vx350int, on Mar 10 2008, 09:48 PM, said:
IMHO I would hardly think that Holden or Ford would let another manufacturer due to the sudden loss of the market share eg.. if they let Toyota and Mitsubishi run Holdens/Fords market share would drop to 25%...
just another dig to Mr HRT...go the FORDS!!!!!
funny thing to say on a commodore website
I thought you went for the driver not the brand???
anyways early day Chris, early days. It's not who's leading after
two rounds of the season it's who is winning at the end......
Skaife draws first blood at Sprint Gas Red vs Blue Challenge at the AGP for Holden
Release date: 13/03/2008
Toll Holden Racing Team driver Mark Skaife has fired the first shot for the Red corner in this weekend's Sprint Gas V8 Supercars Manufacturers Challenge at Albert Park.
Skaife waited until the dying stages of qualifying to snatch provisional pole position with a 1min 58.5086sec lap.
Only moments earlier Ford Performance Racing's Steve Richards had climbed to the top of the timesheet with a 1min 58.6621; however, he had to settle for second following Skaife's blistering time.
The session was red-flagged at the 19-minute mark when a stray tyre from a barrier was knocked onto the circuit at Turn Four.
By the time it was removed there was only eight minutes left for teams to make a mad scramble to set fast laps.
“I knew after the red flag that everyone was going to have another go,” Skaife said.
“It was obvious that the track was going to change compared to what it was before the red flag.
“I also changed the car for that last bit as I was unhappy with it when I first drove out, so it was a good direction for us.”
Skaife indicated that the teams who can have the right setup at the right time would be the ones who profit this weekend.
“You have to chase the track here with setup (as more rubber gets laid by the Formula One cars),” he said.
He also believes that if the ambient temperature remains hot that looking after the machinery will be paramount over the four days of the event.
“As the weekend goes on the heat will become a factor as the engine temperatures will be high and the brake temperatures will be high, so there is a bit of thought needed to make sure that they last for the duration of all the races,” he said.
Steve Richards claimed he was more than happy with his replacement car, which was built up using a chassis from last season after the FPR driver destroyed his 2008 car in an accident at Sydney's Eastern Creek last weekend.
“The car has a good track record; it's Frosty's car from last year and it has had enough updates over its life to be right up there with our current cars,” he said.
Jason Richards found the going tough in the hot conditions, but was ecstatic to finish with the third fastest time (1min 58.7134).
“It was very hot and I didn't have a cool suit so the guys probably won't let me run a cool suit from now on,” he joked.
Will Davison was the fourth fastest followed by Garth Tander, Mark Winterbottom, Cameron McConville, Craig Lowndes, Russell Ingall and Steven Johnson.
Under the unique format for the weekend, the five fastest Holdens and the five fastest Fords advance to tomorrow's Top Ten Shootout; however, it all worked nicely for the statisticians with exactly five of each marque making up the fastest 10 cars overall.
TeamVodafone took a huge gamble and waited until late in the session before both Falcons went out for flying laps.
While it worked for Lowndes, who secured a place in the Shootout as one of the five fastest Fords, Jamie Whincup - who had been fastest in the practice session earlier in the day - was caught behind slower cars on his fast lap.
There was some talk leading up to the event that the non-championship races would not be taken seriously by the drivers and would be used as little more than an extra test session by the teams, but Steve Richards comments after qualifying put paid to that school of thought.
“You always come here to have a go, especially if you qualify well… there is no way that any of the three of us (Skaife, Jason Richards and himself) will be sitting back tomorrow and not having a go,” he said at the post-qualifying press conference.
“It's a good opportunity to get some results on the board, but at the same time we can have a bit of a play with the setup of the cars for the championship,” he concluded.
The Top Ten Shootout kicks off at 12:45pm today (Friday).
Thursday : Qualifying
Pos Car Entrant Driver Vehicle Laps Fastest Lap Fastest Lap Time Gap
1 2 Toll Holden Racing Team Mark Skaife Holden Commodore VE 8 8 1:58.5086
2 6 Ford Performance Racing Steven Richards Ford Falcon BF 6 6 1:58.6621 0:00.1535
3 3 Sprint Gas Racing Jason Richards Holden Commodore VE 8 7 1:58.7134 0:00.2048
4 18 Jim Beam Racing Will Davison Ford Falcon BF 7 7 1:58.7249 0:00.2163
5 1 Toll Holden Racing Team Garth Tander Holden Commodore VE 6 3 1:58.8971 0:00.3885
6 5 Ford Performance Racing Mark Winterbottom Ford Falcon BF 7 7 1:59.1371 0:00.6285
7 15 HSV Dealer Team Rick Kelly Holden Commodore VE 6 6 1:59.1387 0:00.6301
8 14 WOW Racing Cameron McConville Holden Commodore VE 7 2 1:59.1964 0:00.6878
9 888 TeamVodafone Craig Lowndes Ford Falcon BF 4 3 1:59.2023 0:00.6937
10 39 Supercheap Auto Racing Russell Ingall Holden Commodore VE 7 6 1:59.2442 0:00.7356
11 17 Jim Beam Racing Steven Johnson Ford Falcon BF 9 7 1:59.2450 0:00.7364
12 88 TeamVodafone Jamie Whincup Ford Falcon BF 3 2 1:59.2552 0:00.7466
13 4 Jeld-Wen Motorsport James Courtney Ford Falcon BF 8 2 1:59.2988 0:00.7902
14 9 SP Tools Shane Van Gisbergen Ford Falcon BF 11 9 1:59.3754 0:00.8668
15 25 Fujitsu Racing Jason Bright Ford Falcon BF 8 7 1:59.4549 0:00.9463
16 12 Team BOC Andrew Jones Holden Commodore VE 8 7 1:59.4939 0:00.9853
17 111 Glenfords Racing Fabian Coulthard Ford Falcon BF 12 7 1:59.5730 0:01.0644
18 33 Valvoline Cummins Race Team Lee Holdsworth Holden Commodore VE 8 7 1:59.6715 0:01.1629
19 51 Sprint Gas Racing Greg Murphy Holden Commodore VE 9 8 1:59.6851 0:01.1765
20 16 Autobarn Racing Team Paul Dumbrell Holden Commodore VE 11 7 1:59.8272 0:01.3186
21 7 Jack Daniel's Racing Todd Kelly Holden Commodore VE 6 6 1:59.9082 0:01.3996
22 55 Rod Nash Racing Tony D'Alberto Holden Commodore VE 10 6 2:00.0081 0:01.4995
23 67 Supercheap Auto Racing Paul Morris Holden Commodore VE 10 6 2:00.1834 0:01.6748
24 50 PWR Performance Products Andrew Thompson Holden Commodore VE 10 10 2:00.3897 0:01.8811
25 34 Valvoline Cummins Race Team Michael Caruso Holden Commodore VE 11 7 2:00.6498 0:02.1412
26 11 Jack Daniel's Racing Shane Price Holden Commodore VE 12 10 2:00.8066 0:02.2980
27 26 IRWIN Racing Marcus Marshall Ford Falcon BF 10 9 2:01.0328 0:02.5242
28 777 Ausdrill Ford Rising Stars Michael Patrizi Ford Falcon BF 10 8 2:01.7018 0:03.1932
29 021 Team Kiwi Racing Kayne Scott Ford Falcon BF 10 10 2:02.1051 0:03.5965
This post has been edited by MR.HRT: 14 March 2008 - 01:33 PM
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