Kostecki tops Shootout to claim Taupo pole

The Dick Johnson Racing was unstoppable in the Top 10 Shootout, falling less than a tenth short of his record-breaking effort in regular qualifying.

His 1m25.705s left him 0.16s clear of Anton De Pasquale as Kostecki claimed a second pole for the Taupo Super440 weekend.

“This means a lot to everyone in the whole group. It’s a shame that Davo wasn’t in the Shootout but I’m sure he’ll come through strongly in the race,” Kostecki said.

“I think everyone is starting to gel. We’ve been battling a few balance issues but we’ve slowly been getting on top of them, I think we saw that towards the end of the Grand Prix.

“We’re slowly getting there. I was really happy with my lap. I told [engineer] George [Commins] I’d be really happy with two tenths [margin], but almost there.”

De Pasquale made up a spot in the Shootout as he ended up second, as did WAU’s sophomore star Ryan Wood who will start out of third.

Their progress came at the expense of Cam Hill, who had been second fastest in regular qualifying but dropped to the outside of the second row in the Shootout.

Thomas Randle was another driver to improve on his qualifying effort has he jumped up to fifth ahead of Grove Racing pair Matt Payne and Kai Allen.

Andre Heimgartner slipped back from fifth to eighth as Chaz Mostert and James Golding held their qualifying positions on the inside and outside of the fifth row respectively.

The third and final race starts at 3:05pm local time.

Results: Repco Supercars Championship ITM Taupo Super440, Top 10 Shootout Race 10