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Greg Murphy and Mark Skaife head to Bathurst in October as the best credentialed driver pairing on this year's entry list.

 The Sprint Gas Racing duo have won nine of the classic Mt. Panorama races between them, Skaife five and Murphy four.

 That's the same number held individually by motor racing icon Peter Brock, who recorded a phenomenal nine Bathurst victories between 1972 and 1987.

 Does that mean that Brock was as good as Murphy and Skaife combined? Not so, according to Murphy.

 "Don't get me wrong here," Murphy said, "I have the utmost respect for the achievements of P.Brock because he was THE MAN, but back then the level of competition was totally different.

 "You would get 55 starters at Bathurst, but only three or four teams had the resources required to win.

 "Half the field would be weekend warriors just out to have a good time on the mountain in cars that were dodgy prospects to even finish the race.

 "Today there will be 32 cars out there built to parity specifications and any of a dozen could win if the cards fall their way."

 Murphy holds the qualifying lap record at Bathurst, a full 14 seconds quicker than Brock's famous last lap record to win the race in 1979.

 "That says nothing about relative driver ability, rather than that the V8 Supercar of today has 650 plus horsepower and a superior tyre and chassis setup, as against the 400 of Brock's Torana thirty years ago," Murphy admitted.

 Sprint Gas Racing yesterday conducted its final test day of the year with all four drivers (Greg Murphy, Jason Bargwanna, Mark Skaife & Mark Noske) in attendance.

 The team matched the times set by both Garth Tander and Lee Holdsworth giving it a lot of confidence going into next week's 500 kilometre Bathurst warm-up event at Phillip Island.

"The final preparation for Phillip Island and Bathurst went very well," Sprint Gas Racing Sporting Director Jeff Grech said.

 "We matched the times recorded by Garth Tander and Lee Holdsworth which has given us a lot of confidence.

 "The driver pairings were very comfortable with each other and their lap times very consistent.

 "It was a very positive day; we're looking forward to the endurance rounds.

 "We have two cars that we expect to be up there in contention."

 Sprint Gas Racing will be at the L&H Phillip Island 500 next weekend (September 11-13) and at the Super Cheap Auto Bathurst 1000 on October 8-11.