McLean fastest in incident-filled Super2 Practice 2 at Bathurst

Eggleston Motorsport’s Matt McLean has clocked the fastest lap of a heavily-disrupted Practice 2 for Round 5 of the Dunlop Super2 Series at Bathurst.

McLean set a 2:07.1031s in his #54 VF Commodore just before a second red flag period which ultimately led to the session being declared, leaving him 0.0284s faster than MW Motorsport’s Tyler Everingham (#27 Nissan Altima).

Practice 1 fast man Cameron Hill (#111 Triple Eight Race Engineering VF Commodore) was third on a 2:07.2864s, from Zak Best (#78 Tickford Racing FGX Falcon), and series leader Declan Fraser (#777 Triple Eight VF Commodore), with Brad Vaughan (#5 Anderson Motorsport FG Falcon) top in the Super3 class in 16th outright on a 2:10.5089s.

The Mount Panorama track surface was dry despite lingering grey clouds and Everingham, whose opening practice session effectively came to an early end due to a power steering drama, set the initial pace on a 2:10.1908s and then a 2:07.9998s.

A red flag was called in the 10th minute for either of two incidents for Super3 drivers, with James Masterton (#219 Masterton Motorsport VE Commodore) having a standard lock-up and off at Murray’s Corner, but Brendan Strong (#75 Brendan Strong VE Commodore) going deep into the tyre wall at Griffins Bend for reasons unclear.

While Strong was able to extricate himself, there was a long delay to recover the car and reset the barrier, with the end of the session extended 10 minutes to 15:30 local time and hence a net loss of around 12 minutes before green flags flew again.

A number of drivers reportedly rolled back out on green tyres and Hill immediately shifted the benchmark, albeit by just 0.0022s to a 2:07.9976s.

The fastest lap was reset then by Best’s 2:07.4441s, Everingham’s 2:07.1315s, and finally McLean’s (#54 VF Commodore) 2:07.1031s before a second red flag period, with just over 10 minutes remaining.

The cause was McLean’s Eggleston team-mate Cameron Crick, who skated off at The Chase and got his #38 VF Commodore stuck in the sodden gravel trap.

Behind the top five all-told was Angelo Mouzouris (#6 MWM Nissan Altima), from Matt Payne (#10 Grove Racing Nissan Altima), Thomas Maxwell (#3 MWM Nissan Altima), Reef McCarthy (#999 Image Racing VF Commodore), and Jay Hanson (#49 Image VF Commodore) in a top 10 covered by 1.8860s.

Aaron Seton had an early excursion up the Hell Corner run-off error having locked the inside-front on the #30 Matt Stone Racing VF Commodore before being classified 14th on a 2:09.4474s.

David Murphy experienced one of the more unusual incidents in the early minutes of the session when he lost control exiting The Cutting but essentially spun into the gap in the wall on drivers’ left where a tow truck is usually parked.

Save for some light contact with the tyres which line the opening of the wall, he got away unscathed and was able to rejoin the race track once turning his Eggleston-run #24 FG Falcon around in the infield.

Qualifying for Race 1 of the weekend starts tomorrow at 09:20 local time/AEDT.

Results: Practice 2

Classes: S2 Super2, CH Super3 Championship, SC3 Super3 Cup, HC Super3 Heritage Class