The Larry Perkins mantra driving Chahda wildcard

Eyes are on Bathurst for the Matt Chahda Motorsport wildcard ahead of the privateer squad’s maiden Penrite Oil Sandown 500 start.

Chahda and rookie Brad Vaughan may start Sunday’s 500km race from the back of the grid, but the Albury team is clear in what it wants from this weekend.

After a publicised last-minute dash to get sponsors for this weekend’s round, the Chahda crew have since kept their noses clean ahead of Sunday’s race.

While bringing home a solid lead-lap finish is the simple goal for Sandown, the team is determined to bed in all processes to attack the Mountain next month.

"In theory, all week long, we’ve been working off how Larry Perkins used to approach Sandown, as a big test session for Bathurst,” Team Manager Paul Martin told Supercars.com.

"That's our goal, get out of here clean, learn a lot. Obviously it's new for us, new for the drivers, they've come from Super2 with a lot of downforce, this car's a lot different.

"We're just taking baby steps at a time each session, we're learning the car, the drivers are learning the car, and Bathurst is our goal."

Martin said the late additions of Boost Mobile and Shaw and Partners has taken the pressure off the team, which is campaigning an ex-Triple Eight Camaro. However, amid the focus on Bathurst, the team knows it has a job to do at Sandown.

"I went up and did a Q&A before, and once you start doing that, you realise that this race a big deal,” Amin Chahda told Supercars.com.

“But it is very relaxed at the moment. Matt was a bit agitated this morning, but I calmed him down a little bit. It happens because your emotions are high.

"Brad's a good young kid as well. He knows how to drive the car fas. But it doesn’t matter if we're in 24th or 10th or whatever. As long as we're on that lead lap, we’ll be happy.”

The 500km race will start at 2:05pm AEST.