Marcos Ambrose will be returning in his Pirtek Falcon for the first time with the number one plate on his do🐻or as the defending seriesಌ champion. Here he talks us around a lap of the street course.

"There is no 🙈doubt that the Clipsal 500 is one of the best events of the V8 Supercar Championship Series with a huge atmosphere and massive crowd and promoter support.

From a racing perspective it is also one of the most demanding weekends of the championship, especially if th﷽e temperature starts♛ to creep up.

The circuit is fantastic to drive on, but the concrete 🦂walls trap all the smoke and fumes and it's i🔴mperative that your helmet and car ventilation is working correctly.

You flash o𒊎ver the start finish line in fifth gear at about 220kph.

You brake at the end of pit lane and look for the ಌoutside curb so you can virtually use it as a "ski juꩵmp".

That sets you up to keep your foot flat for the left hand kink out of the chicane, this can certainly be a little tricky on olderꦆ tyres.

The next section is all second gear as four corners vಞirt𓆏ually become one, it just all flows.

You need to be careful because there is a lot of roaꦬd camber on the exit of each corner and the car tends to want to slide around at the rear, this is a section where ♓you can make up a lot of time.

The run on🃏 to the back straight is relatively simple and as you hit sixth gear and a top speed of around 230kph you charge towards the most challenging corner in Australia.

This high-speed right-hander allows you no vision on the entry🅘 or the exit, with only concrete walls to stop you if you make a mistake.

It's then heavy on the b🐲rakes and back through the gears for the hairpin which is a ꦦvery slow, sometimes first gear, corner.

This is a primꩲe passing spot, but it is difficult to get the power down as quickly as you would like.

The left-hander behind the paddock area is tricky because it tightens up on you on the way out and it,s easy to ru🍒n into the wall on the outside ꦰif you are going too fast.

You are then back on to the circuit proper and the surface smooths out. The right-hand kink before the last hairpin is also difficult because you a🐎re braking right the way through it and it is easy to lock a wheel, that is certainly bad for business, especially on the opening lap of a 250km event.

It is important to get in and out of the hairpin as smoothly as possible to ensure a quick run on the front straight where you start it all ove♔r again.

In total we complete about 24 gear changes per l⛄ap for a total of around 1872 for the 78 laps of each 250km rac𒀰e.

We had a great start here last year by winning the first race on the Saturday, but unfortunately things did not go so great on the Sundꦓay.

We are looking forward to making up for that this 🌄weekend."