The Shell V-Power Racing Team is growing in confidence ahead of Supercars’ enduro races.

While the Dick Johnson Racing Mustangs were not the pace-setters in the most recent event of the season, at The Bend, Anton De Pasquale and Will Davison each scored two top 10 finishes, with mitigating circumstances applying with respect to the exceptions.

It is still not the swashbuckling form which the Ford homologation team had come to regularly show in recent seasons, but it does represent an upward trend after a major struggle at the start of the 2023 season, the first of Gen3.

On the shape which DJR is in, CEO David Noble told Speedcafe at the conclusion of the OTR SuperSprint, “Probably better than we have been, the previous couple of rounds.

“I think if you look at the improvements collectively now after a couple of rounds for everyone across the board, we’re becoming more confident going into the enduros.

“It’ll be interesting to see what the debrief gives us, and then with a bit of testing for ourselves before Sandown, to see if we can, gain a bit more to go into that first enduro.”

Davison and De Pasquale qualified 13th and 14th respectively for Race 20, the Saturday encounter at The Bend, after a gamble on sitting out the final runs of Part 2 of the knockout session backfired.

Still, they raced through to ninth and 11th respectively by the chequered flag, and Davison might have made it three top 10s from three if he was not taken out on Lap 1 of the weekend finale.

That came despite him tipping that the team needed a big swing at set-up from Saturday to Sunday as it comes to terms with the latest Gen3 Mustang package.

“I think the thing that we liked was that we just kept fighting,” remarked Noble.

“We got a better set-up again [on Sunday]; top 10 finish for both guys. Will was a bit unlucky in that scrap early on [and] I thought Anton drove really well for both races, so still lots of learning, but I thought we fought it out really well.”

Davison is 10th in the drivers’ championship and De Pasquale 12th ahead of the Penrite Oil Sandown 500 on September 15-17.

Additional reporting: Mark Fogarty