Gerard McLeod heads into this weekend’s Watpac Townsville 400 off the back of a promising first test for new Super2 team, Kali Motorsport.

McLeod, who is spearheading the operation, will pilot one of the team’s two ex-Lucas Dumbrell Motorsport VF Commodores in its maiden round.

The former V8 Utes racer has been buoyed by a promising test at Winton in the week leading up to the trip to North Queensland from Kali’s Melbourne base.

“We had a really, really successful day, so we were very pleased,” McLeod told Speedcafe.com.

“We did 105 laps with absolutely zero problems in the car, and the car’s gone through a rebuild.

“The pace throughout the day was more than I could have expected, so I’m very pleased.”

The start will be McLeod’s first since the corresponding round of 2017, when he campaigned an ageing previous-era FG Falcon.

Having a chance to genuinely prepare for this weekend’s racing has left the man who was also an LDM mechanic quietly confident of a better performance than that of 12 months ago.

“The race meeting’s a whole different kettle of fish but last year I didn’t even get a test day in and I went up there in a very old, outdated car with zero budget and we pretty much just made up the numbers,” he recalled.

“This year, we’re in a position now where I can confidently say that we can compete and get a quality result.

“I’m not saying we’re going to be on the front row, I’m not saying we’re going to win the round, but we should be able to compete with the level of machinery we have now, the people we’ve got around us, and the technical support as well.”

Kali plans to build up its second Triple Eight-built Holden in time to also run it at Bathurst in October.

Paul Dumbrell leads the Dunlop Super2 Series ahead of Round 4, which kicks off with two 40-minute practice sessions this Friday.