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After more than a year of development, the Melbourne-based squad revealed its first two Peugeot 308 P51 TCR cars in their respective liveries.
After an initial shakedown at Sandown Raceway, the cars were tested at Calder Park on Wednesday ahead of their competition debut at Sydney Motorsport Park.
Ben Bargwanna and Jordan Cox will race the new Peugeots at the forthcoming SpeedSeries event, which hosts round six of the Supercheap Auto TCR Australia Series.
“It’s a new opportunity, it’s something we’ve been looking forward to for a very long time,” said Bargwanna.
“We finally get the chance to shake down the new Peugeot and I’m very optimistic about what the weekend will bring.
“It is a bit of a ball in the air type situation, we’re not exactly sure how it will go but I’m excited. Can’t wait to just get out there in practice one and finally turn some laps in Sydney.
“If you go from the rear tail light to the front headlight, basically everything is different to the old car so there’s going to be a lot to learn for sure.
“There’s a lot that we need to understand about it, which will take a while but that’s all part of it.”
Cox will continue to carry Schaeffler colours at Sydney Motorsport Park.
The front-wheel-drive specialist has tempered his expectations for the new builds.
“We’re expecting a good and solid consistent performance,” said Cox.
“It’s still very much early days for this car, so it’s foolish to think we’d be getting the most out of it.
“On paper, the spec of the P51 is much better than the previous generation.
“We’d hope to be fighting for the podium position at least and then have something to build on for the next event at Bathurst.
“The tuning ability of the car and the drivability are two areas that we should really notice a difference.
“GRM did a great job of tuning the last car up to the maximum of its performance ceiling, and along the way we learnt the limitations of that car.
“The luxury of building a new car is knowing what we need to improve on, it already looks like the team have done a great job of that.
“How that translates on track, we’ll find out soon.”
Fresh off competing in the Bathurst 1000 in the Supercars and Super2 fields, Aaron Cameron will return to the saddle of his Peugeot 308 alongside Ryan Casha.
The TCR Australia Series opens its account at Sydney Motorsport Park on Friday with two practice sessions.
Coverage of the SpeedSeries event is live and exclusive on the Seven Network across 7mate, 7two and 7plus.
Supercheap Auto TCR Australia Series is supported by Fanatec GT World Challenge Australia Powered by AWS, Monochrome GT4 Australia, Porsche Michelin Sprint Challenge Australia, First Focus Radical Cup Australia, Giti Australian Formula Open and Meguiar’s Australian Production Cars.
