Frosty sizzles in darwin heat

Frosty quickest in practice

Ford Pepsi Max Crew driver Mark Winterbottom has topped the times on the opening day of action in Darwin as drivers and teams adapted to the heat and humidity at Hidden Valley Raceway.

Mark topped the times late in the day on a set of used soft tyres and while his team-mates did not use the faster rubber, they all feel confident heading into qualifying tomorrow morning.

Will did not get the chance to show his outright speed due to a reduced tyre bank but he feels not using any new tyres will give him an advantage later in the weekend.

Saturday is a busy day with a morning qualifying session followed by the Top 10 Shootout for pole and the first of the weekends races at the hottest part of the day.

Mark Winterbottom - #5 Pepsi Max FPR Ford:
Ended the day: 1st 
Weve gone quite well at times this year and weve all worked very hard to rectify the few issues weve had and while it is nice to be on top, until tomorrow we really wont know where we sit in the order. Hopefully we will carry this pace onto tomorrow and if we can end the day in the same spot Ill be very happy.

Will Davison - #6 Pepsi Max FPR Ford:
Ended the day: 24th 
I am quite confident of being much better tomorrow but it was a pretty painful day as the pre-marked tyres we brought werent the best as weve tested recently. The top 13 cars ran softs whereas we didnt so the timesheets dont look favourable but I am sure it will all swing around tomorrow when we use fresh rubber. It was a very low grip day but the balance of the car is great so without being too confident tomorrow will make a lot more sense.

Tim Edwards FPR Team Principal: 
Today was a typical Darwin Friday with a lot of variety on the timesheets and while it might make interesting reading, it doesnt really mean a lot as everyone was using such a variety of tyres. It is obviously nice to have Mark up front and our drivers are happy with the pace of their Falcons but the