Heimgartner edges De Pasquale, Waters in Supercars Practice 2

Brad Jones Racing’s Andre Heimgartner has set the pace as a depleted Repco Supercars Championship field moved onto super soft tyres in Practice 2 for the Beaurepaires Melbourne SuperSprint.

Heimgartner wheeled the #8 R&J Batteries Camaro to a 1:47.8706s just before the chequered flag in a half-hour session which ran green throughout at Albert Park.

Dick Johnson Racing’s Anton De Pasquale (#11 Shell V-Power Mustang) and Tickford Racing’s Cameron Waters (#6 Monster Energy Mustang) finished within 0.0467s of the New Zealander, with Broc Feeney (#88 Red Bull Ampol Camaro) fourth in the only Triple Eight Race Engineering entry which went out in the second session of the Formula 1 Rolex Australian Grand Prix weekend.

Neither his team-mate Shane van Gisbergen (#97 Red Bull Ampol Camaro) nor Tim Slade (#23 Nulon Camaro) were starters after their crashes in Practice 1, although there are hopes that both will make qualifying this afternoon.

The overwhelming majority had run on the hard compound of tyre throughout the day’s first session but some started Practice 2 on the super soft, with both to be used across qualifying and during each of the weekend’s four races.

Feeney was among them heading out on the stickier rubber, clocking a pace-setting 1:48.0460s on his first flyer, with David Reynolds (#26 Penrite Mustang) quickest of those on a hard in fourth on a 1:50.2404s.

Once Reynolds switched to super softs, he came close to knocking Feeney off when he clocked a 1:48.1132s, before Waters did indeed manage to do that with a 1:47.9173s.

With five minutes remaining, Will Davison (#17 Shell V-Power Mustang) went quickest to the second sector but pitted rather than completing the lap, before DJR team-mate De Pasquale set a 1:47.8917s in the last couple of minutes.

Heimgartner was soon across the stripe to go even quicker, then went for a tour through the grass after the rear end of the R&J Batteries machine broke free at Turn 1.

Feeney’s first flyer proved his fastest lap, with James Courtney (#5 Snowy River Caravans Mustang) rounding out the top five in the second of the Tickford entries, from Reynolds, Mark Winterbottom (#18 DeWalt Camaro), Will Brown (#9 Coca-Cola Camaro), Nick Percat (#2 Mobil 1 NTI Mustang), and Thomas Randle (#55 Castrol Mustang).

Macauley Jones (#96 Pizza Hut Camaro) was 11th and Davison 12th, while championship leader Chaz Mostert (#25 Mobil 1 Optus Mustang) ended up 15th with a bump of the outside wall at the Turn 8 sweeper along the way.

Tyre blistering was a significant challenge with the soft compound last year and there appeared to be mixed experiences from the super soft, with some getting multiple push laps out of them but others struggling to even get through one circuit of Albert Park before noticeable degradation set in.

The qualifying sessions which set the grid for Race 3 and Race 4 respectively get underway this afternoon from 14:45 local time/AEDT.

Results: Practice 2