Waters Mercedes elevated to Shootout

Cameron Waters’ Strakka Racing Mercedes will take part in the Top 10 Shootout for the Bathurst 12 Hour, despite narrowly missing the cut in qualifying.

Stewards have confirmed that the #100 Steven Richards Motorsport BMW has been dumped from the session after being found guilty of an unspecified technical breach in qualifying.

Factory BMW ace Phillip Eng had put the #100 BMW third in the qualifying session behind Garth Tander’s Audi (driven by Kelvin van der Linde) and Chaz Mostert’s BMW.

Waters is the biggest beneficiary, having qualifying 11th, less than 0.05 seconds from the provisional pole time.

The 23-year-old Tickford Supercars regular is making his GT racing debut at Bathurst in the Pro-Am Mercedes he’s sharing with Nick Leventis, Lewis Williamson and David Fumanelli.

“It’s cool to finally get to drive the cars,” he told Supercars.com of the experience.

“It’s a good start to the year, to come to the hardest track in Australia in a completely new car and work it out.

“I really love the car, it’s really nice to drive. It’s a lot different to the Supercar so it’s nice to try something new.”

Waters joins Supercars regulars Mostert (second), Scott McLaughlin (fourth) and Shane van Gisbergen (sixth) in qualifying their cars for the Shootout.

The one-at-a-time run-off will take place from 4:15pm local time.

SRM’s #100 BMW of Eng, Timo Glock and four-time Bathurst 1000 winner Richards will start last following its qualifying exclusion.