Kostecki remains wary of SVG threat

Brodie Kostecki is not discounting the threat of Supercars title rival Shane van Gisbergen despite the latter failing to record a Top 10 Shootout time on this occasion.

Repco Supercars Championship leader Kostecki secured a precious pole position for the third-last race of the season after breaching track limits in the shootout a day earlier at the Boost Mobile Gold Coast 500.

This time around, though, it was van Gisbergen who cut the Beach Chicane and hence was consigned to Row 5 on the Surfers Paradise starting grid.

He finished second in Race 25 while Kostecki climbed from 10th on the grid to fifth, a point which the latter alluded to after the one-lap dash.

THE FINAL RACE OF THE 2023 REPCO SUPERCARS CHAMPIONSHIP ON ONE OF THE WORLD’S BEST STREET CIRCUITS.
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“We’re fighting for millimetres around here and, honestly, it’s pretty hard to see the kerbs in these cars because we sit a bit lower,” the Erebus Motorsport driver remarked.

“So, it’s very small mistakes, very big price, so we’ll see what happens.

“I got through to fifth in that last race and I have no doubt that he’ll come through in the race so we’ll see what happens.

“It’s still a big race this afternoon, so I still have to get it off the line, and we’ll see what happens, but I’m stoked with that and just want to thank my whole team.”

As for the 1:11.0118s which he set in the shootout, Kostecki declared, “That was probably the best lap of my career.

“There’s a lot on the line here this weekend and you’ve got to take a lot of risk to get the lap time out of the car.

“It wasn’t too shabby in qualifying, it was pretty sort of evil – I thought I was going to write it off at one point – but George [Commins, Race Engineer] got it tuned up quite nicely then for the heat and it was a dream to drive.

“So, stoked to be on the front row and we’ll see if we can get a jump off the start and see what happens there.”

Kostecki leads van Gisbergen by 104 points after the latter gained 27 in Race 25.

If they finish where they start this afternoon, the margin would expand to 170 points.