Sprint Gas Racing's Greg Murphy is challenging his V8 Supercar rivals to actually beat his 2003 qualifying lap record rather than waste hot air talking about what might be possible.
The fastest man ever around the Mount Panorama circuit at Bathurst, Murphy's 2min 06.8594secs lap time, achieved in the 2003 top ten shootout, came close to being beaten last year by fellow Holden driver Mark Skaife, but the multiple champion just fell short, leaving Murphy to issue his challenge all over again.
“With the money being spent down pit-lane, I would expect my record to be beaten,” the Kiwi veteran said, “There's a lot of talk that it can be beaten, but actions speak louder than words.”
Murphy admits that he knows his record will eventually be bettered, but admits to surprise that it has managed to last for as long as it has.
“Records are made to be broken, I'm under no illusions there,” he said, “The track was fast in 2003, having just been re-surfaced, but I am actually surprised that my lap time has not been broken already.
“The category continues to get faster, teams are spending a lot of money and everyone is driving on the limit. It is obvious to me that someone will eventually put three fast sector times together and go below it. If the time is beaten, so be it.”
Like everyone else, it seems, Murphy wonders by just how much the record can be lowered, especially having seen various drivers come close in recent times.
“I made a mistake [in 2003] and could have been a couple of tenths faster, so a mid-2.06 is very achievable, provided everything falls into place,” he noted, “So do I think a low 2.06 is achievable? Definitely. But, as I say, everything needs to go perfectly and the conditions need to be spot on.”
And a 2min 05secs lap?
“Having watched the Olympics recently and seen the astonishing times set by [Usain] Bolt and [Michael] Phelps, you realise that anything is achievable in sport - absolutely anything,” the veteran, who teams up with Jason Richards in the #3 Sprint Gas Racing Commodore for this weekend's Super Cheap Auto 1000, concluded.
