Kai Allen in the #26 Penrite Racing Ford Mustang during Thursday’s test day at Sydney Motorsport Park. Image: InSyde Media
The Penrite-backed pair were evenly matched to the tenth, with just 0.0252s splitting them after 45 minutes at Sydney Motorsport Park.
Jayden Ojeda was third and the best of the Chevrolet fleet for PremiAir Racing, 0.1138s off the pace. Fellow Camaro drivers Anton De Pasquale (Team 18) and Zach Bates (Matt Stone Racing) completed the top five.
Chaz Mostert led the Toyota Supra quartet in ninth, though his Walkinshaw TWG Racing teammate Ryan Wood languished in last.
The team said there were no issues with the #2 car, despite being 1.4 seconds off the pace.
“They feel great on track. For myself, we’re missing a little bit,” Wood explained.
“I’m driving too hard and trying to make up for my little bit of imbalance. Nonetheless, I’m enjoying driving something new.
“Every time, as a race car driver, you’re sort of searching. When you’ve got a new product underneath you, you’re always learning. That’s what this weekend is all about: learning.
“I probably haven’t done as much driving in the Supra as I would have liked being so busy over summer. I’ve got to pull my socks up and do a better job in qualifying and see where we land.”
Wood completed just 30 laps across four hours of testing on Thursday evening – the least of any driver.
Asked why that was the case, Wood said the team is still developing the Supra package.
“It’s been a bit of development on our end and learning. Big wholesale changes are being what we’ve been trying to find,” said Wood.
“That’s just when you’re exploring, you’re trying to look for that golden ticket at the bottom of the hat to see if you can find it.
“Hopefully we can creep closer to the faster guys. For myself, I’ve got to lean on car #1 now quite a bit to see what I’ve got to do.”
Mostert, meanwhile, said there was work to do on his end to be back towards the front.
The 2025 champion wound up half a second off the leading Allen Mustang.
“Yeah look, a little bit to work on in our camp, for sure,” said Mostert.
“We changed a lot of things throughout that practice session and hopefully we can throw the dart at the next one and make a few more spots. Not a bad start.
“The goal for us as a race car is just working on balance and keep trying to learn the new package.
“Like I said, we threw a lot of stuff then – some pros, some cons – now we’ve got to try and eliminate the cons and put it all together.
“I’m pretty confident for the next one. We’ll definitely have a better package after some stuff we learned then. We just need to piece it all together.”
Macauley Jones was the best of the Brad Jones Racing Toyota Supra trio in 13th, while Andre Heimgartner and Cameron Hill ended up 16th and 22nd.
The session ran without incident. Brodie Kostecki and David Reynolds each pushed the limits out of Turn 3 and sent dust skyward after running wide.
The session ended with a Safety Car procedure test and practice starts.
Results: Repco Supercars Championship Dunlop Sydney 500, Practice 1
Pos
Num
Driver
Team
Car
Laps
Lap
Diff
Gap
1
26
Kai Allen
Grove Racing
Ford Mustang GT
16
1:28.7330
2
19
Matthew Payne
Grove Racing
Ford Mustang GT
15
1:28.7582
0.0252
0.0252
3
31
Jayden Ojeda
PremiAir Racing
Chev Camaro ZL1
14
1:28.8468
0.1138
0.0886
4
18
Anton De Pasquale
Team 18
Chev Camaro ZL1
14
1:28.8534
0.1204
0.0066
5
10
Zach Bates
Matt Stone Racing
Chev Camaro ZL1
16
1:28.8938
0.1608
0.0404
6
17
Brodie Kostecki
Dick Johnson Racing
Ford Mustang GT
13
1:28.9527
0.2197
0.0589
7
888
William Brown
Triple Eight Race Engineering
Ford Mustang GT
14
1:29.1495
0.4165
0.1968
8
38
Rylan Gray
Dick Johnson Racing
Ford Mustang GT
15
1:29.2625
0.5295
0.1130
9
1
Chaz Mostert
Walkinshaw TWG Racing
Toyota GR Supra A90
15
1:29.2795
0.5465
0.0170
10
20
David Reynolds
Team 18
Chev Camaro ZL1
16
1:29.4123
0.6793
0.1328
11
4
Jack Le Brocq
Matt Stone Racing
Chev Camaro ZL1
13
1:29.5006
0.7676
0.0883
12
99
Cooper Murray
Erebus Motorsport
Chev Camaro ZL1
13
1:29.5519
0.8189
0.0513
13
96
Macauley Jones
Brad Jones Racing
Toyota GR Supra A90
18
1:29.5634
0.8304
0.0115
14
777
Declan Fraser
PremiAir Racing
Chev Camaro ZL1
14
1:29.5696
0.8366
0.0062
15
88
Broc Feeney
Triple Eight Race Engineering
Ford Mustang GT
21
1:29.5783
0.8453
0.0087
16
8
Andre Heimgartner
Brad Jones Racing
Toyota GR Supra A90
17
1:29.5939
0.8609
0.0156
17
3
Aaron Cameron
Blanchard Racing Team
Ford Mustang GT
12
1:29.6029
0.8699
0.0090
18
11
Jackson Walls
Triple Eight Race Engineering
Ford Mustang GT
14
1:29.6173
0.8843
0.0144
19
55
Thomas Randle
Tickford Racing
Ford Mustang GT
22
1:29.6470
0.9140
0.0297
20
6
Cameron Waters
TIckford Racing
Ford Mustang GT
21
1:29.7515
1.0185
0.1045
21
7
James Golding
Blanchard Racing Team
Ford Mustang GT
10
1:29.9473
1.2143
0.1958
22
14
Cameron Hill
Brad Jones Racing
Toyota GR Supra A90
17
1:29.9560
1.223
0.0087
23
9
Jobe Stewart
Erebus Motorsport
Chev Camaro ZL1
11
1:30.0308
1.2978
0.0748
24
2
Ryan Wood
Walkinshaw TWG Racing
Toyota GR Supra A90
15
1:30.1915
1.4585
0.1607
