Mies tops wet and wild practice in Adelaide

Mies tops wet and wild practice in Adelaide

German Audi star Christopher Mies has topped both practice sessions for the Fanatec GT World Challenge Australia powered by AWS finale in Adelaide in the Shannons Audi he'll share with points leader Liam Talbot.

Despite wet conditions prevailing over both half-hour sessions at the Adelaide Parklands Circuit, today's practice was run without any major incident as the field got a full hour of wet weather running in anticipation of the rain hanging around for Friday and Saturday.

The highest profile victim of the wet conditions was Geoff Emery, who nudged his Jamec Racing Audi into the wall on the run to turn thirteen after hitting a pool of water with twenty minutes left in Practice Two.

The incident came on Emery's out lap after Austrian Max Hofer handed the car to the Victorian who entered the weekend second in the championship, only seven points behind Talbot.

Emery wasn't the only driver to have issues on the run to the final complex of corners, as fellow Audi pilots Marc Cini (Hallmarc), and Matt Stoupas (KFC) both had similar incidents, as did Hobson Motorsport Mercedes pilot Mike Bailey.

The third of the championship contenders, Yasser Shahin, almost had his own incident with a slide on the exit of the Senna Chicane, however the South Australian just kept the EMA Motorsport Porsche off the wall, and would hand the car to Matt Campbell late in the session.

Meanwhile, Mies got Talbot's championship aspirations off to the best possible start, topping the first session by just over half a second and the second session by five hundredths of a second, with Jayden Ojeda second in both session in the Harrolds Racing / Volante Rosso Motorsport Mercedes he'll share with Christos Batzios.

The Emery/Hofer Audi was third and fifth across the two sessions for Jamec Racing, whilst the Shahin/Campbell Porsche would end up fourth in both sessions.

The Am class was topped by the Schumacher Motorsport Audi of Brad Schumacher (fifth outright) in Practice One, whilst Practice Two was topped by the KFC Audi of Matt Stoupas/Paul Stokell (third outright).

GT3 Trophy was swept by GT World Challenge Australia debutants, with Porsche Michelin Sprint Challenge runners Marcos Flack (tenth outright in Practice One) and Tom McLennan (eighth in Practice Two) impressing in their first appearances.

Invitational honours went to John Goodacre's MARC GT in Practice One (fourteenth outright), whilst the MARC II Mustang of Geoff Taunton/Darren Currie topped Practice Two in thirteenth outright.

The Fanatec GT World Challenge Australia powered by AWS field returns to the Adelaide Parklands Circuit tomorrow at 8:35am local time tomorrow morning for qualifying, before the first of three 40-minute races begins at 1:25pm tomorrow afternoon.

Qualifying and all three races will be broadcast live on Fox Sports 506.