Van Gisbergen edges McLaughlin by 0.0001 seconds for provisional pole at Clipsal 500
Defending Virgin Australia Supercars Champion, Shane Van Gisbergen, will head into the opening Top Ten Shootout of the Virgin Australia Supercars Championship in top spot after qualifying fastest on the Clipsal 500 Adelaide track this afternoon.
Just 0.0001 seconds separated Van Gisbergen and Shell V-Power Racing Team’s Scott McLaughlin, who went into qualifying with the fastest time following today’s practice sessions.
Van Gisbergen said his team made adjustments following this morning’s practice and they paid off in qualifying.
“We made some tweaks to make it better over the bumps in particular and that really upset the handling so we came back and found a pretty good balance,” he said.
“The car is fast on this new tyre and I’m really liking it.”
In the opening practice session of the day, it was four-time Clipsal 500 champion, Jamie Whincup (Red Bull Holden Racing Team) who recorded the fastest time, before McLaughlin recorded the quickest time of the second session.
McLaughlin set the mark of 1:19.7807 midway through this afternoon’s qualifying before Van Gisbergen pipped that time by the narrowest of margins on his final lap.
“I felt straight away when I got in the car today, I felt pretty comfortable,” McLaughlin said.
“There’s a lot of new parts on the car and it’s just good to see that it’s paying off at the moment.”
Rick Kelly continued his impressive form this weekend, setting the third fastest time ahead of two-time Clipsal 500 Champion, James Courtney and Chaz Mostert.
“We did a lot of miles on the new tyre on testing day,” Kelly said.
“I’m really excited to see how tomorrow’s race plays out on that new rubber because I think it will be a little bit different behaviour wise.”
Defending Clipsal 500 Champion, Nick Percat recorded the 11th fastest time this afternoon.
Tomorrow’s Top Ten Shootout will be between; Shane Van Gisbergen, Scott McLaughlin, Rick Kelly, James Courtney, Chaz Mostert, Fabian Coulthard, Jamie Whincup, Mark Winterbottom, Cameron Waters and David Reynolds.
For a full list of today's qualifying results, click here.
The Shootout will determine which driver will start from ARMOR ALL Pole Position for the first of this weekend’s two 250km races on the Adelaide street circuit
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