Bates fastest as crashes, rain punctuate final practice

Zach Bates topped the final practice session of the weekend for the Dunlop Super2 Series at Bathurst, in a session that was effectively written off by red flags and rain.

Bates set a 2:16.1765 on what proved to be his only flying lap in damp conditions on slick tyres, heading Eggleston Motorsport teammates Jordyn Sinni and Cody Burcher.

However, only eight cars set times within 10 seconds of Bates' benchmark, proving how interrupted the session was.

With Friday forecast to be dry, the first taste of dry running for the Dunlop Series will come in Boost Mobile Qualifying tomorrow morning.

As the 22-car field rolled out of pit lane, a light drizzle began to fall over Mount Panorama following the dry Supercars practice session, which became a lot more noticeable across the top of the hill on the first flying lap.

The weather caught out Ryan Tomsett, who came back down the earth with a thud after topping Practice 1, coming unstuck under the tree following Anderson Motorsport teammate Ayrton Hodson.

The #17 Mustang collected the wall first with the left rear, before the left front followed into the wall, with the teenager

The session went green again with 10 minutes effectively taken out of track time, with rain still falling lightly at the top of Mount Panorama, however the bottom of the circuit remained dry.

That saw series leader Rylan Gray hold put in pit lane, as did Tickford teammate Lochie Dalton, who will both co-drive the team's wildcard Mustang in the Repco Bathurst 1000 on Sunday.

The first semi-representative laps came six minutes after cars rolled on track, which proved to be the best times of the session.

The tree claimed another victim just prior to the halfway point of the session, as Ben Gomersall all but replicated Tomsett's incident in his #35 Triple Eight Commodore.

The session went green with just under 14 minutes remaining, however as the rain picked up no one immediately moved for pit exit, with Max Geoghegan and Jarrod Hughes eventually leading the charge.

However, the rain set in in earnest, with Hughes and Cameron McLeod the only cars staying out for push laps, however Hughes quickly bailed, whilst McLeod pressed on for another couple of laps.

Tomorrow will be a busy day for the Dunlop Super2 Series at Bathurst, beginning with Boost Mobile Qualifying for Race 1 at 9:00am local time.

That is immediately followed by the Boost Mobile Top Five Shootout at 9:30am local time, before the opening race of the weekend begins at 3:15pm, and will run over 40 minutes.