Winterbottom leads Ford 1-2-3 in Race 3 qualifying

Ford Performance Racing duo Mark Winterbottom and Will Davison will share the front-row for today’s third race of the 2012 V8 Supercars Championship at Symmons Plains

Will Davison displaced Shane van Gisbergen at the top of the order by setting a 51.50s lap with just over a minute remaining in the 20 minute session, before being pipped by Winterbottom just seconds later.

While Winterbottom’s 51.48s effort proved good enough for pole, the Orrcon Steel FPR driver lowered the benchmark further to 51.40s on his final flyer.

Van Gisbergen’s time, set on his first set of soft tyres, will see him start on the inside of the second row. The SP Tools Falcon driver had a difficult run on his second set of tyres, spearing off at Turn 2 on his first lap, before finding traffic on his final.

Jamie Whincup, Craig Lowndes, Garth Tander, David Reynolds, Taz Douglas, Jonathon Webb and Steve Johnson rounded out the top 10.

Douglas was another driver to set his best time at the midpoint of the session – the iSelect Commodore jumping to fourth on the time sheets with 10 minutes remaining.

While his final set of tyres were wasted with a lock-up at Turn 2, the V8 Supercars Championship rookie’s earlier effort was just 0.28s slower than the eventual pole time.

Qualifying was held in significantly different conditions to this morning’s practice, with a significant headwind having developed along the back straight.

Race 3 of the V8 Supercars Championship will get underway at 1610 local time.

See below for the full qualifying result

See below for Speedcafe.com’s Tasmania Challenge V8 Race Guide

[issuu width=550 height=389 shareMenuEnabled=false backgroundColor=%23222222 documentId=120328135654-884b31a1d10b438c9440f0d60434f6c7 name=2012_symmonsplains username=speedcafe tag=speedcafe.com unit=px id=7bb87d8c-49a2-2a14-4c0a-9c34822dc616 v=2]