The Red Bull Racing Australia team hit the streets of Surfers Paradise on Friday for the start of the GC600.
Kicking off a huge weekend of sun, surf and supercars, the bulls charged into four action packed practice sessions.
An early encounter with a wall saw Jamie Whincup set a vibration in Car #1, however that was a small blemish in what was an otherwise solid practice day on track.
Jamie and Paul Dumbrell raced seamlessly through the Gold Coast circuit, taking the tight corners in their stride.
Coming off the back of a monumental Bathurst 1000 win, Craig Lowndes and Steve Richards kept pace, staying clear of those notorious concert walls and finishing in top three.
We are back on track tomorrow from 10.00am AEDT for qualifying. Check out the TV guide times here.
WHAT THEY SAID:
JAMIE WHINCUP / PAUL DUMBRELL (VF Holden Commodore, Car #1)
Practice One: 5th (Fastest Lap – 1:12.0332) *Whincup
Practice Two: 2nd (Fastest Lap – 1:12.3865) *Dumbrell
Practice Three: 1st (Fastest Lap – 1:11.2680) *Dumbrell
Practice Four: 24th (Fastest Lap – 1:12.1884) *Whincup
Jamie Whincup:
“I clipped the wall this morning which bent the car, it seems since then we have been behind the 8 ball for most of the day. PD had a bad vibration for his session, I was out late for my session and we didn’t manage to get a run on our good tyres in the end. It just kept snowballing really.”
Paul Dumbrell:
“Jamie had a little incident this morning which caused a slight vibration in the car. I spent my sessions trying to get on top of that, whilst also working on the car set up. The car was pretty strong out the gate from Jamie’s session which flowed through to my session. We stopped a little early in practice three just to make sure we changed a few things for Jamie, but otherwise I think we are on track so far.”
CRAIG LOWNDES / STEVEN RICHARDS (VF Holden Commodore, Car #888)
Practice One: 16th (Fastest Lap – 1:12.9465) *Lowndes
Practice Two: 7th (Fastest Lap – 1:12.6574) *Richards
Practice Three: 9th (Fastest Lap – 1:12.2699) *Richards
Practice Four: 3rd (Fastest Lap – 1:11.0603) *Lowndes
Craig Lowndes:
“We have worked pretty hard over the day, both Stevie and I, to make the car not only fast but comfortable to drive which is obviously very important around here. I think we have achieved what we wanted and we are really happy where we ended up. The car is good on both soft and hard tyres which is very important for tomorrow’s race and I look forward to seeing what tomorrow brings.”
Steven Richards:
“It was a good practice session running hard tyres and we had great racecar performance. We made some good steps given lap times where competitive on the condition tyres that we used. I felt comfortable behind the wheel and am looking forward to tomorrow’s race.”
