CHAZ Mostert says it’s hard to know if revisions to Ford’s aerodynamic package helped him to an encouraging second-fastest time in Friday practice at the Boost Mobile Gold Coast 500.
The 11 Mustangs on the Supercars grid are running an updated package this weekend following a post-Bathurst parity review.
A raft of changes – which Ford had lobbied to have approved before Bathurst – have been aimed at reducing drag and redistributing downforce to the rear of the car.
While talk of the tweaks dominated the headlines in the lead-up to the event, their effectiveness was always going to be difficult to quantify on the tight street course.
The first day of running for the Gen3 cars on the Surfers Paradise layout was complicated by tricky track conditions from intermittent showers.
“It’s really hard to try to judge it around here compared to the track we just came from,” said Mostert, who finished Practice 2 just 0.1975s adrift of Shane van Gisbergen’s Camaro.
“Between Bathurst and here it’s completely different, so I can’t really comment too much on it to be honest.
“I was surprised with that last lap to be up here, conditions were pretty tricky but like Shane said, everyone is dealing with the same thing.
“We had got a list of things to try throughout the sessions; we still tried to do them, but it was really hard to get a read on.”
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The pre-Gold Coast changes marked the third aero package for the Mustang this year, and largely reversed revisions made ahead of Townsville in July.
Supercars announced this week that it’ll beef-up its aero program in the off-season via wind tunnel testing at the renowned Windshear facility in the United States.
The category also ran pitot tubes and ride height sensors on selected cars today as it gathers data on the aerodynamic performance of the two cars.
Friday ended with four Mustangs inside the top 10.
Walkinshaw Andretti United driver Mostert led the Ford charge, while Tickford Racing’s Cam Waters, James Courtney and Thomas Randle ended the day fifth, sixth and 10th respectively.
Little over 0.3 seconds separated the top five cars that also included the Camaros of Jack Le Brocq and Scott Pye.
“It looks pretty tight at the top so that’s pretty promising and it’s going to be a pretty interesting qualifying tomorrow because I know, me personally, I don’t feel that confident out there,” Mostert added.
“I haven’t had a lot of dry laps today and even when you’re changing lines, off-line was still a bit wet as well.
“It’s still fun, sliding around… and today WAU gave me something that I felt a bit more confident in than I have the last few rounds anyway.”
