Erebus Motorsport’s Shae Davies hit the track at Winton Motor Raceway yesterday, for his first day of solo running in his new car.

The team utilized a Rookie Test Day as they welcomed the new face, ahead of his debut at Sydney Motorsport Park next week.

Rookie drivers are usually allowed three test days, additional to the team’s allocation, however under the changed circumstances Davies was allowed one Rookie Test Day as he enters midway through the season.

“The car feels great and the team did a great job,” Davies said.

“We made a lot of changes, every time I got in the car there was something different and something new for me to learn.

“They obviously trust me quite a lot because they threw a lot at me; we tried a lot and only a few things didn’t go in the right direction so we are feeling pretty pumped.”

Shifting from the older specification Ford raced in the Dunlop Series to the new generation Commodore didn’t take any time for Davies.

“The cars are fairly different, they are probably 80% of the same car but you can certainly feel the difference in the way they come off the corners,” he said.

“The soft tyre has been the biggest difference, there is a lot more grip than the hard tyre so getting my head around that, and getting the most out of the tyre is the biggest element.

“I haven’t had a lot of mileage so I am really appreciating every lap and I have come to grips with it reasonably well.

“There is always room for improvement but I am feeling more and more comfortable in the car each time I go out.”

Davies recently got the call up to the main game, after running ninth in the second-tier series this year, and has already impressed Erebus’ General Manager Barry Ryan.

“Shae exceeded our expectations, he showed a lot of maturity which is the main reason why we’ve selected him,” Ryan said.

“He gave good, honest feedback; better feedback than what we thought, which allowed us to do more changes than what we normally would have felt comfortable doing with a rookie, and those changes were meaningful.

“The team worked well together and it was our first real test day this year, it’s the first time we have been able to really try some new things; some of the changes were pretty radical but we probably have a bigger bag of tricks now.”

The team now prepare for the Sydney SuperSprint, August 26- 28.