Often less than a tenth of a second a lap will separate the top three or four qualifiers and one tenth will see you back in sixth or seventh.

No-one is more aware of this than Brad Jones Racing driver Nick Percat.

After finishing ninth in 2019 and heading into his third season with the Albury-based squad, he knows he just needs to find "a tenth or two" to be at the front of the field, but that "tenth or two" can be very elusive.

"I've got a completely new car this year - every nut, bolt, steering wheel you name it, is new," Percat said.

"To be honest though, today's cars are so good, whilst it's nice to have a new car, I'm not sure how much time it will relate to lap wise, as my last car was still pretty good and 'Macca' (teammate Macauley Jones) will be driving it this year."

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"The big thing for us to close the gap is finding the sweet spot with setup and getting consistency across the season.

"Also, we weren't strong enough in the endurance events either - we just gave away too many points really.

"We had good pace last year, but just didn't maximise it results wise, which was frustrating for everyone."

"The endurance races (The Bend 500, Bathurst 1000 and Gold Coast 600) are the biggest point-scoring weekends so it will improve our championship position massively to do better there.

"But we do need to qualify better - trying to come from 10th is too far back when the pace is so quick."

BJR will have four cars on the grid with two new drivers coming into the team.

The 2018 Super 2 Champion Todd Hazelwood joins them for 2020, along with Jack Smith, who steps up from BJR's Super 2 team to the top series.

Hazelwood spent his first main game season with Matt White Motorsport, running a full spec 888 Engineering car - the same as seven-time champion Jamie Whincup and 2016 series winner Shane van Gisbergen.

"It doesn't really bother me who my teammate is to be honest, I just do my own thing," Percat said

"But it will be interesting having Todd's' input as he's driven a 888 car recently and the car he had last year was as good as any 888 car on the grid, so he has good knowledge of how their cars feel and handle and also the way they tune it.

"That will all be a good insight for our engineers just to get a heads up on the way 888 would go about doing it, so that will be quite good for us."

As for this weekend, Percat is looking forward to getting the season under way at his home race.

The South Australian native enjoys the tight, fast Adelaide street circuit.

"It's one of my favourite tracks, I can't wait to get there," he said.

"It's got a bit of everything and turn eight is a highlight of our racing year.

"But generally, it's just a great event and it's always good to get the season started as it's all you think about in the off-season."

Supercars hit the track on Thursday afternoon for their opening practice session, with two 250-kilometre races on Saturday and Sunday.