Jamie Whincup put the #88 Triple Eight Race Engineering JMR Mercedes AMG fastest in Saturday morning’s Practice 5 at The Mountain, in a session where the top 14 cars dipped into the 2:04s. Whincup’s time, a 2:03.1132, was the best of the session, almost four tenths ahead of the next best car, the #911 Shell V-Power/The Bend Porsche at the hands of Harry King.
This puts two Pro-Am class cars at the top of the time sheets ahead of Practice 6, which effectively functions as pre-qualifying this weekend.
Track conditions were warm and sunny for this morning’s session, though the track was once again very green after overnight rain. Jules Gounon set the early mark of the session with a 3.8 in the #75 SunEnergy1 Mercedes, before the first red flag interruption of the weekend.
The #25 McLaren was spotted parked up backwards in the run-off at Hell Corner, with tyre marks on the tarmac and the grass indicating a close call with the inside wall. Driver Jesse Bryan corroborated the inference of commentators, calling it “One hell of a ride”.
“I don’t really know what happened,” Bryan told the host broadcaster. “Into the braking at T1 and the rears locked up.”
“I don’t think you could have fit a piece of paper between me and the wall.”
The McLaren was extracted from the gravel, and after a 5-minute stoppage, the session was back underway.
That would prove the only interruption, with the last 30 minutes of the session running clear to the end. Behind Whincup and King, it was Engel in the #130 Gruppe M Mercedes and Jules Gounon in the #75 SunEnergy1 Mercedes also in the 2:03s. Rounding out the top 5 was the Craft Bamboo #77 Mercedes with Maxi Goetz, ahead of the #888 Triple Eight Racing Pro car, and Ross Gunn in the #27 Heart Of Racing Mercedes.
Matt Campbell’s #912 Manthey EMA Porsche, Christopher Haase in the #22 Wash-It Audi, and Charles Weerts in the #32 WRT BMW rounded out the top 10, with the top 13 cars under the 2:05 barrier.
The top Invitational car was Cameron McLeod in the #91 Wheels/FX MARC II, who set a 2:05.6, becoming the first Invitational class driver to dip under the 2:06 index time. 3 Invitational cars including the #91 hit the 2:06 mark, setting up an interesting battle for qualifying.
The stewards were busy this morning with two cars getting 10-minute stop-and-hold penalties throughout the session for infringements. Firstly, the #19 Nineteen Corp Mercedes were parked for the first 10 minutes due to taking the chequered flag 3 times in yesterday’s practice 4.
A radio failure in the car meant that when the driver missed the chequered flag the first time, the team was unable to call the car in on the following lap. The session had to be red-flagged for that car to come in. Adam Christodoulou set the best GT4 lap of the session in that car; a 2:15.0003
Also getting slapped with a 10-minute penalty was the #46 WRT BMW, for passing under red flag. That car finished the session in 13th place.
Practice 6 is next at 10:00 local time, and is acting as a pre-qualifying session. The top 15 cars from Practice 6 will be placed in Q1, while the next 15 will be in Q2. With traffic becoming a big talking point, all of the GT3 cars will want to be in Q1, making the next session very important indeed!
