Matt Payne Sandown 500 practice pace, Digi Mart USA News: Championship leader Matt Payne has got Grove Racing off to a flyer in the Penrite Oil Sandown 500. The Kiwi was fastest of all across the back-to-back sessions to set the tone for the weekend ahead.
Perhaps aided by his bonus tyre allocation as a rookie, Jayden Ojeda topped the opening 25-minute session for PremiAir Racing. The Friday benchmark would soon be lowered, however, with only a short intermission before cars returned to track for the second and final practice.
Payne’s time of 1m08.5014s proved unstoppable. Broc Feeney, Cooper Murray, André Heimgartner, James Golding, Ryan Wood, Anton De Pasquale and Ojeda himself all bettered the Practice 1 pace.
Less than nine tenths of a second covered the entire 24-car field in Practice 2. Attention now turns to qualifying for Race 33, which begins at 11:20am local time on Saturday morning.
