Frosty’s rain dance
Mark Winterbottom shot to the top in a wet practice session at the Perth SuperSprint, but all eyes will be on Garry Rogers’ camp with 50 minutes to change an engine in James Moffat’s car.
Moffat pulled into the pit lane with no oil pressure in his Volvo S60 during the 15-minute session, and said the outlook ‘wasn’t flash’.
His teammate Scott McLaughlin was second quickest, 0.2410sec behind Winterbottom 1min03.3112. In contrast, yesterday’s best lap set by James Courtney was a 55.9297sec.
“It was wet, the sun’s been out non-stop and just before you roll out torrential rain comes out,” Winterbottom said.
“It’s good – the wet weather has been a weakness in the past for me, so it was good to roll out, get the top time and some confidence.”
Qualifying could be a lottery, though teams will check the forecast and do their best to read the play.
“You sit here, look at the forecast, then look up at the weather and see if forecast relates to outside,” Winterbottom said.
“No doubt the session will be mixed and it’s going to be the right lap at the right time. A lot of that’s life but planning does come into it.”
Craig Lowndes, Rick Kelly and Fabian Coulthard completed the top five, with yesterday’s fastest Courtney in 20th in the wet session.
Will Davison hadn’t been out on track with five minutes to go, but did complete a run in his Darrell Lea STIX Commodore.
Click here for full results.
The V8 Supercars qualify at 11.40am local time at the Perth SuperSprint.
