The Hunter River Times

Rylan Gray has shown he is not on the 2024 Super2 grid just to make up numbers, he means business.

The goal was to be in the top 10 for the season opener at Mount Panorama on the weekend, and he has walked away fourth in the championship and rookie of the round.

“I’m pretty happy with it, some people on debut never get to the front straight away, I was fortunate enough that the team has done an awesome job throughout the weekend and the car has been phenomenal,” Rylan shared after his second race of the weekend.

Straight out of the gates he was up the front, qualifying sixth for the first race and finishing fourth.

“We had a hard-fought race two, we had a car stall in front of us on the grid and then just had to work our way forward from there,” he told The Hunter River Times.

“It was it was good fun though, we made a few passes and a few bombs, it was good we came home sixth in the end.”

This was Rylan’s first weekend with Tickford Autosport and he is grateful for the support he is already getting from the two Supercars drivers Cameron Waters and Thomas Randall.

“After my first quality session I had some questions for Thomas and he answered them straight away which was good to have main game drivers there,” he said.

“If you’re a bit on the ropes about something you can ask them and get it cleared up, it’s been good to have them around and I’m sure we’ll get a lot out of them throughout the year.

Meanwhile, Rylan’s maiden run in the Bathurst 12 Hour proved much more challenging and despite overcoming a number of issues throughout the day and making it to first in class, the 111 Racing entry was forced to withdraw due to mechanical failure with two hours to go.

-JEM ANSHAW