Defending winner Brodie Kostecki will start from pole position for Sunday’s Supercars Bathurst 1000 after snatching the fastest time in the Top 10 Shoot Out on Saturday.
Kostecki headlined a Ford lockout of the first two rows, when he steered his Dick Johnson Racing Mustang around the track in 2m04.0413s, just 0.01s down on the time he set in Friday’s qualifying session, in which he also topped the times.
In taking pole he wrote his name alongside that of Peter Brock and Allan Moffat as the only drivers to take three consecutive poles for the race.
“Pretty special moment, three in a row with some people I really looked up to,” said the emotional Kostecki.
“That in-lap was something special. There are a lot of Ford fans out there. Not many cars win from pole but last year, I proved that wrong. Looking forward to trying to do that again tomorrow.”
Kostecki was 0.1760s clear of Cam Waters, who was second in the Tickford Racing Ford. Waters, who was the fourth driver to take to the track, vaulted over four of the drivers who followed him, but fell just short of taking his third pole in the 1000km enduro.
“I knew where my lap was really good and where it was not so good. I was out early and then the track was not at its best,” he said.
On the second row of the grid will be the two Walkinshaw Andretti United Fords, Chaz Mostert just clear of his team-mate Ryan Wood, who was in his first Bathurst Shoot Out.
Brodie Kostecki, Dick Johnson Racing Ford Mustang GT
Photo by: Edge Photographics
It was the first 1-2-3-4 qualifying result at Bathurst for Ford since 1990, when the Sierra RS500 Cosworth racers dominated the Group A era of Touring Car racing.
The first of the Chevrolet Camaros was the Triple Eight example of Broc Feeney. After 14 poles through the season, many expected that he would be the fastest of the breed but few would have predicted that he would be 0.55s down on pole, after what he admitted was a ragged lap.
Cooper Murray was sixth in the Erebus Chevrolet, the car that Kostecki vacated after winning the race last year, and he will start alongside the other Tickford entry. Thomas Randle was the first man out in the Shoot Out and gaining four places gives his team two cars close to the front of the grid.
Matt Stone Racing put both its Chevrolets in the Shoot Out, Cam Hill taking eighth in his first such session, two places ahead of team-mate Nick Percat, who is making his final Bathurst start as a full-time driver.
The pair were split by Anton De Pasquale, whose Team 18 Chevrolet underwent a late-night rebuild after a Practice crash on Thursday. ‘ADP’ lost a little time at the first corner but at least finished with a car ready to race.
Sunday’s Supercars programme is due to start at 8:30am, Australian Eastern Daylight Savings Time, with the traditional 20-minute warmup.
The Bathurst 1000, the results of which will determine the 10 drivers who will vie for the title in the first-ever Supercars Finals series, will start at 11:45am (the latest time in its history) and is due to run over 161 laps.
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– The Autosport.com Team
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