Three of Four Sessions Complete

Three of the four Practice sessions havebeen complete on day one of the Austin 400, at the Circuit of the Americas inTexas.

In the early hours of the morning (AESTtime) the first three sessions unfolded with Fabian Coulthard, Scott McLaughlinand Shane Van Gisbergen recording the fastest times, respectively.

At this point the lap record for the COTAshort circuit sits at 1min34.2269, which McLaughlin set in the second session.

The first session saw two red flags, onefor Jonathon Webb’s TEKNO Autosports Darrell Lea Holden Commodore, which had anengine issue with around one minute to go.

After Practice One, Webb – who was12th quickest in the session – said he didn’t think the car would be readyfor the day’s second session, to be run an hour later. But the car did come outfor Practice Two and Webb recorded 7th – a relief for the team, which onlyhas one spare engine for the flyaway round.

“To be honest I’m a long way from beingcomfortable driving it, as well as with the car,” Webb said after that firstsession.

It has been difficult to assess pace fromthe times – with only 28 hard tyres allocated for the weekend and nopre-marked tyres for the event, cars have been running wet weather tyres.

Championship leader Jamie Whincup made noimpression on the times in the first two sessions, but ended up tenth in P3,after commenting earlier in the week he felt unprepared for the internationalevent. 

Van Gisbergen led the first part of the thirdsession and while Coulthard once again went to the top of the times, on his finallap van Gisbergen dialed in the session’s top time, quickest with a 1min34.5358.

Follow Practice Four live with V8 SuperView– see www.v8supercars.com.au/v8superview for more information. P4 beginsat 7.15am AEST (4.15pm local time).