Renee Gracie has continued her impressive run of form in GT World Challenge Australia powered by AWS, topping Bronze Driver Practice at Hidden Valley Raceway on Friday afternoon.
Behind the wheel of the #181 OnlyFans Racing Ferrari 296 GT3, Gracie produced the session’s best lap of 1:06.325 on her lap of the session to claim top Bronze Practice honours for the second consecutive round, having done so at Queensland Raceway.
Finishing just under three tenths behind Gracie was Brad Schumacher in the Kelso Electrical / Team MPC Audi R8 LMS EVO II, with the Audi driver briefly holding top spot before ultimately ending the session second fastest.
Only a further one hundredth of a second adrift was Team BRM's Mark Rosser, whose best effort of 1:06.364 saw the Audi R8 LMS EVO II complete a top three covered by less than four hundredths of a second.
The Geyer Valmont Racing by Tigani Motorsport Mercedes-AMG GT3 EVO of Sergio Pires ended the session fourth fastest after posting a 1:06.482, while Steve Brooks rounded out the top five aboard the Team BRM / Wolfbrook Motorsport Audi R8 LMS EVO II with a lap of 1:06.526.
In the Trophy Class, Paul Stokell looked set to comfortably top the series overall after setting an impressive early benchmark of 1:07.190 aboard the KFC / Team MPC Audi R8 LMS EVO II.
However, Stokell's session came to a premature end when he crashed midway through the outing, bringing out the session's only red flag. Despite the incident, his earlier lap remained good enough to secure Trophy Class honours.
Nathan Halstead finished second in the Trophy Class aboard the AED Consulting by Tigani Motorsport Porsche 911 GT3 R, ending the session more than four and a half seconds behind Stokell's benchmark.
Aside from the single red flag, the session ran largely uninterrupted and produced another closely contested battle at the front, with less than four hundredths of a second separating the top three drivers.
View the full results for Bronze Driver Practice here.
The final GT World Challenge Australia powered by AWS session for Friday is Practice 2, which gets underway at 5:25pm ACST.