» V8s: Winterbottom on pole for Phillip Island 60/60 SuperSprint

Mark Winterbottom will start from pole positions for today’s 60/60 SuperSprint race at Phillip Island.

The Ford Performance Racing driver vaulted to the top of the timesheets on his final flying lap, smashing the qualifying lap record to finish over half a second clear of his the rest of the field..

‘Frosty’ was languishing in a provisional back row starting position until his final flying lap, but he found a gap in the traffic to hustle his Ford Falcon around the 4.4-kilometre circuit with a time of 1:30.6099.

His time bumped provisional pole-sitter and championship leader Craig Lowndes to second on the grid. The pair’s fellow championship rivals and respective teammates, Will Davison and Jamie Whincup, could manage no better than tenth and thirteenth on the grid.

Garth Tander took his HRT Commodore third-quickest, while Alex Davison qualified his FPR Falcon an impressive fourth. With David Reynolds qualifying ninth-fastest, all four FPR cars managed to qualify inside the top ten.

Positions five to eight on the grid were claimed by Chaz Mostert, Fabian Coulthard, Shane van Gisbergen and Jason Bright.

Van Gisbergen was quickest in the early running, which saw the field run wet-weather tyres after an earlier rain shower. But the track quickly dried, triggering a switch to slick rubber at the halfway mark.

The slippery conditions caught a few drivers out. Coulthard and Whincup both speared off the track at Turn 2, but both managed to rejoin the circuit without too much drama.

James Moffat was another driver to come to grief at the same corner after getting his Nissan well out of shape at the fast Turn 1 right-hander, but he also managed to recover although starts from the back row of the grid.

The first 60-kilometre race leg gets underway at 3:45pm local time, with the grid order for the second points-paying race determined by the finishing order of Leg 1.

2013 V8 Supercars Phillip Island 360 – Race 1 Qualifying Results:

	Driver	Entry / Team	Result
1.	Mark Winterbottom	Pepsi Max Crew / Ford Performance Racing	1:30.6099
2.	Craig Lowndes	Red Bull Racing AU / Triple 8 Engineering	+ 0.5050
3.	Garth Tander	Holden Racing Team / TWR	+ 0.5392
4.	Alex Davison	Jeld-Wen Racing / Ford Performance Racing	+ 0.5552
5.	Chaz Mostert	Wilson Security Racing / Dick Johnson Racing	+ 0.5893
6.	Fabian Coulthard	Lockwood Racing / Brad Jones Racing	+ 0.7745
7.	Shane van Gisbergen	VIP Petfoods / Tekno Autosports	+ 0.7804
8.	Jason Bright	Team BOC / Brad Jones Racing	+ 0.8023
9.	David Reynolds	Bottle-O Racing / Ford Performance Racing	+ 0.9266
10.	Will Davison	Pepsi Max Crew / Ford Performance Racing	+ 0.9710
11.	Tim Blanchard	Wilson Security Racing / Dick Johnson Racing	+ 1.0225
12.	Lee Holdsworth	IRWIN Racing / Erebus Motorsport	+ 1.0779
13.	Jamie Whincup	Red Bull Racing AU / Triple 8 Engineering	+ 1.0829
14.	David Wall	Wilson Security Racing / Brad Jones Racing	+ 1.1168
15.	James Courtney	Holden Racing Team / TWR	+ 1.1453
16.	Todd Kelly	Jack Daniel’s Racing / Nissan Motorsport	+ 1.2162
17.	Scott McLaughlin	Fujitsu Racing / Garry Rogers Motorsport	+ 1.2256
18.	Michael Caruso	Norton 360 Racing / Nissan Motorsport	+ 1.2643
19.	Alexandre Prémat	Fujitsu Racing / Garry Rogers Motorsport	+ 1.3729
20.	Rick Kelly	Jack Daniel’s Racing / Nissan Motorsport	+ 1.3853
21.	Scott Pye	EKOL Racing / Lucas Dumbrell Motorsport	+ 1.4629
22.	Tony D’Alberto	Team HIFLEX / Tony D’Alberto Racing	+ 1.5465
23.	Jonathon Webb	Darrell Lea Racing / Tekno Autosports	+ 1.7260
24.	Dean Fiore	Dodo Insurance / Lucas Dumbrell Motorsport	+ 1.8719
25.	Russell Ingall	SuperCheap Auto Racing / TWR	+ 1.8767
26.	Tim Slade	Heavy Haulage Racing / Erebus Motorsport	+ 1.8884
27.	James Moffat	Norton 360 Racing / Nissan Motorsport	+ 2.1342
28.	Maro Engel	SP Tools Racing / Erebus Motorsport	+ 2.9061