Whincup takes pole for Clipsal 500
Team Vodafone's Jamie Whincup kicked off his V8 Supercar title defence in the best way possible with pole position for this weekend's Clipsal 500 in the Adelaide Parklands
Whincup was fastest in the opening two legs of qualifying and again in the top ten shootout to mark a near-perfect debut for Ford's FG Falcon. Whincup ended up nearly a quarter of a second ahead of his closest challenger.
Alongside Whincup on the grid will be his team-mate Craig Lowndes, after Mark Winterbottom's time in the shootout was disallowed for going outside the defined track surface at turn four.
This was good news for 2007 series champion Garth Tander in his Holden Racing Team Commodore, who moved up to third just ahead of Jim Beam Racing's James Courtney, with Fabian Coulthard completing the top five in another Ford.
Errors at the hairpin cost both Will Davison and Jason Richards on their shootout laps and they will start seventh and eighth just ahead of Winterbottom and Lee Holdsworth, who lost his shootout time after shortcutting the kerbs at the turn one/two chicane.
Steven Richards just missed the top ten in his Ford Performance Racing Falcon, while a trio of Holden runners expected to perform well struggled, with Russell Ingall, Rick Kelly and Greg Murphy in sixteenth through eighteenth. Ingall's rookie team-mate Tim Slade was next up.
Todd Kelly's season got off to an even worse start than brother and team-mate Rick, starting 24th after bringing out the red flag at the end of leg one.
WOW Racing's Cameron McConville failed to set a time after crashing exiting the chicane at the start of qualifying, while Dale Wood didn't even take part after crashing in practice at the reprofiled but still difficult turn eight sweeper.
Pos Driver Car Time 1. Jamie Whincup Ford Falcon FG 1:21.8123 2. Craig Lowndes Ford Falcon FG 1:22.0668 + 0.2545 3. Garth Tander Holden Commodore VE 1:22.1887 + 0.3764 4. James Courtney Ford Falcon FG 1:22.3369 + 0.5246 5. Fabian Coulthard Ford Falcon FG 1:22.3919 + 0.5796 6. Paul Dumbrell Holden Commodore VE 1:22.5136 + 0.7013 7. Will Davison Holden Commodore VE 1:22.7285 + 0.9162 8. Jason Richards Holden Commodore VE 1:25.4188 + 3.6065 9. Mark Winterbottom Ford Falcon FG 10. Lee Holdsworth Holden Commodore VE 11. Steven Richards Ford Falcon FG 1:21.9388 + 0.1265 12. Shane Van Gisbergen Ford Falcon FG 1:21.9976 + 0.1853 13. Jason Bright Ford Falcon BF 1:22.0567 + 0.2444 14. Steven Johnson Ford Falcon FG 1:22.0619 + 0.2496 15. Michael Caruso Holden Commodore VE 1:22.0877 + 0.2754 16. Russell Ingall Holden Commodore VE 1:22.1041 + 0.2918 17. Rick Kelly Holden Commodore VE 1:22.1090 + 0.2967 18. Greg Murphy Holden Commodore VE 1:22.2240 + 0.4117 19. Tim Slade Holden Commodore VE 1:22.3902 + 0.5779 20. Tony D'Alberto Holden Commodore VE 1:22.4528 + 0.6405 21. Marcus Marshall Ford Falcon BF 1:22.7828 + 0.9705 22. David Reynolds Holden Commodore VE 1:22.7843 + 0.9720 23. Jason Bargwanna Holden Commodore VE 1:22.8073 + 0.9950 24. Todd Kelly Holden Commodore VE 1:22.8853 + 1.0730 25. Jack Perkins Holden Commodore VE 1:23.0927 + 1.2804 26. Alex Davison Ford Falcon FG 1:23.3827 + 1.5704 27. Michael Patrizi Ford Falcon BF 1:23.8807 + 2.0684 28. Dean Fiore Holden Commodore VE 1:24.8808 + 3.0685 29. Cameron McConville Holden Commodore VE
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