Matt Payne took provisional pole place for the Bathurst 1000 after a qualifying session of superb margins at Mount Panorama.
Payne and his Grove Racing Ford streaked across the 6.213km circuit in a time of 2m05.6452s to edge out fellow Mustang pilot Cameron Waters by a scant 0.0060s.
“It simply appeared to hook up actually properly and it simply appeared to show very well at ‘The Grate’,” he defined after the lap.
“The earlier follow we didn’t have such a superb run on inexperienced tyres. I knew the automobile was higher than that. I knew we have been going to be within the prime 5, however P1 is fairly cool.”
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Waters, who almost had a crash at Forrest’s Elbow throughout the session, revealed he had additionally suffered a reliability scare within the early levels.
“It was a fairly intense session, I had an engine drawback to begin with and that cleared,” he mentioned.
“Everyone seems to be attempting so laborious, even in follow one, it was loopy how briskly everybody was going. I’m simply fortunate I’m not one of many ones crashing.”
The session featured a pair of crimson flags, with the primary coming with 23 minutes remaining on the clock as David Reynolds misplaced management of the rear of his Team18 Chevrolet Camaro at The Dipper, amassing the wall the place team-mate Warren Luff had carried out a miraculous escape earlier within the weekend.
Will Davison, Dick Johnson Racing Ford Mustang GT
Photograph by: Edge Photographics
The second got here resulting from a crash on the similar nook after Shell V-Energy Racing driver Will Davison destroyed all 4 corners of his Ford Mustang on his ultimate push.
This crash ruined Broc Feeney’s try and prime the session, though he remained the highest-placed Chevrolet driver in third. Previous to the crimson flags being displayed, he had been 0.25s up on Payne’s benchmark.
The Triple Eight man was 0.0081s quicker than 2023 polesitter Brodie Kostecki, who set the fourth quickest time and clattered the wall at Sulman Park, requiring a mid-session suspension change which price eight minutes of observe time.
Highlighting how shut the session was, Kostecki’s time was 0.0194s away from Payne.
Championship chief Will Brown secured his shootout place in fifth, having spent the vast majority of the session out of the window, whereas Chaz Mostert was sixth.
Andre Heimgartner, Jack Le Broc, Anton de Pasquale and Richie Stanaway rounded out those that will contest Saturday’s shootout.
On account of inflicting the crimson flags, each Reynolds and Davison noticed their finest occasions struck from the report, leaving them twenty first and sixteenth respectively.
The Supercars will probably be again on observe at 10:05am Australian Jap Daylight Saving Time [12:05am BST], with a one-hour follow session for co-drivers solely. There will probably be one other hour’s follow at 1:10pm [3:10am BST] and the highest 10 shootout is because of start at 5:05pm [7:05am BST].
Bathurst 1000 Qualifying Outcome
