Prodrive Racing (Australia)’s Chaz Mostert has set a new practice lap record on Friday at the Phillip Island 500 after topping the timesheet in the final session. Mostert had just one lap to attempt the fastest time of the day following last-minute changes to the car, setting a time under the one minute 30 second mark. Cameron Waters and Mark Winterbottom also finished within the top 10, with Winterbottom chasing understeer ahead of qualifying tomorrow. Despite bringing out a red flag in the opening session after becoming stuck at turn two, Waters believes there is room left for improvement in his own driving to move him further into the top five. Jason Bright is confident that the top 10 is achievable for the MEGA Racing FG X after further improvements were made in the final session.
Mark Winterbottom – #5 The Bottle-O PRA Ford:
Practice 1: 15th – 1m31.72s
Practice 2: 6th – 1m30.17s
“I’m struggling with understeer quite a lot. We tried to get it better but it wasn’t really turning, it was more sliding to make the car quicker. We’ll have a look at it and try and improve it for tomorrow. I messed up the first sector as well so we’re probably more third on the track but yeah obviously Chaz’s car is quite a bit better so we’ll have to try and go down his path a bit and get our car better. We’ve had a pretty good day which is a nice change for once as opposed to what we’ve been having recently.”Cameron Waters – #6 Monster Energy PRA Ford:
Practice 1: 20th – 1m31.95s
Practice 2: 5th – 1m30.16s
“It was good to finish the day in fifth and in the top five obviously. We rolled out and weren’t really that happy with the car but made it a lot better in practice two. There’s a little bit more in the car and in my driving to get the most out of it. We have a little bit to find to Chaz but at least we’re up there but we’ll all work together and look at it overnight.”
Chaz Mostert – #55 Supercheap Auto PRA Ford:
Practice 1: 10th – 1m31.32s
Practice 2: 1st – 1m29.57s
“It was a pretty good day for our guys today. It was one of those things, we didn’t really run tyres too much in the first session so there was a bit of a question mark as to how we’d go in the second one. We chucked a couple of sets of tyres at it in that second session so it was nice to get a good lap in and then to have another crack on greens at the end there. The car feels pretty promising this weekend but I still think we can make some little gains in some areas so we’ll go through the data tonight.”
Jason Bright – #56 MEGA Bulk Fuels PRA Ford:
Practice 1: 19th – 1m31.90s
Practice 2: 11th – 1m30.54s
“We finished up alright. I felt like we sort of struggled on all of our practice tyres and we made a couple of changes right before we put the greens on that I felt made the car a lot better, and then on the greens we got a really big jump. It wasn’t a very nice lap so I’m really happy with 11th. I think we dumped a fair bit of time in the first and last sector but our middle sector was really strong so I think it bodes well for tomorrow.”
Tim Edwards – Team Principal:
“We had a pretty good day out there today. To have all cars in the top 11 is great and to have the fastest car of the day was a good improvement as well. The whole team has done a great amount of work in the past two weeks to make further gains with our cars and its showing. There is still a bit of work to do. We can do a few things here and there to make the cars better, even for Chaz so we’ll work on those overnight. Tomorrow will be a long day so there’s plenty still to work on.”‘
DUNLOP SUPER2 SERIES
Prodrive Racing (Australia)’s Garry Jacobson has claimed his first race win for 2017 after taking the race lead on the final lap. After looking to make his move at the restart, Jacobson was able to pass former teammate Jack Le Brocq in a mega maneuver at turn three. After running off the track at turn two and sustaining damage to the left hand side of his car in qualifying, Josh Kean was able to improve on his 12th place qualifying position, moving up in a clean race to finish 10th.
Garry Jacobson – #1 MEGA Bulk Fuels PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 2nd – 1m31.67s
Race 1: 1st
“It was an absolute mega day. I think we showed good progress again being fast in the wet, being second quickest by only .01 of a second but also being quick in the dry for qualifying. We were front row contenders whether it was wet or dry but I think with (Jack) Le Brocq it was just like the good old days, racing up the front with me and him and I was just happy to be able to challenge him this time. It was just a bit of keeping calm when he pulled away at the start of the race and trying to keep the car on the track and allow my car to have its chance to fight at the end. It was pretty good fun out there with the sprinkles of rain and the pass I made going into turn three. It was pretty risky but I’m glad it came off.”
Josh Kean – #5 Wynns Racing PRA Ford:
Qualifying: 12th – 1m33.25s
Race 1: 10th
“It was pretty slippery out there in practice. I ran onto the grass on the exit of turn one and slid across the track at turn two and once we grabbed the dirt it was all over and I found the wall. We weren’t able to get as good a lap together as we would have liked from there and then I got bogged down off the line at the start of the race. I was able to make up a heap of spots but still would have preferred to be further up. The car wasn’t going in the direction we wanted to but we’ll tune her up overnight and see what we can roll out with.”
