HARRI JONES has beaten David Russell to pole position in Round 4 of the Porsche Paynter Dixon Carrera Cup Australia Championship, in an all-time great battle for the TAG Heuer Pole Award at Queensland Raceway.
In a pulsating 30-minute session, Jones had a relatively comfortable – at least in one-make Porsche racing terms – margin over the entire field for much of the session before a late Russell flyer forced the champion to dig deep in a bid to secure his third pole of the year.
His final push lap did just that, his 1m08.8130s best denying Russell’s TekworkX entry a home-track pole by 0.0099 seconds – the fourth closest pole position margin in Carrera Cup Australia history.
The entire field lapped beneath the existing Carrera Cup qualifying record at Queensland Raceway today.
It was Jones’ third Equity One class TAG Heuer pole award and fourth consecutive front row start this season, with the bonus championship point on offer edging back his margin to new championship leader Dylan O’Keeffe – who was fourth.
Russell’s qualifying performance comes amidst an upturn of form from the TekworkX driver who has climbed to fifth in the championship following three rounds. It’s Russell’s best qualifying performance since scoring pole in New Zealand last year.
Dale Wood was third in a strong performance aboard his Connected Spaces EBM entry with Bayley Hall fifth for EMA Motorsport and Clay Osborne a career-best sixth for McElrea.
Fellow Porsche Michelin Juniors Caleb Sumich and Lockie Bloxsom were next, just in front of international import Marcus Amand – who will start his first Carrera Cup race on Australian soil in ninth position. Ange Mouzouris was the best of the Sonic entries, rounding out the top-10.
Just 0.63 seconds covered the entire Equity-One Professional class field following a session that sets the tone for three compelling races across the weekend.
Jones’ scored pole for both races one and two at QR by virtue of setting both the quickest and second quickest laps of the session.
He’ll start on pole for race two with Dale Wood alongside him on the front row. Russell will start race two third alongside a standout performance from Caleb Sumich, who was fourth. Mouzouris, Hamish Fitzsimmons, Osborne, O’Keefe, Hall and Amand will complete the top-10.
In Pro-Am, a long journey from Europe has delivered reward for Sam Shahin as he rebounded from a tough practice session to put his The Bend Motorsport Park entry on pole for both races one and two this weekend.
Shahin’s best of 1m08.63s late in qualifying saw him only 0.8s away from Jones’ outright pole time and at the same time three-tenths up on Matt Belford, who was second.
Brett Boulton’s return delivered him third on his home circuit with Rodney Jane, Matt Slavin and Scott Taylor next.
The Porsche Paynter Dixon Carrera Cup Australia field races just once on the Saturday program of the Century Batteries Ipswich Super440 event at Queensland Raceway, Race 1 commencing at 2:10pm local time – with live coverage on Fox Sports 506, Kayo and Sky Sports NZ.
