Strong Start for Jack Daniel's Racing at Bathurst; James Moffat puts Nissan inside the top 10 at Mount Panorama

BATHURST, New South Wales, Australia – The pair of Jack Daniel's Racing Nissan Altimas have made a strong start to their 2014 Supercheap Auto Bathurst 1000 campaign, with 12 months of development on the cars starting to pay off.

After three practice sessions, the combination of Rick Kelly and David Russell was 12th fastest overall, while Todd Kelly and Alex Buncombe placed 15th.

Both cars overcame minor niggling issues, with the team making strong progress with setup on the new Mount Panorama track surface.

The day also provided a valuable opportunity for British rookie Alex Buncombe to acclimatize to the daunting layout in a V8 Supercar.

On track action continues tomorrow with two further practice sessions, and the all-in 40-minute long qualifying session, with the top-ten progressing to Saturday's shootout.

JACK DANIEL'S RACING QUOTEBOARD

RICK KELLY - #15 Jack Daniel's Racing Nissan Altima:
Practice 1- 17th
Practice 3- 12th
Overall Practice- 12th
"For us it's extremely exciting to see all of the hard work the entire team has put in on the development side of things starting to pay off," said Rick Kelly.

"It's early days yet, but you can see there is progress in today's results.

"We've all got a lot of work to do with our cars to make it nice on the new surface, so for us to be where we are it's pretty exciting.

"On the car 15 side of things, we had a challenging start to the day with a couple of issues, and we got them ironed out.

"We found some pace there and ran some different sets of tires from some different batches, and the car handled very differently on them.

"We need to tune it for the Bathurst tire we've been given, and if we can do that, we can be in for a really exciting weekend.

"It's now head down, backside up, and make the most of the opportunities ahead of us."

DAVID RUSSELL - #15 Jack Daniel's Racing Nissan Altima:
Practice 2- 11th
Practice 3- 12th
Overall Practice- 12th

"It's been pretty good," said David Russell.

"To be honest, the first practice session that we had was hampered by an electrical issue that we've rectified.

"Rick only got in four laps in the opening practice, which meant that any tuning that we really needed to do was carried over to my session.

"I don't think we're there yet, we've still got a way to go.

"I was quite happy with my run in the car, we were just outside the top ten, but I'm not sure what other people were running with their tires.

"I'm quite happy with where we are pace wise, but I think we still have a ways to go yet."

TODD KELLY - #7 Jack Daniel's Racing Nissan Altima:
Practice 1- 9th
Practice 3- 15th
Overall Practice- 15th

"I was quite surprised with the lap I did there at the end," said Todd Kelly.

"We had a little bit of a misfire that we chased after Alex did a few laps at the start and I got in.

"I did one lap to quantify the setup we had, then we made a reasonably big change, and went straight onto a new set of green tires.

"I didn't really know what kind of car I had under me, two laps would have been handy, so it was a pretty wobbly lap.

"To end up where we did, I think there's a bit of potential in it."

ALEX BUNCOMBE - #7 Jack Daniel's Racing Nissan Altima:
Practice 1- 9th
Practice 2- 18th
Practice 3- 15th
Overall Practice- 15th

"Daunting has got to be the word," said Alex Buncombe.

"I knew the track fairly well because of the 12 Hour, I got 10 or 12 laps at that race, so I knew which way the track went.

"But it is obviously a tough track to learn, and these cars are hard to drive, and I've still got a bit to learn.

"I've learned quite a bit today about the car, how to drive it, and I've made some improvements.

"Again I've been running around on some old tires, which is the best thing to do try and learn the car.

"I've got another drive in the morning in free practice four, I'll get a few more laps out there, and hopefully find a few more tenths."

James Moffat puts Nissan inside the top 10 at Mount Panorama

James Moffat has led the Nissan Motorsport challenge on the opening day of practice for the 2014 Bathurst 1000 at Mount Panorama.

The #360 Norton Nissan driver sat on top of the time sheets before a late dash by his rivals saw him complete the day ninth overall.

It was a strong overall day for the #360 car, with Moffat's co-driver Taz Douglas finishing his session in ninth as well.

For the "heritage-liveried" #36 Norton Nissan of Michael Caruso and Dean Fiore, it was also an encouraging day.

Caruso finished the final session in 11th overall, with both drivers happy with the balance of the Altima V8.

Track action continues tomorrow with two practice sessions before qualifying at 3pm AEST.

James Moffat, #360 Norton Nissan Altima

"A pretty positive day all in all. It's nice to get the first day out of the way without any major dramas," said James Moffat.

"The big unknown for us was the new track surface and its grip. Certainly, we need to make some adjustments to the car, but we're pretty happy with how it has started.

"Taz did a terrific job in his co-driver session and we seemed to show reasonable speed all day.

"It's funny. We ended up ninth for the session and we did a 2m07s – that's the fastest time I've ever done around here!

"It's important that we look over the data overnight and stay on top of the changing track conditions, which I thought we did a good job of today."

Taz Douglas, #360 Norton Nissan Altima (co-driver)

"It was a pretty good day. First and foremost, the co-drivers role is to keep the car off the fence, and I did that!" said Taz Douglas.

"The car is a lot better than Sandown. James has been going quite well, and I felt really comfortable during my time in the car.

"As long as I'm near the pace, I'm happy, but there's still a long way to go."

Michael Caruso, #36 Norton Nissan Altima

"We started a bit behind the eight-ball in the first two sessions, but my engineer Steve Todkill did a fantastic job to bring the car back into the zone," said Michael Caruso.

"Tomorrow is a completely different day, so we just need to go over what we learnt today and put our best foot forward in qualifying.

"The track surface has made a big step up in grip, and amongst that, it brings the speed and we've seen some very quick cars so far. It's interesting, and I think it's going to be very difficult to get into the shoot-out, but saying that, qualifying will be different to the shoot-out because they're at completely different times of the day."

Dean Fiore, #36 Norton Nissan Altima (co-driver)

"It was a really good start. The car seems quick and the team are happy," said Dean Fiore.

"I was pleased with my first session. It didn't start the way I wanted it to, and the car was quite nervous, but I was expecting that after the feedback that Michael gave.

"At the end of my session, we put another set of tires on that were much better than what I had before but I didn't get to post the time. From the sector data, and the way I felt, the car was unbelievable. I was really happy and we just need to continue to improve it over the weekend."

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