In a highly competitive session at the Beaurepairs Sydney SuperNight, less than a second covered the top 15 in qualifying for Round 3 of the Porsche Michelin GT3 Cup Challenge Australia.
The TekworkX Motorsport team locked out the top two positions at Sydney Motorsport Park with Aron Shields (1:29.9819) able to knock off his teammate Nash Morris by 0.012s to take pole position for Race 1. It was his first after qualifying third and sixth at the previous rounds.
Morris who is making his debut in the category while also competing in Super 2 and Trans Am/TA2, was the fastest in the first practice session and third on overall practice times, was the initial pacesetter. He was eclipsed for a period before he became the first to go sub 1:30 with a 1:29.998 flyer.
Marcos Flack, from Sonic Racing, recovered from a spin that triggered a red flag in P2, to be third fastest ahead of Earl Bamber Motorsport’s Zac Stichbury. He was the quickest of a trio of Pro drivers from New Zealand as he headed Ronan Murphy (Sonic) and points leader Marco Giltrap (EBM).
Lachlan Bloxsom from McElrea Racing was seventh just in front of the quickest of the Pro Am drivers in Adrian Flack (EBM). Pros Harrison Goodman and Tom Taplin rounded out the top 10 with Hamis Fitzsimmons next. The three time Queensland karting champion in his first year of Porsches, set the pace earlier by going fastest in the overall times of the two practice sessions.
Then in 12th position was Sam Shahin, the second of the Pro Am steerers and currently unbeaten in the class with six victories over the last two rounds.
Nearest to Shahin in Pro Am is Brett Boulton who has been second at each race, and qualified 16th behind Caleb Sumich, Tom McLennan and Oscar Target. Matt Slavin was third in Pro Am while Brad Carr in 18th headed the Class B runners as Richard Cowan and Andrew Goldie made up the top 20.
The Porsches next hit the track for Race 1 on Saturday July 29 under lights for a scheduled 14 laps at 18:25 before two races on Sunday at 10:10 and 13:35.