Late flyer puts Waters on top at Surfers Paradise

Cam Waters has started the Boost Mobile Gold Coast 500 in style, producing a late flyer to top opening practice at the Surfers Paradise Street Circuit.

The Tickford Racing driver delivered a 1:11.3972s on his last run to lead the field by 0.1136s, with Andre Heimgartner and James Courtney completing the top three.

Waters rose to the occasion to knock Chaz Mostert off the top of the leaderboard, with Mostert fourth ahead of championship leader and Broc Feeney.

Richie Stanaway moved to seventh late on ahead of Anton De Pasquale, James Golding and Matt Payne, who led the way for the balance of the 40-minute session.

While there were smiles at Brad Jones Racing for Heimgartner, the biggest casualty was rookie Jaxon Evans, who was sidelined with a suspected transaxle issue and ended up 24th and last with just nine laps to his name.

Under sunny Gold Coast skies, Triple Eight driver Brown kicked the session off with a 1:13.9540s, before lowering his number to a 1:12.8198s.

Golding (1:12.7706s) and De Pasquale (1:12.5124s) continued to move the benchmark before Payne set the front-running with a 1:12.0315s, ahead of Brown (1:12.3179s).

Waters' challenge began with the first 1:11s of the weekend, a 1:11.9940s, before Payne went faster again with a 1:11.8402s. Waters pressed on and fired in a 1:11.8014s, despite saving a slide at the beach chicane.

Drivers were pushing to the find the limits at the back of the circuit, with over 50 separate kerb hops recorded in the first 10 minutes alone. Notably, Nick Percat had recorded six strikes at the Turn 9 sensor on the beach chicane, and needed seven attempts to set a time.

All told, there were 189 separate kerb hops recorded at the beach chicane in Practice 1, 136 coming at Turn 9, 51 at Turn 8 and two at Turn 10. The Turn 2 chicane sensor, meanwhile, had been turned off in the session in a trial.

Through the opening runs, Waters led Payne, Thomas Randle, Brodie Kostecki, Brown, Golding, Heimgartner, Feeney, De Pasquale and Bryce Fullwood. After a round of changes, David Reynolds jumped from 11th to sixth with a 1:12.3417s, before being immediately demoted by teammate Mark Winterbottom.

Payne shot back to the top with a 1:11.7693s with 22 minutes remaining, with Brown going third with a 1:11.8334s. Heimgartner then lowered the number to a 1:11.7421s, the top four covered by just 0.0913s.

Down in 20th, Mostert tried to make inroads into the top 10, and jumped to seventh with a 1:12.0274s, albeit nearly 0.3s down on Heimgartner. Randle, meanwhile, shot to third with a 1:11.7920s.

Into the final 11 minutes, De Pasquale clocked a 1:11.7359s to unseat Heimgartner, with Brown going fastest in the first sector. Brown lost time in the middle sector, but closed out the lap to record a 1:11.6007s, with Waters (1:11.6064s) and then Feeney (1:11.6041s) moving to second.

All the while, Stanaway turned in a 25-lap race run, sitting 19th with a best of 1:12.6052s with six minutes remaining. However, there was an awkward moment when he returned to pit lane, narrowly missing his mechanics as he turned into the garage.

With four minutes remaining, Mostert powered in the fastest first sector and jumped to fourth with a 1:11.6218s, and pressed on with a 1:11.5572s to take top spot from Brown. Payne, meanwhile, loomed to regain first position, but recorded a shortcut and gave his time away.

Waters, Heimgartner and Courtney all improved as the chequered flag unfurled, with the top 10 cars covered by 0.9s.

On track action at the Boost Mobile Gold Coast 500 continues with Practice 2 at 3:35pm local time/4:35pm AEDT. Tickets for the event are on sale now.