McLaughlin beats Whincup to provisional pole in a Thrilling Qualifying
- Shahmir Khan
- Mar 1, 2019
- 2 min read
Scott McLaughlin in his new Ford Mustang beat Jamie Whincup in Pole Position Qualifying at the Supercars season opening in Adelaide.
The DJR Team Penske driver did a 1m19.5983s lap time around the street circuit to be just 0.05 s clear of Triple-Eight Engineering driver.
They will lead the field going into the Pole Position Top 10 Shootout, with four mustangs in top six.
Fabian Coulthard took times into the 1:19s after initial runs were upset by a red flag, his 1m19.7874s briefly fastest until McLaughlin logged a 1m19.5983s.
That had McLaughlin at top with Chaz Mostert in third in an all Mustang top-three.
Improvements in the closing stages meant Whincup, Coulthard and Nick Percat all got within 0.0695s of McLaughlin by the end of the 20 minutes.
McLaughlin said, "For everyone at Ford Performance, all the Ford teams, it’s been fantastic,"
"The Shell V-Power car was great for me and Fabian, everything feels pretty good.
"I need to tune up a couple of different areas, but looking forward to the Shootout tomorrow.
"It was a bit of a toss-up whether we go out again, but there’s always something to try.
"We’ve got a set for the Shootout tomorrow anyway, so all good."
Mustang and Commodores split the top four places, ahead of the Tickford Racing Fords of Cameron Waters and Davison.
Shane van Gisbergen did enough to be in seventh ahead of Rick Kelly in the lead Kelly Racing Nissan, David Reynolds and James Courtney.
"It’s friggen’ hot in the cars, it’s tough, but at least we’re getting somewhere, we’re getting better and better," van Gisbergen said.
"I was on for a better lap there, the front four I think, but then got held up... that was a shame.
"But we’ve got another session tomorrow to tune in up and we’re in the Shootout, so that’s what matters."
Mostert dropped down to 12th by the end of the session with Lee Holdsworth and Mark Winterbottom 14th and 16th respectively.
Macauley Jones was the best of the two rookies in 17th, three spots ahead of Garry Jacobson.
There was a red flag after Anton De Pasquale crashed at Turn 8 on his first flying lap.
Practice 4 starts at 16:40 on Saturday, followed by the Pole Position Top 10 Shootout and the opening 78-lap race from 22:50.
Classifications of Pole Position Qualifying:
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