Holden's Fabian Coulthard has broken his own lap record in a blistering final practice session at the Bathurst 1000 on Thursday.
Flying Kiwi Coulthard clocked a remarkable 2:05.47 - eclipsing his old mark set barely 12 months ago of 2:05.60.
Defending champion Chaz Mostert of Ford appeared to be the man to beat after his opening 2:06.32 effort on Thursday - the fastest ever set in an opening practice session at Mount Panorama.
Yet Mostert didn't finish within the day's top three times.
Mostert's teammate Mark Winterbottom (2:05.57) was second fastest in the third practice blitz ahead of fellow Ford driver David Reynolds (2:05.73).
Multiple records fell on the mountain's resurfaced track last year with Coulthard and Mostert (2:07.49) eventually setting the new qualifying and race lap times to beat respectively.
Six-time V8 series champ Jamie Whincup had tried to hose down talk of lap records being set this year despite a new gearing set-up being used at Bathurst that is set to allow drivers to shatter the 300kph barrier for the first time.
But someone forgot to tell the rest of the field on Thursday.
Nissan's Rick Kelly was the first big scalp claimed by the mountain.
He missed the final practice session on Thursday after co-driver David Russell hit the wall heavily at The Cutting midway through the second practice hitout.
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