Tasmania Supercars: Lowndes ends pole drought

The veteran was just eighth quickest in the Q2 session, but upped his game significantly in the 10-minute Q3 session that decided pole position.

It started with a 50.708s that put him on top after the first runs, before Lowndes laid down a 50.579s on his final run to secure a breakthrough pole after a couple of seasons of lean qualifying results.

Shane van Gisbergen did go close to knocking off Lowndes, falling just 0.008s short, while Jamie Whincup was a tenth of a second back in third to make it a Triple Eight one-two-three.

"The car has been working really well over the weekend," said Lowndes.

"When you roll a car out and its 80 or 90 per cent right, it's always a lot easier for us as drivers.

"The guys next door [in the Red Bull Holden garage] are not going to make it easy on me. It's great to have a one-two-three; now we've got to translate that into race results."

Scott McLaughlin was best of the non-T8 cars in fourth, 0.201s off pole, while Jack Le Brocq capped off a standout session for Triple Eight-build Commodores by putting his Tekno entry an impressive fifth on the grid.

Fabian Coulthard was sixth fastest in his Penske Ford, ahead of a gaggle of Holdens with James Courtney, David Reynolds, Garth Tander, and Scott Pye, who was the only driver to go all the way from Q1 to Q3.

Rick Kelly was the only driver to go straight into Q2 but not make it to Q3, the Nissan driver set to start from 13th after failing to replicate his Top 10 pace from practice.

For the second day in a row Q3 was a Tickford-free zone, not a single one of the team's four drivers making it out of Q2. Chaz Mostert will start as the best of the Tickford Fords in 11th, with Mark Winterbottom 12th, Cam Waters 14th, and Richie Stanaway not making it out of Q1.

Others to not make it out of Q1 included Nick Percat, who will start out of P17, and Michael Caruso, who was 10th fastest in the session and will start the race from 20th.

Cla	#	Driver	Car	Time
1	888	Craig Lowndes	Holden Commodore ZB	50.5790
2	97	Shane van Gisbergen	Holden Commodore ZB	50.5870
3	1	Jamie Whincup	Holden Commodore ZB	50.6882
4	17	Scott McLaughlin	Ford Falcon FG X	50.7808
5	19	Jack Le Brocq	Holden Commodore ZB	50.7860
6	12	Fabian Coulthard	Ford Falcon FG X	50.8099
7	25	James Courtney	Holden Commodore ZB	50.8156
8	9	David Reynolds	Holden Commodore ZB	50.8608
9	33	Garth Tander	Holden Commodore ZB	50.9681
10	2	Scott Pye	Holden Commodore ZB	51.0092
11	55	Chaz Mostert	Ford Falcon FG X	50.9462
12	5	Mark Winterbottom	Ford Falcon FG X	50.9530
13	15	Rick Kelly	Nissan Altima	50.9866
14	6	Cameron Waters	Ford Falcon FG X	51.0344
15	230	Will Davison	Ford Falcon FG X	51.0967
16	14	Tim Slade	Holden Commodore ZB	51.1394
17	8	Nick Percat	Holden Commodore ZB	51.1781
18	18	Lee Holdsworth	Holden Commodore ZB	51.1911
19	7	Andre Heimgartner	Nissan Altima	51.2027
20	23	Michael Caruso	Nissan Altima	51.2567
21	35	Todd Hazelwood	Ford Falcon FG X	51.3257
22	99	Anton de Pasquale	Holden Commodore ZB	51.3434
23	78	Simona de Silvestro	Nissan Altima	51.3531
24	56	Richie Stanaway	Ford Falcon FG X	51.3922
25	21	Tim Blanchard	Holden Commodore ZB	51.4411
26	34	James Golding	Holden Commodore ZB	51.5887