Sydney Supercars: Heimgartner tops wet qualifying

Drivers were greeted with extremely wet conditions at the Eastern Creek circuit, tyre pressures critical to getting a lap in times that were around 15 seconds slower than in the dry.

I was Kelly Grove Racing driver Heimgartner, a race winner in the wet earlier this season, that read the conditions best, a 1m45.082s leaving him 0.05s clear of renowned rain master Shane van Gisbergen.

The two Kiwis will run second last and last in the Top 10 Shootout that will determine pole later today.

"I love those sort of conditions, it's good fun," said Heimgartner.

"It doesn't mean too much, we've got the Top 10 Shootout to come. We'll wait and see but it's a good start.

"The car was comfortable. The tyre pressures were just right. Turn 1 is sketchy but apart from that it was all good."

Turn 1 did prove problematic for drivers, with both Todd Hazelwood and Jamie Whincup both ending up in the outside wall after high-speed excursions.

Remarkably both still made it through to the Shootout, Hazelwood third fastest and Whincup sixth.

Fabian Coulthard was the surprise of the session, putting his Team Sydney Holden into the Shootout with the fourth-best time.

"We've struggled there last few weeks and the car was a handful early on in the wet but it just got better and better and we got that lap in the end," he said.

Nick Percat, Tim Slade, Chaz Mosert, Cam Waters and David Reynolds will also run in the single-lap dash for pole.

It was a tough session for a number of in-form drivers, including the two Erebus rookies, Will Brown 16th fastest and Brodie Kostecki 19th.

De Pasquale, who's been the form man over a lap at SMP in recent weeks, also missed the Shootout and will start 17th.

"We didn't get a great run [early in the session], didn't have much pace," he said. "Then we changed tyres and it was all coming good and I made an error on that last lap."

Cla	#	Driver	Car	Time	Gap	Interval
1	7	Andre Heimgartner	Ford Mustang GT	1'45.082
2	97	Shane van Gisbergen	Holden Commodore ZB	1'45.138	0.055	0.055
3	14	Todd Hazelwood	Holden Commodore ZB	1'45.155	0.073	0.017
4	19	Fabian Coulthard	Holden Commodore ZB	1'45.396	0.314	0.241
5	8	Nick Percat	Holden Commodore ZB	1'45.416	0.334	0.019
6	3	Tim Slade	Ford Mustang GT	1'45.469	0.387	0.053
7	88	Jamie Whincup	Holden Commodore ZB	1'45.573	0.491	0.104
8	25	Chaz Mostert	Holden Commodore ZB	1'45.589	0.506	0.015
9	6	Cameron Waters	Ford Mustang GT	1'45.859	0.777	0.270
10	26	David Reynolds	Ford Mustang GT	1'45.882	0.800	0.023
11	17	Will Davison	Ford Mustang GT	1'45.974	0.892	0.092
12	96	Macauley Jones	Holden Commodore ZB	1'46.112	1.029	0.137
13	44	James Courtney	Ford Mustang GT	1'46.140	1.058	0.028
14	5	Jack Le Brocq	Ford Mustang GT	1'46.376	1.294	0.235
15	20	Scott Pye	Holden Commodore ZB	1'46.443	1.361	0.067
16	9	Will Brown	Holden Commodore ZB	1'46.461	1.379	0.017
17	11	Anton De Pasquale	Ford Mustang GT	1'46.565	1.483	0.104
18	18	Mark Winterbottom	Holden Commodore ZB	1'46.591	1.509	0.026
19	99	Brodie Kostecki	Holden Commodore ZB	1'46.923	1.841	0.332
20	2	Bryce Fullwood	Holden Commodore ZB	1'47.109	2.027	0.185
21	34	Jake Kostecki	Holden Commodore ZB	1'47.432	2.350	0.322
22	35	Zane Goddard	Holden Commodore ZB	1'47.537	2.455	0.105
23	22	Garry Jacobson	Holden Commodore ZB	1'48.381	3.299	0.844
24	4	Jack Smith	Holden Commodore ZB	1'56.001	10.919	7.620
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