FRIDAY PRACTICE WRAP – PENRITE RACING

Hitting the streets of Newcastle for the first time, Penrite Racing kicked the Gen3 era off to a flying start in Practice 1. David Reynolds secured P3 with a time of 1:12.1979 and rookie, Matt Payne brought his Ford Mustang Gen3 in to close out the first practice in P15.

Practice 2 saw Matt finish P23 and Reynolds higher in the pack in P12.

It was P15 for Matt Payne and P21 for David Reynolds to round out the last practice session before Qualifying and Race 1 tomorrow.

David Reynolds, Driver #26 said:

“First time in the Gen3 around here. The car handles very different to the old car. All in all it was a good day I think our pace relative to the rest of the field was quite strong we were always in the top 5 for the majority of the day until right at the end when we put new tyres on and we just probably didn’t get the most out of them so we’ve learned a lot about this car today the limits of what not to do and what to do, so every time we change something we’re learning a lot so everyone; engineers, drivers, we’ve got our eyes wide open, our minds wide open to figure out what’s the best plan for tomorrow but it was a positive day, very positive day.”

Matthew Payne, Driver #19 said:

“Just finished day one here of practice in Newcastle. Rolled out the gate pretty well, we were pretty quick straight away. Made a couple of set up changes throughout the day…put new tyres on for the last session and I think judging by the times, it was incredibly close for the mid-packs. We have to do a bit of work overnight for both cars, but I think it’s been a pretty positive day. There hasn’t been any damage. We have both been pretty clean – that was the focus today: to minimise any mistakes and I think we’ve both achieved that so it’s going to be all on for tomorrow for Qualifying and then 95 laps.”

Tomorrow will see Qualifying first up, Top Ten Shootout and the first Race of 2023 in the afternoon.

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