Multiple drivers made their last Bathurst 1000 starts – Jason Richards, Glenn Seton, Tony Ricciardello, Damien Assaillit and Mark Noske.

[1] Similarly Tim Blanchard stepped aside from his Paul Morris Motorsport drive to allow Allan Simonsen to take up the seat alongside Greg Murphy.

2009 Bathurst 1000 winner Garth Tander was sixth fastest ahead of Paul Dumbrell, Will Davison, Russell Ingall and Jason Bargwanna.

Salmon stepped down from the drive of the #44 Greg Murphy Racing car and the originally nominated driver, Marcus Zukanovic, returned to the seat.

[7] Steve Owen topped the co-driver session on Friday morning ahead of Luke Youlden, Warren Luff, Mark Skaife and Andrew Jones,[8] the latter giving a preview of the pace of the #8 BJR Commodore.

However, half an hour later the car was eliminated from qualifying after co-driver Jason Richards clipped the inside wall at Forrest's Elbow resulting in a heavy impact with the outside barrier.

Richards’ car had bent chassis rails, and the Brad Jones Racing team would concentrate their efforts on Jason Bright for qualifying.

Craig Lowndes offset Whincup's problems by recording the fastest ever lap around the circuit, a 2:06.8012, eclipsing Greg Murphy's 2003 pole position by five hundredths of a second.

With twelve minutes left in the session Jason Bright showed the pace Brad Jones Racing had by jumping past Winterbottom into third.

Lee Holdsworth was next, followed by Greg Murphy with Steven Johnson moving into seventh as the final ten minutes began.

Greg Murphy and Paul Dumbrell completed the shootout line-up with Steven Johnson missing out by nine hundredths of a second.

Tony Ricciardello and Geoff Emery were respectively 1.3 and 2.4 seconds slower than the next best healthy car while Damian Assaillit would join the absent BJR Commodore of Jason Richards at the back when the MW Motorsport Falcon was disqualified from the session.

Winterbottom lead the way at the start, pulling clear of Mark Skaife, Holdsworth, Davison, Whincup, Murphy, Courtney, Dean Canto and Steven Johnson.

Into The Chase on the same lap, Coulthard's left rear wheel failed, tipping the car into the sandtrap and rolling six times.

At the final restart Lowndes led Whincup, Tander, Courtney, Bright, Holdsworth, Murphy, Ingall, Winterbottom and Caruso.