Shane van Gisbergen has described his Friday at the Bathurst 1000 as “another pretty disappointing day” despite rescuing a berth in the Top 10 Shootout.
The Red Bull Ampol Racing driver was off the road in all three sessions but stitched together a good enough lap to put the #97 Camaro a provisional seventh on the starting grid for Sunday’s 161-lap race after being 13th when the chequered flag came out.
“I had another pretty disappointing day, but as always I have to thank my team for doing an incredible job with my car again, but it’s been tough out there,” said van Gisbergen, who won last year’s Bathurst 1000.
“The #88 guys are doing a cracking job and we’re working really well together to make sure both cars are competitive before we get to Sunday.
“At the end of the day, the car is still straight, we’re working through our programme, and our excitement is building to Sunday.”
‘The #88 guys’, namely Broc Feeney and Jamie Whincup, are also into the shootout after the former earned fifth in Qualifying.
Whincup, also Team Principal at Triple Eight Race Engineering, said, “Overall, both of our cars are in the [top] 10, so that’s fantastic.
“Of course, you want to be faster, but today’s job was to get both cars in the 10, and we did that.
“Broc was solid all day, and SVG did a great job on the last lap. He wasn’t happy with the car but he dug deep and got us into the 10, so full respect to him.
“We’ll now work on making the cars quicker. In terms of race pace, we’re not sure on what it will be – I don’t think anyone knows just yet.
“We’ve got some work to do, but I’m happy we’re in the 10.”
For Feeney, who was benched from Qualifying at a wet Mount Panorama 12 months ago, tomorrow afternoon will be something of a landmark moment in his career.
“The goal from today was to make sure we made the shootout, which we’ve done, so that’s great,” he said.
“It doesn’t really matter if you’re first or 10th, as long as you’ve made it in there.
“We’re certainly not the quickest car out there, but we’ve been close.
“We learnt a few things, and it’s just awesome to be in the shootout – my first one.
“We’ll try and focus on the race car a bit tomorrow and then tune it up for the shootout.”
Meanwhile, van Gisbergen’s co-driver, Richie Stanaway, is eager for Practice 5 tomorrow morning given it is exclusively for the part-timers.
“I’m looking forward to the co-driver session in the morning because today was a light day for me,” he said.
“I think we have some good car speed, so we have to keep working on that and see how we end up on Sunday.
“I’m comfortable in the car, so we just have to keep moving forward from where we are, but overall I think we’re in a pretty good spot.”
Practice 5 starts at 10:00 local time/AEDT.
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