Chaz Mostert puts Audi on pole for the first-ever Fanatec GT World Challenge Australia Powered by AWS

Chaz Mostert edged out Jamie Whincup to claim a historic pole position in the inaugural qualifying for Fanatec GT World Challenge Australia Powered by AWS.

Mostert drove the Audi R8 LMS GT3 Evo he will share with Tony Bates to the fastest lap time in the combined Qualifying 1 and Qualifying 2 results at a sunny Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit on Friday.

This means the Melbourne Performance Centre-prepared #24 car will start from pole position for Race 1 on Saturday at the 4.45km Victorian circuit.

Mostert led the early running in The Bend Motorsport Park Audi before most of the cars filled into the pits at the halfway mark and the crews got to work.

However, only a handful of people went back on track and improved on their efforts, with Mostert retaining the quickest time by a narrow margin on a 1:28.184s.

Garth Tander had been in close contention for pole in the #777 Audi but was pipped by Triple Eight Race Engineering for second.

Jamie Whincup laid down a 1:28.365s lap time in the #888 Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo to put the car only 0.18s behind pole-sitter Mostert in a close battle for the inaugural pole.

This demoted Tander to third, while fourth was Grove Motorsport’s Porsche 911 GT3 R of Brenton and Stephen Grove, and the Audi R8 LMS Ultra of Brad Schumacher completed the top five.

Schumacher was the best of the Trophy class competitors in both sessions after also topping Qualifying 1 overall.

In the combined results, Trophy class runners Gary Higgon and Paul Stokell claimed sixth in their KFC Audi R8 LMS ahead of another KFC-backed Audi in the hands of Matt Stoupas in seventh.

Andrew MacPherson and Ben Porter’s Lamborghini Huracan GT3 was eighth, followed by the Brett Hobson-driven Nissan GTR NISMO GT3 and Tony Quinn’s Aston Martin Vantage which will start 10th.

Earlier in the day, Tander started the weekend out strong, topping Practice 1 before the times tumbled in Practice 2 with Whincup securing the best time.

Race 1 is scheduled to take place at 12:20 AEDT.

Catch the action live and free on the screens of Seven with coverage beginning at 10am on 7plus and 11am on 7mate on Saturday.

QUOTES

Chaz Mostert
Driver, #24 Bostik Audi R8 LMS

“It’s a pretty awesome result for the Bostik Audi crew and for Tony Bates to have the car on pole for Race 1,” said Mostert.

“To be up the pointy end there with my mates J-Dub and Garth and to get one over those guys is quite a good feeling.

“The weather conditions are a bit warmer than what we normally see here in Victoria land but there is some wet weather on the forecast for the next few days so we’ll see what happens.”