Photo: PSP Images

Gordon Shedden’s late qualifying gamble pays off with a critical gain on the grid

Honda Yuasa Racing’s Gordon Shedden made a late surge up to third and is the best placed of the main championship challengers in qualifying at Rockingham, saying third on the grid “feels like pole.”

After a red flag with three minutes to go, after Support Our Paras Racing’s Derek Palmer went off at Tarzan in his Infiniti Q50, the session resumed with five minutes left to go. The Scotsman was the only driver to opt to head into the pits after his outlap, sacrificing the option of having three flying laps to having just one lap, with the front and rear tyres switched over in the pits to have the advantage that comes with it of a warmer set of rears.

“It was perfect. It feels like pole position to me,” said Shedden to TouringCarTimes. “When you look at the two cars in front of me, they have no ballast and I’ve got 66kg, around here that’s a big difference so I’m dead chuffed with that.”

The red flag gave the team the time to make a quick set-up change and make a plan of attack for the last five minutes. Team-mate Matt Neal remained in the pits, while Shedden was the only driver to make a significant gain in the final five minutes.

“With five minutes to go they were telling me that I was P10 and four-tenths off, and I thought really? I didn’t know where we were going to find the next jump from, but that red flag just allowed us to have a look at it, make a little change and got the lap done.

“I knew what I wanted tyre wise but we were really tight on time which was the issue. Today it’s generally the second flyer which has been the quickest, but I only had time for one and it was a risk I was prepared to take.”

With Motorbase Performance’s Mat Jackson on pole and Team BMR’s Aron Smith second ahead of Shedden, his closest championship rival on the grid is championship leader Jason Plato in sixth, with Honda team-mate and third in the points Neal seventh.