While nervous in the lead up – admitting he was running on around five hours of sleep – Reynolds clocked a 2:04.0589 effort to snare position one.

“I’m stoked … it’s a good feeling,” he said, Saturday’s effort adding to his shootout winning effort in 2015.

“I’d been putting pressure on myself all day. I woke up this morning at like four o’clock doing laps in my head, stressing out, I had anxiety, everything, couldn’t sleep.

“I got in my car, pulled my socks up before I got in, tightened my belts and just let it happen.”

But Reynolds was not the only reason Erebus had to celebrate as team-mate Anton De Pasquale secured position three.

The first rookie to qualify for the shootout in 16 years, de Pasquale was second man out in the qualifier. He clocked a 2:04.3498, and that was having cost himself two-tenths of a second as his tyres touched dirt metres from the chequered flag.

His time stood him on provisional pole until Reynolds came up with his brilliant qualifier, with just one driver yet to set a time. Still, he was delighted.

“It feels really good,” he said.

“I didn’t know how the track would be, so I just went as quick as I could and it was the fastest I’d done all weekend.

“After a few guys went you actually start realising it wasn’t too bad of a time and then you start to get really stressed.

“Coming into the weekend, I definitely would have taken that.”

Jamie Whincup joined Reynolds on the front row, the Red Bull Racing star clocking a 2:04.0683 after being the last man out on track.

“I got a good lap, the engineers did a good job, the car was fast,” he said.

Whincup’s Red Bull Racing team-mate Shane van Gisbergen claimed position four with a 2:04.5385, while last year’s pole sitter Scott McLaughlin was the fastest of the Falcons in fifth with his 2:04.5494.

Cameron Waters, Nick Percat, James Courtney, Craig Lowndes and Garth Tander rounded out the top 10.

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