Shane van Gisbergen has backed up his Clipsal 500 Adelaide race one pole position with another today, in ARMOR ALL qualifying for race two this morning.
After a slow start saw him drop through the field from pole yesterday, van Gisbergen reaffirmed the outright pace of the #97 VIP Petfoods Tekno Autosports Holden today with a last-lap flyer that put him to the top spot on the grid for the second time in two days.
Van Gisbergen’s 1m20.71s was the quickest lap of the weekend and just 0.1085s quicker than #5 FPR Ford of Mark Winterbottom – ensuring the same front row for races one and two.
It means he pockets a total of $5,000 from ARMOR ALL for his weekend’s work in qualifying.
“It’s been awesome,” he said.
“Pole on Friday, pole again today. All I’ve got to do is remember to put it in gear at the start! I was all prepared to go but I was in neutral – I let the clutch out and I went nowhere..
“It’s been great, everyone here is stoked and to get pole positions in a weekend is great. We can only go better by winning the race!”
Second for the second time this weekend, Winterbottom says he is keen to go for a little bit longer in today’s 78-lap race.
“The car was really good, I’m really happy with how it handled,” he said.
“A few laps you don’t get the maximum – another front row start is good. We’ll try to do what we did yesterday over 78 laps, and not just one.
“The guys have built four new gearboxes overnight. We’re confident that we’ve fixed it.”
Jamie Whincup was third – his last lap flyer unable to rocket him quite to the top – with Will Davison fourth in the second Pepsi Max Ford.
Lockwood Racing’s Fabian Coulthard was fifth, another to back up his strong run yesterday and only 0.2s from pole.
Backing up their strong run yesterday, Fujitsu Racing GRM pair Alex Premat and Scott McLaughlin were sixth and seventh, respectively, with race one winner Craig Lowndes, Russell Ingall and James Courtney completing the top-10.
This afternoon’s 78-lap race will commence at 2:35pm, local time, and will be broadcast live on the Seven network and via V8supercars.com.au and the all-new IPTV online service.
