Van Gisbergen takes provisional pole for Race 32 at Gold Coast 500

Shane van Gisbergen has provisionally qualified on pole position for Race 32 of the Repco Supercars Championship at the Boost Mobile Gold Coast 500 by a margin of 0.0193s.

The Red Bull Ampol Racing driver, who unofficially sealed the championship title on the afternoon prior, pipped Shell V-Power Racing Team’s Will Davison with his final lap, while Race 31 pole-sitter David Reynolds (#26 Penrite Mustang) was only 0.0106s slower again in third.

Davison was, however, involved in an awkward moment when he got a touch from James Golding (#31 Subway ZB Commodore) through Turn 12 of the Surfers Paradise Street Circuit in the closing stages of the 20-minute session.

Golding nevertheless snuck his PremiAir Racing entry into the Top 10 Shootout with a 1:10.6237s well after the chequered flag, nicking 10th position from Red Bull Ampol Racing’s Broc Feeney.

Earlier, Scott Pye (#20 Alspec ZB Commodore) had been quickest on a 1:10.6925s after most had done their first runs, although a handful of notables had not set a representative time if they had even completed a lap at all by then.

Among them were Brodie Kostecki (#99 Boost Mobile ZB Commodore), who soon went to the top on a 1:10.6338s before van Gisbergen (#97 ZB Commodore) clocked a 1:10.4856s on his first flyer.

Davison (#17 Mustang) moved the benchmark to a 1:10.2832s on his second run, with van Gisbergen second, Brodie Kostecki seventh, and Pye’s aforementioned time putting him in 10th ahead of the final five minutes.

Pye was out of the top 10 when Feeney set a 1:10.6635s but got himself back up to fifth with a 1:10.5074s which pushed fellow Team 18 driver Mark Winterbottom (#18 Irwin Tools ZB Commodore) out with less than a minute to go.

Meanwhile, van Gisbergen had set a 1:10.2639s before Chaz Mostert (#25 Mobil 1 Optus ZB Commodore) made himself safe with a 1:10.4861s which was good enough for fourth at the time.

When the chequered flag came out, it was van Gisbergen fastest from Davison, Reynolds, Cameron Waters (#6 Monster Energy Mustang), Mostert, Pye, and Thomas Randle (#55 Castrol Mustang).

Both Anton De Pasquale (#11 Shell V-Power Mustang) and Brodie Kostecki then improved their times but not their positions as they remained eighth and ninth, respectively.

Golding, however, extracted a 1:10.6237s to move himself up three positions to 10th, consigning Feeney to 11th and Winterbottom to 12th.

Nick Percat (#2 Mobil 1 NTI ZB Commodore) ended up 19th and Andre Heimgartner (#8 R&J Batteries ZB Commodore) 20th, the latter having been given something of a salute from van Gisbergen as they exited the Turn 4 hairpin with about five minutes to go due to a perception from the Triple Eight Race Engineering driver that he had been held up.

Tim Slade is set to start last after glancing the inside wall at Turn 11 around halfway through the session, an impact which would lead to the spring falling out of the left-front corner of the #3 CoolDrive Mustang.

The Top 10 Shootout takes place at 11:35 local time/12:35 AEDT.

Results: Qualifying for Race 32, Boost Mobile Gold Coast 500