Last Tuesday, the 26 cars that will contest the championship took part in a one-day test at Sydney Motorsport Park, primarily to evaluate and experience the new construction Dunlop control tyres that will be used this year.

The teams had access to four sets each of the new soft and super soft tyres, as well as any 2016 specification tyres they may have left in their tyre bank to do back-to-back testing.

The new tyres have the same compound as previous, but have a different construction, and it was anticipated that they would prove to be quicker and more durable.

After eight hours of testing, with some cars completing more than 100 laps, only two cars managed to get under the best-ever practice time of 1-28.8272 established by Chas Mostert in the Falcon in August last year.

The Sengled Racing Nissan of Rick Kelly was faster by only five-hundredths of a second with Scott McLaughlin second in the Shell V Power Falcon a further hundredth of a second further back.

They were followed by Fabian Coulthard, Chas Mostert, Shane Van Gisbergen and Will Davison with only one second covering the first fifteen cars back to Garth Tander in the Garry Rogers Motorsport Commodore.

Not a great deal can be read into the times as the track was in average condition for the test, and the weather conditions were not conducive to fast times.

Trying to read anything from a test session is always difficult as there are unknowns.

Variables include how much fuel was in the car, what tyres were fitted and whether teams were just concentrating on finding the right balance with the new specification tyre.

There were also drivers having their first run with a new team such as Garth Tander, Scott Mclaughlin, Jason Bright, Dale Wood, Scott Pye and Nick Percat.

Special mention should be made of Simona De Silvestro in the Kelly Racing Nissan Altima who was driving a new car at a track she had never seen before.

The Swiss driver finished up 18th in the second and fastest session, when the track was at its best with a time that was only 1.1 seconds slower than her team mate Rick Kelly.

It was a great effort that surprised more than a few fellow drivers and augured well for what is going to be difficult season, as almost all of the circuits on the championship trail will be new to her.

Next weekend the cars will race in two, 78-lap races in what are traditionally very hot conditions so it will be a big test for drivers and cars.