McLaughlin takes provisional Race 12 pole

Scott McLaughlin continued to showcase his impressive pace at Hidden Valley by taking provisional pole for Race 12 at the CrownBet Darwin Triple Crown.

The DJR Team Penske driver pipped his team-mate Fabian Coulthard in the 20 minute session which precedes a Top 10 Shootout to determine the grid.

McLaughlin topped the majority of the hit-out before lowering his personal best to a 1:05.68, which was 0.14s faster than Coulthard.

Jamie Whincup was third fastest in the Red Bull Holden just a tenth shy of the Shell-back Fords.

Erebus Motorsport’s David Reynolds continued his sparkling form to claim fourth despite battling gearshift issue, which was eventually resolved before the end of qualifying.

James Moffat secured a place in the Top 10 Shootout with a solid effort to claim fifth ahead of Shane van Gisbergen, who came to a halt on track as the session reached its climax.

The field for the shootout was completed by Lee Holdsworth (Preston Hire Racing), Craig Lowndes (Triple Eight), Prodrive’s Cameron Waters and Saturday’s third place finisher Nick Percat (Brad Jones Racing).

Tim Slade narrowly missed out on the all important top 10 in 11th ahead of yesterday’s pole-sitter Rick Kelly (Nisan Motorsport).

“The track changes that little bit in that 20 minutes and it’s enough to upset your qualifying routine,” said Rick Kelly.

“We timed it very well yesterday, the track was at its best when we delivered at the start of the session.

“Today we thought it’d be better towards the end of the session as it was last year and we were a little bit mistaken.”

Chaz Mostert was a notable absentee from the top 10 along with team-mate Mark Winterbottom, who continued to struggle for pace in 20th position.

The session ran clean although Garth Tander was lucky to avoid a major incident when he had swerve to miss collecting Alex Rullo on the start/finish straight.

Rullo filed out of pit lane behind a train of cars before weaving into the fast lane in front of the fast approaching Tander.

The incident was set to be investigated by the stewards.

“It was like Sydney traffic, they all just went everywhere,” said Tander.

“I was finishing the lap, just crossing the line, and I could see them all coming out of pit lane, and I think it was Rullo changed lanes straight to the outside of the fast lane.

“You’re almost top speed there. I was finishing the lap, it didn’t hurt the lap, but it’s certainly hard to pull the car up when someone does that, and then he weaved at me.

“It didn’t affect our lap time but it certainly got our heart rate up.”

Rullo admitted fault for the near miss revealing in a interview that he failed to check his mirrors when he rejoined the track.

“It is 110 percent my fault, I didn’t check my mirror,” said Rullo, who apologised to Tander.

“As Garth went past I got the message on the radio as we have a bit of a delay.

“I will happily accept the blame on that one it was completely my fault. Sorry to Garth I wasn’t sure if he was on a lap or not.”

Mobil 1 HSV Racing continued to battle a lack of grip as Scott Pye managed 16th, while James Courtney will start today’s race from 22nd.

The grid for Race 12 will be determined by a Top 10 Shootout from 1100 local time, ahead of a 200km heat scheduled for 1330.

Results: Virgin Australia Supercars Championship: Qualifying for Race 12, CrownBet Darwin Triple Crown