Practice report

Supercars Bathurst

Bathurst 1000: McLaughlin lowers lap record, Whincup crashes

Scott McLaughlin set a new Mount Panorama benchmark in final pre-qualifying practice for the Bathurst 1000, as Jamie Whincup ended the session in the wall.

Andrew van Leeuwen

Edited: Oct 11, 2019, 2:42 PM

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Scott McLaughlin, DJR Team Penske Ford

Having lowered his own record from 2017 in practice yesterday, McLaughlin took another chunk out of the benchmark with an incredible 2m03.481s.

That put him almost three-tenths clear of his Thursday lap, and left him 0.5s ahead of the field heading into this afternoon's qualifying session.

"It was a full-on lap and then you get told on the radio the team wants you to go a bit faster in the first sector. It’s like ‘come on boys, give me something!’,” said McLaughlin.

“You’ve got to have some sort of feel in case it is dry for qualifying.

“I’m not sure if it’s going to be wet as well. I’m within my limit, I am being safe, but I’m hanging on to a point where a 3.4, it’s pretty fast across the top for anyone.

“It’s cool to be there, but I think there’s more in it yet.”

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Bathurst 1000: McLaughlin fastest as rain shakes up qualifying

While it was all good news for one outright contender, another ended up in the fence.

Whincup was caught out when Richie Stanaway spun in front of him heading into The Dipper, the #888 Holden ending up in the wall after narrowly avoiding the GRM car.

The seven-time series champion had been gearing up for a qualifying simulation, the crash leaving him down in 14th for the session.

"I saw Richie go in as I came over Skyline," Whincup explained.

"If you look at it on TV it all looks pretty flat there, but it’s massively downhill. I just tried to scrub off as much speed as I possibly could while going around him. Going around means you’re in the marbles as well.

"It hit the wall. Not massive, I’d had a lot worse, [but it] smashed the front-left corner.

"Rear has got the camber knocked off it, but hopefully it’s not transaxle or anything like that.

"I’m pretty confident we’ll be out for qualifying. I tried to give the boys as much info as I could so we can start preparing.

"It’s broken a front-upright, front wishbones, trailing arm. There’s no fluid anywhere so radiator looks intact.

"The front splitter is smashed across and it just kooks like a rear trailing arm at the back as well."

Stanaway's car was also left with reasonable damage from his impact.

Adding to the drama was a late off for the Walkinshaw Andretti United wildcard car, Alexander Rossi firing the Holden into the gravel at the first corner with four minutes to go.

Following a lengthy red flag for the Whincup/Stanaway clean up, officials elected to not restart the session after Rossi went off.

That left Andre Heimgartner in second, the Nissan driver becoming the fifth driver to join the so-called 'Threes Club' with a 2m03.985s.

Cam Waters continued his promising form with the third quickest time, with David Reynolds fourth despite having better laps twice cut short by red flags.

Qualifying, which will determine both who makes the Top 10 Shootout and positions 11-26, kicks off at 4pm local time.

Cla # Driver Car Laps Time Gap Interval km/h 1 17 New Zealand Scott McLaughlin
France Alexandre Prémat Ford Mustang GT 14 2'03.4813 181.135 2 7 Andre Heimgartner
Australia Bryce Fullwood Nissan Altima 17 2'03.9853 0.5040 0.5040 180.398 3 6 Cameron Waters
Michael Caruso Ford Mustang GT 16 2'04.0248 0.5435 0.0395 180.341 4 9 David Reynolds
Luke Youlden Holden Commodore ZB 17 2'04.1919 0.7106 0.1671 180.098 5 12 New Zealand Fabian Coulthard
Tony D'Alberto Ford Mustang GT 16 2'04.2325 0.7512 0.0406 180.039 6 97 Shane van Gisbergen
Australia Garth Tander Holden Commodore ZB 19 2'04.2852 0.8039 0.0527 179.963 7 5 Lee Holdsworth
Thomas Randle Ford Mustang GT 18 2'04.3370 0.8557 0.0518 179.888 8 2 Scott Pye
Warren Luff Holden Commodore ZB 16 2'04.4820 1.0007 0.1450 179.678 9 99 Anton De Pasquale
Will Brown Holden Commodore ZB 16 2'04.5004 1.0191 0.0184 179.652 10 34 Australia James Golding
Richard Muscat Holden Commodore ZB 16 2'04.5240 1.0427 0.0236 179.618 11 18 Mark Winterbottom
New Zealand Steven Richards Holden Commodore ZB 16 2'04.6103 1.1290 0.0863 179.493 12 15 Rick Kelly
Dale Wood Nissan Altima 14 2'04.6298 1.1485 0.0195 179.465 13 55 Chaz Mostert
Australia James Moffat Ford Mustang GT 15 2'04.7297 1.2484 0.0999 179.322 14 3 Garry Jacobson
Dean Fiore Nissan Altima 17 2'04.7547 1.2734 0.0250 179.286 15 35 Todd Hazelwood
United States Jack Smith Holden Commodore ZB 14 2'04.8433 1.3620 0.0886 179.158 16 33 New Zealand Richie Stanaway
Chris Pither Holden Commodore ZB 13 2'04.8815 1.4002 0.0382 179.104 17 888 Australia Jamie Whincup
Craig Lowndes Holden Commodore ZB 14 2'04.9580 1.4767 0.0765 178.994 18 8 Nick Percat
Tim Blanchard Holden Commodore ZB 14 2'05.0038 1.5225 0.0458 178.928 19 22 James Courtney
Jack Perkins Holden Commodore ZB 16 2'05.2185 1.7372 0.2147 178.622 20 23 Will Davison
Australia Alex Davison Ford Mustang GT 15 2'05.2555 1.7742 0.0370 178.569 21 78 Switzerland Simona de Silvestro
Alex Rullo Nissan Altima 16 2'05.2664 1.7851 0.0109 178.553 22 14 Tim Slade Holden Commodore ZB 17 2'05.7105 2.2292 0.4441 177.923 23 56 Brodie Kostecki
Jake Kostecki Holden Commodore ZB 18 2'06.1389 2.6576 0.4284 177.318 24 21 Australia Macauley Jones
Dean Canto Holden Commodore ZB 14 2'06.2179 2.7366 0.0790 177.207 25 27 United States Alexander Rossi
James Hinchliffe Holden Commodore ZB 13 2'06.3885 2.9072 0.1706 176.968 26 19 Jack Le Brocq
Jonathon Webb Holden Commodore ZB 16 2'06.8144 3.3331 0.4259 176.374

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