HOLDSWORTH TURNS IT ON

Holdsworth held off a late flying run from Triple Eight Engineering’s Shane van Gisbergen, to finish with the fastest lap time of the day at one minute 12.6772 seconds.

It was a case of catch up across the grid during yesterday’s second practice session after the unrelenting drizzle at the start of the day had caused havoc to many teams’ plans.

Only 20 drivers made their way on to the Reid Park surface for the opening session, with a slick effort from Monster Energy driver Cameron Waters putting him on top.

Waters’s impressive day behind the wheel of his Monster Energy Mustang continued in the second practice session when he finished fifth, 0.1818 seconds behind Tickford teammate Holdsworth.

“It’s good to be back. It is only practice, but I am getting more and more comfortable in the car every time I get in it. Around here you need really good confidence,” Holdsworth said.

“First session we had all sorts of conditions, we were pretty quick in the wet and then we got to experience the dry as well.

“The track seemed to have fairly good grip. We obviously didn’t get to make too many changes, but here we are. We have rolled out with a really good car and hopefully we can continue it over the weekend.”

It was a rare sight with the rain falling on the Reid Park surface during the opening practice session, and while the weather forecast is expected to improve over the weekend, Holdsworth said he was paying no attention to the morning weatherman.

“I don’t even look, because there is no point,” he said. “People were saying it was going to be wet all day, others were saying it was going to be dry. You just have to deal with what you have got.

“It would be nice to have a dry weekend. Around here, it is pretty crazy in the wet. There is plenty of surface changes, you go from having grip, to no grip, to grip.”

Supercars leader Scott Mclaughlin finished the second practice session in third place, running old tyres throughout the entirety of the halfhour session.

After overcoming the tough start in the opening session, Mclaughlin began to show signs of the form that has helped him to 12 race wins from 16 starts already this season.

“This morning was a bit of a waste in some ways. We got some wet testing done, but it was all right,” he said.

The Supercars will have a final practice session this morning before going into qualifying for the opening race at 11.50am.