Fujitsu Racing's Michael Caruso has finished the 2011 V8 Supercar season on a high with two top-10 finishes this past weekend at the final event of the season, the Sydney Telstra 500 (December 2-4).

Continuing his flying form on the streets of Sydney Olympic Park – having qualified and finished all races inside the top 10 during the previous 2 years of the event – Caruso was not surprisingly quick on first day of practice.

"Friday practice went fantastically," enthused Caruso. "To be fastest in the second practice session and then come second in two other sessions was a great confidence boost and the car's setup worked really well out of the box. The car's given us bad results all year long on street circuits and we've been really slow until we got this brand new car. So it's great to be back up the front."

Come Saturday, Caruso qualified 8th and earning a berth in the Top 10 Shootout however tyre issues hindered the 28-year-old from improving his grid position for Race 27.

"We went to green tyres for the Shootout but unexpectedly we didn't have any grip on them, so we ended up 9th. We were still positive going into the race given how constantly quick the car was.

"I started next to Craig Lowndes who had the Championship to worry about. We moved forward from the get go and basically kept passing people and made our way to the front of the field. We pulled a 5-second gap on Craig and from our last pitstop it became fuel-strategy race to make it home. We knew we had to conserve fuel but the funny thing was that everyone pitted on the same lap so everyone had to conserve, we thought we were fine. I made another 5-second gap on Craig and we start conserving fuel even more so basically with 15laps to go I had to go to extreme measures. I started backing off down the straights but Craig kept powering on which was surprising to us. Their engines can run really lean compared to ours.

"I let Craig go past and then I thought we were okay. But I got the fuel warning lights with 4 laps to go and I knew it was going to be an uphill battle. On the last lap Garth (Tander) passed me down the back straight and everyone saw how lucky I was to get the car over the line. We finished 4th which is heart-wrenching really considering how hard we fought all day and we deserved a win after the year we've had.

"With one corner to go though I was trying to shake the fuel out of the car and Shane van Gisbergen's come passed and we had this massive hit. He wasn't trying to hit me, and I was just so concerned I wasn't going to finish. I felt the hit but didn't know what really happened until I saw it on TV later. It was quite spectacular which him driving up the side of my car and almost on the bonnet! We joked about it later."

The Garry Rogers Motorsport crew had minimal work to do overnight, yet any hope for another strong qualifying session on Sunday morning were put to rest after a premature ruling by officials.

 "I locked up and went into the tyre wall at turn 1, I had to let a couple of cars go past and I selected reverse. But officials pulled the red flags out too quick which ended my session. It's disappointing to do that so prematurely. I don't know where they wanted me to go when I couldn't move until the cars went past.

Garry Rogers went and spoke with them about it but not much you can do really. I've been a bit of a target all year."

Caruso's best time only put him 21st fastest for the final 250km race of the season, but once again Caruso was on the receiving end of officialdom after some confusion at the green flag.

"When I got to the grid there must been 15-20 cars who pulled into pitlane because they wanted to change their tyres. Now there's no grid numbers on the grid and it's almost like you have to guess where to stop. I pulled up where I thought was my grid position and the officials told us I had jumped the start. We got a 10 second penalty for that during the race and effectively that cost us another podium position. It was an outstanding drive from us to finish 6th after 250km.

"Overall it was good to have some strong results to finish the year off and show we were good enough to potentially win the race, fast enough to be on the podium, despite the results not showing it. It's definitely some positives going into next year and show everyone that I can make the step up in 2012."

Michael Caruso completed the V8 Supercar Championship in 14th position on 1729 points. The 2012 Championship kicks off on the streets of Adelaide at the Clipsal 500 from March 1-4.

Michael would like to wish all of his sponsors, supporters, family and friends a Merry Christmas and a safe, happy and healthy New Year.

To keep up to date during the off-season join Michael's Facebook Fan Page or following him on Twitter @michaelcaruso34. More information can be found on