The pair have shared driving duties before and last year at Phillip Island qualified sixth before the mechanical gremlins threw a spanner in the works, causing them to finish way back in 27th place.
Van Gisbergen fared better than that in 2009 with Alex Davison, and in 2008 with Jonathan Webb, finishing 10th on both occasions.
"The weekend's going to be pretty good and, as I've said all season, I'm not going to think too much about the championship until after the endurance races," said van Gisbergen.
"But we're racing for the championship so it's hard not to think about it. If we have a good Saturday and do all right on Sunday we could pick 200, or maybe a bit more, points. And if Jamie [Whincup] or Craig [Lowndes] have a bad day we're right back in the hunt, and then there's Bathurst as well."
The endurance races this weekend are worth so many points, and have a big effect on the championship, so getting it right is vital.
"I've changed engineers recently and qualifying is a bit different this weekend as I've had trouble there in the past. My new engineer [Dave Stewart] has some fresh ideas, especially for qualifying, about how to make the car better."
McIntyre is fired up to get back to racing, as it's been a while since he's driven a V8 in anger. "I haven't had much race time recently except in a six-hour race in May, but I don't really count that, so Hamilton was my last serious race," said McIntyre.
"A lot of us co-drivers this Saturday know that we'll be a little bit on the back foot until halfway through the stint on Sunday."
It's not as if McIntyre doesn't know what he's doing in a race.
All drivers at the elite level of motorsport know that race kilometres are the best, followed closely by lots of practice in the car they're going to race.
"I've had four runs in the car this year, which is okay, but it's only half of what I had last year. But ... I've had a chance to work on some of my old habits from the NZV8 with the use of a GoPro camera so I can drive Shane's car more consistently."
The L&H 500 has a unique format with 20-minute individual qualifying sessions and 14-lap qualifying races, each worth 50 points, for both drivers today and a shared 113-lap enduro tomorrow worth 200 points.
A good run from each driver is important today because the grid for tomorrow's enduro is based on the combined result from the two sprint races.
All three races will be on the regular hard tyre, rather than the softer sprint tyre used at recent events.
Points table
* Jamie Whincup 1895
* Craig Lowndes 1797
* Shane van Gisbergen 1502
* Rick Kelly 1418
* Steven Johnson 1345
* Garth Tander 1321
* Mark Winterbottom 1321
* Will Davison 1302.
