Erebus Motorsport has their eyes forward to Sandown, after struggling to crack the set-up this weekend at Sydney Motorsport Park.

With the fastest times set in the opening minutes of qualifying, Reynolds and Davies were unable to maximise the track when it was at its best.

They pulled together their fastest laps in the last minute, however was only good enough for 20^th and 25^th respectively. Davies did however make gains, closing his margin by 0.6seconds to the leader.

Following a troubled qualifying session, the team’s day fought to improve. Reynolds made an early move on Karl Reindler in the shortened 51-lap race, before setting his eyes on Tim Slade and Todd Kelly in front. The #9 driver put all efforts into making a move stick, but was unable to get the job done.

With today’s race scheduled in the early afternoon and track temperatures above those seen yesterday, Davies also found it difficult with an even greater stress on tyre life.

Reynolds pitted for a fresh set on lap 12, and with no rest for our crew, Davies shortly followed; both drivers completing their first of two compulsory stops.

With tyre life proving the deciding factor, Reynolds came in for his second stop on lap 31 and inevitably too late. Re-joining the race, the #9 driver made his best attempt to pass a slower Jason Bright but wore his front tyres, and ultimately sealing his 19^th placed finishing position.

Davies again pitted just laps later, and now surrounded by those on older rubber he chased the pack in front but with not enough laps left, he passed the chequered flag 25^th.

The team now prepare for the season’s first endurance event, the Wilson Security Sandown 500, September 16 – 18.

Shae Davies, #4 Erebus Motorsport

“I was pretty excited after yesterday, I think we made some good headway with the car balance. We headed into qualifying and the whole field went slower but we had a six tenth net gain today, so for me personally that was really good, to extract more time out of the car when everyone else went slower.

“I believe we had a pretty good balance in the car but obviously today’s race was in a hotter part of the day so that threw us a little bit in the first and second stint of the race. I struggled to get longevity out of the tyre and tried a few things with the car and different racing lines, and by the third stint we had some pace and decent car balance but it was a shame it was a little too late.

“In the last stint we were lapping up with the mid-fielders so I was really happy with that and where we ended up, I just wish we got there  a little quicker. We need to qualify better and push forward earlier on, the whole category finished where they started so if we had qualified a couple of cars up, we might had a better result today.”

David Reynolds, #9 Erebus Motorsport Penrite Oil Racing

“Qualifying was pretty bad, we lost a lot of positions from yesterday which I’m not happy about because the further back you are the worse your race will be. The whole objective of today was to qualify better and we didn’t do that so we started the race down the back and we basically finished down there.

“From about lap 3 or 4 I noticed I wasn’t keeping up with the rest of the pack, and knew it was going to be a long race. I tried to play with my bars and get the most out of the car but nothing was really working. We just had the wrong set up; we need to understand our car a lot better for long-loaded corners. I think the short, sharper stuff like street circuits suit our cars, but the long-loaded corners we need to work on.”