Feeney defies wet to take Sandown 500 provisional pole

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Feeney defies wet to take Sandown 500 provisional pole

Broc Feeney has overcome fickle Melbourne weather to claim provisional pole ahead of the first endurance race of the Supercars season at a slippery Sandown 500.

The Triple Eight youngster will be the last to jump in Saturday’s top-10 shootout, giving him and co-driver Jamie Whincup a golden chance to back up their 2023 race win.

Teams reached for the wets as hail blanketed the Springvale circuit minutes before qualifying began.

Feeney went off the track early as drivers struggled for grip with cold tyres but recovered to outpace Walkinshaw Andretti ******* rival Chaz Mostert by four hundredths of a second.

“Far out, I’ve been running off that much today I’m surprised I didn’t get a ****** flag,” Feeney said.

“It’s super hard out there.

“We thought it was going to be dry and then the hail, literally a minute before we went out, so yeah a high-pressure situation. But great to be in the shootout.”

Mostert (1899 pts) and Feeney (1782 pts) will be vying for a spot at the top of grid as they look to reel in Will Brown (1980 pts) at the head of the championship standings.

Brown claimed the sixth-fastest time, 0.188 seconds behind his Triple Eight teammate, with the Ford quartet of Cam Waters, Ryan Wood, Matt Payne and Mostert ahead of him.

Reigning Supercars champion Brodie Kostecki was two-tenths of a second off the pace in seventh, and Richie Stanaway, Andre Heimgartner and Anton De Pasquale rounded out the top 10.

The session was halted with 12 minutes to go after Blanchard Racing’s Aaron Love slipped off the kerb on turn seven and careened into the fence. The red flag waved over the track as recovery teams worked to dig his beaten-up Mustang out of the gravel.

Team 18 veteran David Reynolds topped the times when qualifying resumed but slipped down the standings to 17th as tyres heated back up and the pace quickened.

***** Johnson Racing’s Will Davison notched the 15th-fastest time, having earlier crashed into the fence to force a ********** end to a chaotic final practice session.

The sun came out late in the session but teams will think twice before chucking the slicks back on, with more showers forecast for the afternoon.

The top-10 shootout for pole position gets underway at 5.25pm local time before race 19 begins at 2.05pm on Sunday.

RACE 19 QUALIFYING RESULTS:

1. Broc Feeney (Triple Eight Race Engineering) 1:12.898

2. Chaz Mostert (Walkinshaw Andretti *******) +0.040s

3. Matt Payne (Grove Racing) +0.087s

4. Ryan Wood (Walkinshaw Andretti *******) +0.126s

5. Cam Waters (Tickford Racing) +0.129s

6. Will Brown (Triple Eight Race Engineering) +0.188s

7. Brodie Kostecki (Erebus Motorsport) +0.200s

8. Richie Stanaway (Grove Racing) +0.224s

9. Andre Heimgartner (Brad Jones Racing) +0.286s

10. Anton De Pasquale (***** Johnson Racing) +0.480s

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