A FRIDAY afternoon happy hour with all the intensity of qualifying highlighted the opening day of running in round four of the Porsche Paynter Dixon Carrera Cup Australia Championship at The Bend Motorsport Park.

Taking advantage of a fully dry circuit and new slick Michelin tyres, the South Aussie form guide was established in a flat-out practice session that ended with local hero Max Vidau quickest with a 1m49.9507s flyer aboard his Tyrepower / TekworkX Motorsport entry.

That lap was two-tenths quicker than Aaron Love’s 1m50.12s pole time from 2022.

The first of two practice sessions was staged on a wet and drying circuit meaning practice two was the only time for teams to understand their cars on new rubber ahead of a key qualifying session on Saturday morning.

Vidau timed his run to perfection at the end of practice to go quickest, while Angelo Mouzouris was a rapid second aboard his Bob Jane T-Marts / Sonic Motor Racing machine.

Mouzouris hovered in the top half of the top-10 for most of practice before his final flyer elevated him to second.

Just 0.0415s split the pair as a sign of things to come tomorrow.

Fabian Coulthard continued his charge to the front of the field in third, with championship leader Jackson Walls fourth. Four teams held the top four places.

Christian Pancione ended his day in fifth position – just 0.16s from the quickest time – with Dylan O’Keeffe, David Wall, Bayley Hall, Simon Fallon and Callum Hedge completing the top-10.

Making his solo Porsche Carrera Cup debut, Garth Tander was 14th outright today, exactly one second from the quickest time.

While Vidau was narrowly quickest in the Equity-One Pro class, it was another South Australian on top in SP Tools Pro-Am.

Sam Shahin topped the Porsche ‘race within a race’, his 1m51.1139s best just 1.1 seconds away from the quickest time outright.

Shahin will start his 100th Porsche Carrera Cup Australia race tomorrow in race one as he seeks to build on his Pro-Am class lead.

His nearest rival for title honours, Adrian Flack, was second in Pro-Am with Dean Cook third and Rodney Jane fourth, just in front of Matt Belford.

The pair of practice sessions were largely uneventful today as the 28-strong field prepares for qualifying and race one on Saturday.

Qualifying commences at 10:35am local time with Race 1 to follow at 3:20pm.

Both sessions will be broadcast live on Fox Sports 506 and Kayo Sports.