Subscribe

Sign up for free

  • Get quick access to your favorite articles

  • Manage alerts on breaking news and favorite drivers

  • Make your voice heard with article commenting.

Motorsport prime

Discover premium content
Subscribe

Edition

Global
Breaking news

Tander impressed with ‘perfect’ GRM Commodore

Garth Tander was left impressed with a flawless day of running in his brand new Garry Rogers Motorsport Commodore at yesterday’s Sydney Motorsport Park tyre test.

Garth Tander, Garry Rogers Motorsport

Garth Tander, Garry Rogers Motorsport

Garry Rogers Motorsport

Garth Tander, Garry Rogers Motorsport
James Moffat, Garry Rogers Motorsport, Garth Tander, Garry Rogers Motorsport
Garry Rogers and Garth Tander, Garry Rogers Motorsport

The GRM squad made a last-minute decision to build two brand new Holden Commodores for James Moffat and new signing Tander ahead of the 2017 season, after failing to reach an agreement with Volvo to keep using the S60 hardware.

That left the mid-sized team with a massive workload over the break, given that the build of two new cars for the Dunlop Super2 Series was already underway.

Having now driven one of the new cars, reigning Sandown 500 winner Tander says he is impressed with the build quality after a day of trouble-free running.

“It’s seriously impressive,” he told Motorsport.com.

“We elected to not do a separate shakedown day like Erebus did [on Monday]. We elected to not do that, just to make sure we got as much of everything finished – crossed all the Ts and dotted all the Is – for the test.

“The car rolled out and it was perfect, there wasn’t a problem with the car at all.

“It’s huge credit to the team. Both Moff’s car and my car ran without a single mechanical issue. They’s been working some long hours, so it's a credit we had no issues.”

Tander was mid-grid in both of yesterday’s sessions, improving from the 20th best time in the morning to 15th in the pecking order in the afternoon.

The focus, he says, was on both he and the team coming to terms with the new cars, as well as settling into a new work environment, rather than lap-times.

“We had a reasonably productive day,” he added.

“There were a lot of new things for us today. It was a new car for me, a new driver settling into the team, new aero for the team – even though they’ve run Commodores before, even last year in the Dunlop Series, the VF II aero is quite different to VF I. So understanding the aero influence on the chassis compared to the Volvo they’ve been running for the last few years.

“We worked through a fair bit. We were about where we expected to be time-wise, and we’ve got a few ideas before Clipsal to implement. But it was a successful day.”

One thing Tander didn’t get a great read on was the new tyre, with the unfamiliar chassis making it difficult to precisely pinpoint the differences in the new construction Dunlops.

“It’s hard for me, and for the rest of our team, to quantify, just because we’re dealing with a lot of different factor in our garage,” said Tander.

“Even though it’s a Commodore, a GRM Commodore is very different to a Walkinshaw Commodore. And, as I said, the team is getting its head around the VF II aero.

“It certainly does some things significantly differently, and some things don’t feel too different at all, as far as the tyre goes. But it’s not really a back-to-back test for me.”

Be part of Motorsport community

Join the conversation
Previous article Rick Kelly tops Supercars tyre test
Next article Van Gisbergen: No radical difference with new Dunlops

Top Comments

There are no comments at the moment. Would you like to write one?

Sign up for free

  • Get quick access to your favorite articles

  • Manage alerts on breaking news and favorite drivers

  • Make your voice heard with article commenting.

Motorsport prime

Discover premium content
Subscribe

Edition

Global