Heavy rain has seen the Bathurst 1000 Shootout cancelled, casting doubts over the crown jewel of the Aussie Supercars championship in country New South Wales.
The build-up to the 'Great Race' at Mount Panorama has been marred by inclement weather conditions that have seen drivers struggle to achieve top speed in practice and qualifying.
Ironically, as Kiwi Shane van Gisbergen tries to clinch his second straight Supercars crown, co-driver Garth Tander produced the fastest lap time of the weekend in between showers.
The shootout traditionally brings together the 10 fastest drivers in qualifying for a one-lap time trial around the race circuit, but race control pulled the plug on the event 10 minutes before its scheduled start, with rain lashing the venue.
"Race control has advised that the Supercars top-10 shootout has been cancelled, due to extreme weather, leaving the track in an unsafe condition for competition," said Motorsport Australia.
"Stewards are currently determining grid position for tomorrow's Bathurst 1000."
The decision left Australia Cam Waters on pole for the 1000km race that usually takes 6-7 hours to complete.
Kiwis Fabian Coulthard, Richie Stanaway and Greg Murphy will share the second round with Coulthard teams with defending champions Chaz Mostert, while Stanaway and Murphy share the drive in a wildcard entry.
Van Gisbergen qualified fourth fastest, but was penalised three spots on the grid, after collding with Macauley Jones towards the end of qualifying.
"Obviously, we had that big downpour of rain," said Supercars chief executive Shane Howard. "There was a lot of run-off coming across the circuit.
"The officials went out and gave it every chance they could, giving it some time to see if it improved. We actually tried to re-divert where the main water course was coming across the track.
"Unfortunately, there was too much there and it wasn't dissipating. It was sheeting across the circuit, particularly across turn one really bad.
"The officials deemed it too unsafe to compete and obviously we can't compromise driver safety. Extraordinarily disappointing for everyone, all our great fans who sat out there waiting for it to happen.
"Obviously, disappointing for the drivers as well, they want to go. We had to make a decision."
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