Scott McLaughlin sweeps Friday practice in Ipswich
Championship leader Scott McLaughlin has continued his run of one-lap speed this season as the DJR Team Penske driver ended both Friday practice sessions at Queensland Raceway in first place.
As the track’s current lap record holder and with a home track advantage for the team, McLaughlin earned a healthy gap to the chasing pack in both half hour outings to come out on top.
It was a good day for those with a Mustang on their grilles as all bar one of the Ford drivers made it in to the top ten, automatically sneaking in to the second qualifying session on Saturday.
Practice One
The day’s opening session was mostly uneventful over the 30 minutes at Queensland Raceway with Triple Eight’s Jamie Whincup the fastest early on, posting a time of 1:09.4594 which stood at the top of the time sheets for a majority of the session.
While the 15 minutes saw the top nine cars split bu under two tenths of a second, no one looked to be able to topple the seven time champion until Will Davison got his 23Red Racing Ford Mustang up to the top spot after putting in a 1:09.4171.
Despite bettering his time to a 1:09.3253 shortly after, it was again championship leader Scott McLaughlin in the DJR Team Penske machine which came up to the top after the chequered flag flew, setting two fastest sectors en route to a 1:09.1982 lap and ending the session in first place.
Practice Two
As with every other SuperSprint round this year, practice two was crucial for everyone’s Saturday as the top ten in the session automatically booked themselves a ticket into the second qualifying session tomorrow.
Though McLaughlin was the first to put in a quick lap with a 1.09.2804 in the initial runs of the sessions, Erebus Motorsport’s Anton de Pasquale displaced the championship leader on his next set of runs after posting a time of 1:09.1946.
de Pasquale’s time didn’t stay at the top for long as McLaughlin responded, a 1:09.0760 beat his own time from the morning’s session and put him just over a tenth clear from the field.
With just under ten minutes remaining, all six Fords in the championship worked their way up into the top ten while only de Pasquale and his team-mate David Reynolds as well as the Triple Eight pairing of Shane van Gisbergen and Jamie Whincup flew the Holden flag towards the top of the order.
Another improvement from McLaughlin towards the end of the session dropped his time down to a 1:08.9888 as Will Davison pipped him a few moments later after completing a lap in 1:08.9422.
In the dying minutes as the field came out onto the track for their last runs, McLaughlin retook his position at the top of the standings with a 1:08.8277 as Todd Hazelwood in the Matt Stone Racing Commodore bumped himself up to third, only just displaced by Chaz Mostert’s Tickford car after the session finished.
With the 30 minutes over, some big names like Cam Waters, Mark Winterbottom and James Courtney missed out on the top ten and have to fight their way out of the first qualifying session tomorrow morning.
