the low 2:30s inside the opening 10 minutes of the session.
Mostert was the first driver to break below the 2:30 mark with his 2:29.7241 but his mark was quickly eclipsed by Richie Stanaway’s lap.
In the run towards the halfway mark of the session there was little movement at the top end of the leaderboard.
Teams weren’t in a hurry to both get their cars onto the track or to take many risks around the circuit.
Anton de Pasquale made the first off road excursion of the session when he went down the exit road at Hell Corner but he came away unscathed.
Hell Corner proved to be a problem spot throughout the session, catching out the likes of Craig Lowndes, Simona de Silvestro, Scott McLaughlin and Stanaway.
Lowndes also had a scary moment at the Chase went he ran long but he got his car out of the sand trap.
Coulthard and McLaughlin both went under the 2:30 mark with just under half an hour remaining. but remained just shy of Stanaway’s mark.
The higher section of the Mount were also toying with the field.
Dave Reynolds and Warren Luff both got the wobbles coming out of the Cutting, though both drivers remained well clear of the wall.
Weather conditions didn’t improve and, with no-one willing to risk their machine in the wet, Stanaway’s time stayed on top when the hour-long session came to a close.
Friday’s first practice session will be a co-drivers only edition that gets underway from 8.30am.
Qualifying will follow later in the day from 3.50pm.
