MOTORSPORT: McLaren and SVG grab Bathurst pole

McLaren driver and V8 Supercar star Shane van Gisbergen has stormed around the Mt Panorama circuit in an all-time record time to grab pole position for tomorrow’s LiquiMoly Bathurst 12 Hour endurance race.

Driving the latest 650S GT3 racer, the Kiwi recorded a lap of 2:01.286 – more than 3.6sec faster than the V8 Supercar practice record of 2:04.9097 set by Jamie Whincup in 2014. It is the fastest official time ever set by a road-car based racer at Mt Panorama.

Second fastest was the Jamec Audi of Rene Rast, Garth Tander and Steve McLaughlin. With Rast at the wheel, the new-generation R8 LMS posted a fastest lap also in the 2:01 range.

At 2:01.840 Rast was a scant 0.004sec faster than the third-placed Objective Racing McLaren 650S GT3 of Warren Luff, Tony Walls and Matt Campbell. Luff’s lap also came late in the standalone Class A 20-minute session that topped off Saturday’s qualifying at Bathurst.

The sister Jamec-Pem Audi (Christoper Mies, Christoper Haase and Marco Mapelli) qualified fourth and another McLaren, the Darrell Lea entry driven by Craig Baird and Tony Quinn and son Klark, was fifth. Quinn Jnr set the team’s fastest lap in the penultimate qualifying session. The team elected to sit out the final ‘shootout’ and only lost one spot on the grid via the strategy.

Polesitter van Gisbergen is partnered with Tekno Motorsport boss Jonathan Webb and Alvaro Parente in the lead 650S GT3.

The laid-back Kiwi was clearly pleased with his qualifying and the efforts of the Tekno squad.

"The car has been amazing all weekend. We've mainly been doing race set ups on high fuel so it's been pretty good. With qualifying we just put it all on the table and did what we could,” van Gisbergen said.

"It was pretty awesome to see that number come up on the dash, I was pretty pumped about that. We're not really excelling over the top but the car is good in every sector," he said.

Meantime, Audi is also quietly confident that over the race distance it’s frontrunners will be strong.

Rast, a factory driver for the German factory stated: “We had five or six flyers in Q1 and had a good feeling for the car and then went into Q2 and warmed up my tyres for a few laps and we made the best out of it.

“We’re pretty happy with P2 [but] Shane did an awesome lap and I couldn't beat him today!"

Significantly faster than 2015 and paired in seventh and eighth on the grid were the two factory Bentley Continentals.

On hand at Bathurst for the 2016 event, team principal Malcom Wilson was effusive with his praise for the event and the Mt Panorama track.

“I’ve no doubt this event is becoming and will cement itself as an iconic event on the international GT calendar. If there’s one negative, it’s the fact we have to run one ‘amateur’ driver. But there’s huge potential,” he told motoring.com.au.

motoring.com.au’s own Luke Youlden, teamed with Steve Owen and Roger Lago in the JBS Lamborghini Gallardo, was just outside the top 10.

“The pace in the afternoon surprised us a little. But we’ve got a good race car and it’s a long day tomorrow,” Youlden said.

Defending 2015 champs at NISMO Motorsport qualified outside the top 10 in 13th place.

Rick Kelly, back in the car after missing last year’s race, posted a best lap of 2:02.998 -- good enough for a front-row start last year but a measure of the increased pace of the 2016 field.

The first eight qualifiers this year are all faster than last year’s pole.

"Pole wasn’t a big deal for us but we certainly wanted to be a little further up than that. [But] the race-spec set-up on the car is certainly strong. We really need to focus on keeping it nice and clean [in the race]... so we are there at the end like they were last year, " Kelly said.

Grove Racing secured pole position in the battle of the Porsches in Class B, a very impressive 2:08.74s lap by V8 Supercar Volvo driver Scott McLaughlin. Le Mans 24 Hour winner Earl Bamber is alongside McLaughlin and team boss, gentleman driver Stephen Grove.

A mighty effort from the Melbourne-built Daytona coupe secured them a pole position in the Invitational class with a 2m10.864s lap. Continuing the theme of a record-setting day, the locally developed replica coupe was measured at an incredible 306.5km/h on Conrod Straight.

The Bathurst 12 Hour starts at 5.45am tomorrow and will be televised live on the Seven Network across Australia. Look our also for motoring.com.au’s live Periscope crosses throughout the day. Follow @motoringcomau on Twitter to watch them.