Strong start to Sandown 500 weekend for BJR

Supercars

Brad Jones Racing have rolled out strong at the Sandown 500, with Andre Heimgartner and co-driver Declan Fraser at the top end of the time sheets in all three practice sessions.

Heading into the first endurance race of the season, the R&J Batteries car looked racey at the hands of Heimgartner and Fraser.

Fraser finished second in the dedicated co-driver session while Heimgartner was third on the sheets in the third hit out of the day.

Across the garage Bryce Fullwood and Jaylyn Robotham had a bit of an up-and-down day chasing car balance.

The pair believe there’s more to come from the Middy’s Electrical Camaro, Fullwood was 11th fastest at the end of Practice 3 - however he was under three tenths off the fastest time of the session.

An incredibly slim margin covered most of the field in that last outing, with less than a second from first to 25th.

Macauley Jones in the Pizza Hut Racing Camaro ended the day in 20th, with Jordan Boys setting the 7th fastest lap in the co-driver session.

Both the #96 crew and the #50 car of Jaxon Evans and Dean Fiore were looking for a bit more balance in the car and with two more practices tomorrow are confident that they can go into qualifying strong.

Supercars are back on track tomorrow at 9:55 AEST for Practice 4. 

Super2

It was a tricky day for both Elliot Cleary and Cody Gillis in the Dunlop Super2 Series.

Cleary struggled with balance in the #19 Sync Music ZB Commodore and finished the sessions in 17th and 18th respectively.

Team-mate Gillis also struggled with the car balance aboard the #9 Bowser Bean ZB Commodore and is eager to move up the grid in qualifying tomorrow.

The duo will review the data overnight and look at where to find speed at the historic Sandown circuit.

Super2 action continues tomorrow with qualifying at 11:30 AEST. 

Supercars Quoteboard

Andre Heimgartner
 Supercars driver, #8 R&J Batteries Camaro
"The car rolled out pretty fast and was able to work on my driving technique, which is nice. Declan was speedy, and we have similar sort of driving styles and feedback, so it's good. Really looking forward to tomorrow. Looks like be some rain but hopefully it'll be dry for qualifying and we can share our speed and get stuck into it. But a really positive start. It's just a credit to all the work everyone's done and the test days we did. So yeah, hopefully we keep it rolling."

Declan Fraser
Supercars co-driver, #8 R&J Batteries Camaro
"It was cool in the morning session to jump in after Andre and just go back-to-back against each other. First session, we came out of with pretty good feedback and quite close to each other. And then that allowed me to go into the co-driver session with a bit of confidence. We did a long race run, which went pretty well. The team were stoked with that, and then went into a bit of a quali sim at the end of the session. Ended up coming out p2 so, very happy with the pace that we've got rolling into tomorrow for qualifying. Andre finished third in that last practice session as well, so massive confidence boost for the whole team now. We've got to keep the momentum going and come home strong tomorrow to put us in a good spot for the race."


Bryce Fullwood
Supercars driver, #14 Middy's Electrical Camaro
"A little bit of up-and-down day here for us at Sandown. First practice, the car really wasn't too nice for us, so it was a little bit of a bugger. We tuned it up a fair bit for the third practice, but it's still very erratic and still quite hard to piece a lot together. So I think there's a little bit of speed in it but it's just very difficult at the moment to put it all together. We've got some work to do overnight to try and make it a little bit more repeatable and hopefully we'll be good for tomorrow, depending what the weather does."

Jaylyn Robotham
Supercars co-driver, #14 Middy's Electrical Camaro
"First session, we struggled a bit with the car. We made some changes for the second session and did a race run. I wasn't too happy with it because I was still getting up to grips and getting comfortable in the car. We went out on a better tyre at the end and finished p8 which is pretty good. Third session, Bryce did the whole thing just trying to find a good setup for a race run. We’ve got a bit of speed to find but confident we can make some changes overnight and go quicker tomorrow."

Macauley Jones
Supercars driver, #96 Pizza Hut Camaro
"It's nice to be in the Enduro season. It's roll out balance wasn't too bad. The tyre phasing is always a bit of a weird one here for practice with different batches of tyres, I think it throws a spanner in the works quite a lot for us, which can be confusing for the balance. But I feel like the car's not too bad. It's just trying to get the most out of it for a one lap. Qualifying is quite difficult. It's very close, but it's a little loose, so will try and tune that up a little bit. Jordan did a solid job and a race run, so hopefully we can keep it going in the right direction for tomorrow -which is also odd with more practice but kind of nice, but the weather's gonna probably turn to shit for lack of a better word. So we might be putting some wets on tomorrow which will be interesting."

Jordan Boys
Supercars co-driver, #96 Pizza Hut Camaro
"We had a good day. Our race run was fairly strong, and then our one lap pace provided some confidence. We just have to tune the car up a little bit more for quali for Macca."

Jaxon Evans
Supercars driver, #12 SCT Logistics Camaro
"Day one complete. Three practice sessions today. Practice one, Dean started and then I got in the car. So both got a bit of a taste for Sandown, and what the car was like which we weren't too happy with. So tried to make some changes for the Co-driver session. Dean got some valuable laps, did a race run and then threw a set of tyres on at the end. But wasn't too bad, just still not quite happy with where our car was. So we actually made some big changes for practice three, which I had all to myself thanks to my lovely co-driver. But we were learning, the car is definitely was a step in the right direction. Still not where we want to be, a couple little mistakes when it came to crunch time on the better tyres but I don't think our position is representative of our car speed. Still a lot of work to do. We've got another two practice sessions before qualifying tomorrow. And whether it's wet or dry we'll hopefully be further up the grid."

Dean Fiore
Supercars co-driver, #12 SCT Logistics Camaro
"Good to get a lot more laps under my belt. I'd like to drive the car after the big changes that we made between practice, two and three. So, looking forward to tomorrow."

Super2 Quoteboard

Elliott Cleary
Super2 driver, #19 Sync Music ZB Commodore 
"Friday done at Sandown, bit of an average day. I feel like we just have been trying to get on top of the car, balance and a few things on my side driving wise. We'll look at it all tonight, and come back tomorrow and go better."

Cody Gillis
Super2 driver, #9 Bowser Bean ZB Commodore 
“Tough day at Sandown. Sort of just lacking a bit of everything, little bit of driver and little bit of car setup. It’ll be a late night tonight working on it and going through all the data. We’ll reset to go again tomorrow.”