Townsville Supercars: Reynolds tops opening practice
A late green tyre run helped David Reynolds to top spot in the opening practice session for the Townsville 500.
The Kelly Grove Racing driver was the best of a number of late improvers at the end of the 40-minute session, a 1m12.797s leaving him two-tenths clear of the field.
It was a somewhat surprising result given KGR struggled for pace last time out in Darwin, Reynolds revealing that a more aggressive front-end set-up helped unlock some speed.
"That was a decent lap," said Reynolds.
"I ran a sat of tyres, most other people probably didn't. We changed a couple of things in our cars between Darwin and here, we've sped up the steering to try and give me some more feel and changed some front-end parts, and it's obviously working.
"The car is really good. We've just got to keep it there."
Dick Johnson Racing driver Will Davison was second quickest, edging Brad Jones Racing's Todd Hazelwood by a hundredth of a second.
Chaz Mostert was fourth quickest ahead of Will Brown, while Jamie Whincup, who led the way for the majority of the session, was shuffled back to sixth after not running greens at the end.
Fabian Coulthard was ninth fastest as points leader Shane van Gisbergen rounded out the Top 10.
| Cla | # | Driver | Car | Time | Gap | Interval |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 26 |  David Reynolds | Ford Mustang GT | 1'12.797 | ||
| 2 | 17 | Will Davison | Ford Mustang GT | 1'12.998 | 0.201 | 0.201 |
| 3 | 14 | Todd Hazelwood | Holden Commodore ZB | 1'13.007 | 0.210 | 0.009 |
| 4 | 25 | Chaz Mostert | Holden Commodore ZB | 1'13.025 | 0.228 | 0.017 |
| 5 | 9 | Will Brown | Holden Commodore ZB | 1'13.087 | 0.290 | 0.061 |
| 6 | 88 | Jamie Whincup | Holden Commodore ZB | 1'13.180 | 0.383 | 0.093 |
| 7 | 6 | Cameron Waters | Ford Mustang GT | 1'13.263 | 0.466 | 0.083 |
| 8 | 19 |  Fabian Coulthard | Holden Commodore ZB | 1'13.269 | 0.471 | 0.005 |
| 9 | 97 | Shane van Gisbergen | Holden Commodore ZB | 1'13.319 | 0.522 | 0.050 |
| 10 | 35 | Zane Goddard | Holden Commodore ZB | 1'13.336 | 0.539 | 0.017 |
| 11 | 44 | James Courtney | Ford Mustang GT | 1'13.339 | 0.541 | 0.002 |
| 12 | 34 | Jake Kostecki | Holden Commodore ZB | 1'13.339 | 0.542 | 0.000 |
| 13 | 7 | Andre Heimgartner | Ford Mustang GT | 1'13.354 | 0.557 | 0.014 |
| 14 | 18 | Mark Winterbottom | Holden Commodore ZB | 1'13.522 | 0.725 | 0.167 |
| 15 | 20 | Scott Pye | Holden Commodore ZB | 1'13.535 | 0.738 | 0.012 |
| 16 | 5 | Jack Le Brocq | Ford Mustang GT | 1'13.578 | 0.781 | 0.042 |
| 17 | 8 | Nick Percat | Holden Commodore ZB | 1'13.647 | 0.850 | 0.069 |
| 18 | 11 | Anton De Pasquale | Ford Mustang GT | 1'13.706 | 0.909 | 0.059 |
| 19 | 3 | Tim Slade | Ford Mustang GT | 1'13.844 | 1.046 | 0.137 |
| 20 | 99 | Brodie Kostecki | Holden Commodore ZB | 1'13.993 | 1.196 | 0.149 |
| 21 | 2 | Bryce Fullwood | Holden Commodore ZB | 1'14.052 | 1.255 | 0.059 |
| 22 | 96 | Macauley Jones | Holden Commodore ZB | 1'14.234 | 1.437 | 0.182 |
| 23 | 22 | Garry Jacobson | Holden Commodore ZB | 1'14.300 | 1.503 | 0.066 |
| 24 | 4 | Jack Smith | Holden Commodore ZB | 1'14.442 | 1.645 | 0.141 |
| View full results | ||||||
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