Hill, 28, enjoyed a stellar Thursday at Albert Park, taking a third and a second from the two qualifying sessions and converting the former to a third-place finish in the evening’s race.

It was the perfect fightback from a poor Sydney 500 for the entire MSR team and a strong statement from the Canberran.

Hill had to take the long road to Supercars. Two years in Formula Ford were followed by two in Toyota 86 and four in Carerra Cup, all with his own team.

A single year with Triple Eight in Super2 then catapulted him into the Supercars seat at MSR, where he had improved steadily over two seasons but lacked a breakthrough result.

“It’s been a bit of a journey, right?” he said on TV after the finish.

“It’s a bit of a dream come true to make it to the main game and then there’s another mountain to climb when you get here.

“I really thought this year we had the potential to get on the podium and just a massive thanks to the guys at Matt Stone Racing.

“This car, this is special. It’s built for greatness and there’s more in it.”

The “built for greatness” comment was not an impromptu one.

“It’s the motto we’re running with this year,” he later explained, having received a new chassis for the start of the 2025 season.

“I just said that this car has got good vibes about it. We’re going to try to put it out in the universe and it’s starting to pay back.”

Hill finished his rookie Supercars season 23rd in points before improving to 13th last year, ending that season knowing what he had to do to take the next step.

“Towards the second half of last year I thought I had some really good races, we circled qualifying as the area we needed to improve,” he said

“If you can qualify at the front, you can generally stay up there. That was the goal for us this year, to be better at quali, so we’re off to a decent start.”

As for his pre-season promise to the crew that had built “greatness” in the form of a new Camaro?

“I sort of promised the boys before the year started that I’d get them a trophy and I was a bit stressed about that because I thought if I don’t follow through, I’ll look like an idiot,” he said.

“So I’m glad I can give them one this early in the year and then we can try and put together a few more.”

Hill followed Triple Eight duo Broc Feeney and Will Brown from lights to flag in the Thursday race and will line up alongside the former on the front row today.

“Being on the front row there is the opportunity that if we can get a good start, I can play the game like they did,” he said.

“They were stressing me out driving so slow [to manage tyres]. I was glad the Safety Car came because they got a bit of a move on after that.”