Golding takes S5000 pole at Symmons Plains

James Golding has qualified on pole position for Round 1 of the S5000 Australian Drivers’ Championship at Symmons Plains.

The 20-minute fight for pole was effectively a two-way contest between the Garry Rogers Motorsport driver and Team BRM’s 2021 champion Joey Mawson, with the former consolidating his advantage in clocking a 0:48.3895s on his 16th lap.

Mawson subsequently improved, but fell 0.0653s short in setting a 0:48.4548s near the end of his single run in the session.

Team-mate Tim Slade is set to start third after improving his time but not his position in achieving a 0:48.6139s with the chequered flag out, with Versa Motorsport’s Cooper Webster joining him on Row 2.

The rest of the nine-car grid will be Tim Macrow in fifth, from Blake Purdie, Josh Fife, Kaleb Ngatoa, and Adam Garwood.

Race 1 for the S5000 field at AWC Race Tasmania starts at 15:10 local time/AEDT and will be streamed live on Stan Sport.

Results: Qualifying

Pos	Num	Team/Sponsor	Driver	Fastest lap	Split
1	31	Team Valvoline GRM	James Golding	0:48.3895
2	1	ALABAR/FORM700 Team BRM	Joey Mawson	0:48.4548	0:00.0653
3	3	ALABAR/FORM700 Team BRM	Tim Slade	0:48.6139	0:00.2244
4	37	Versa Motorsport	Cooper Webster	0:48.6818	0:00.2923
5	23	UCS Group Racing TMR	Tim Macrow	0:48.7922	0:00.4027
6	48	Nippy’s	Blake Purdie	0:48.9676	0:00.5781
7	88	ACMFinance.com Racing	Josh Fife	0:48.9932	0:00.6037
8	15	Team BRM	Kaleb Ngatoa	0:49.0280	0:00.6385
9	12	Giraffe Civil	Adam Garwood	0:49.2647	0:00.8752