Thumbs up for Tasman's VY.

Tasman Motorsport will go to Queensland Raceway for Round 6 of the V8 Supercar Championship Series with a significant confidence boost after it successfully rolled out its brand new VY Commodore racer at a test day at Sydney's Oran Park this week.

The car, built up by Tasman Motorsport from a shell supplied by Paris Acott Racecraft, performed faultlessly in its shakedown test session. Driver Jason Richards said within the car's first five laps, he had matched the best lap times he had previously set at Oran Park in the team's old VX Commodore.

"I was really happy with the pace out of the box," he said. "It's not a perfect car yet, there's still improvements to be made and unfortunately we didn't move as far forward as we might have hoped over the rest of the test day.

"We did manage to get a few more tenths (of a second) out of it by the end, but I believe there's still another half-a-second in the car, easily."

Richards, who last year drove a VY Commodore with Team Dynamik, said the new Tasman Motorsport car "feels like a VY should".

"There's definitely a different feeling from one car to the other, and this a better car than what we've been using, there's no doubt about it," he said. "There's an inherent feeling there that is very familiar to me."

Tasman Motorsport general manager Jon Matthews said he was pleased there had been no problems on the car's debut. "Probably the best part for us was that there were no dramas at all," he said. "The car is obviously very well built and we have learned a lot already."

Tasman also used the test session to trial two promising young drivers, former Garry Rogers Motorsport driver Jamie Whincup and Carrera Cup campaigner Fabian Coulthard, to team with Richards for the forthcoming enduro races at Sandown and Bathurst.

Both were given three stints of 10 laps each in the team's older VX Commodore and both impressed with their speed and maturity, Matthews said.

"Jamie was immediately strong, which you'd expect with a year in Supercars (2003) behind him, and continued to improve over the day," Matthews said. "He's a very level-headed driver with a bagful of talent.

"Fabian has only driven a V8 Supercar once before, in a test with Larry Perkins, and while he wasn't immediately as quick, he followed instructions well, showed he is a good thinker and returned a very respectable result given his experience."

Richards agreed. "They're both quality drivers and we're probably a bit spoilt for choice. Jamie's ready-made, while you can see Fabian's got heaps of potential. It's going to be a tough choice."

Matthews said he would sit down with team directors Kevin Murphy, Tim Miles, Steve Reed and Trevor Ashby after the data from each of the drivers has been analysed.

"There's a few other names in the mix as well, although we're not planning at this stage to test anyone else," he said. "Now that we have the VY up and running, it's important to us to make a good showing in the enduro races so we won't be taking this decision lightly.

"The first six months for Tasman Motorsport has been pretty challenging, and the next 6-12 months are looking very exciting."

Tasman Motorsport will debut the new car at Round 6 of the V8 Supercars Championship Series, a single 300km race, at Queensland Raceway near Ipswich from July 2-4.