Brodie Kostecki gains provisional pole for 2023 Bathurst 1000 following dramatic qualifying session

Kostecki laid down a fastest lap of 2:04.6644 in a dramatic Friday qualifying session that featured two red flags, brought out by crashes to his teammate Will Brown along with Tickford Racing's Declan Fraser.

James Golding, currently 15^th in the championship, was the surprise packet of the session as he took his PremiAir Racing Camaro to second with a 2:04.8133, while Shell V Power Racing's Anton de Pasquale was third (2:04.9667).

Tickford's Cam Waters was the only other driver to do a sub-2:05 lap (2:04.9909) on his way to fourth, while Broc Feeney, David Reynolds, Shane van Gisbergen, Matt Payne, Chaz Mostert and Will Davison rounded out the top 10.

Saturday's Top 10 Shoot Out is set to feature six Mustangs and four Camaros.

Grove Racing (Reynolds, Payne), Triple Eight Race Engineering (Feeney, van Gisbergen) and Shell V Power Racing (de Pasquale, Davison) will have both their cars featured in the one-lap dash.

Erebus was able to get Brown back onto the track for qualifying but he'll be forced to start Sunday's race from 17^th while fellow championship high-flyer Andre Heimgartner was another surprise absentee from the top 10, finishing 13^th.

Defending Bathurst 1000 and Supercars champion van Gisbergen was on the verge of missing out on a top 10 finish but pushed his way into the Shoot Out with his final lap of the qualifying session.

Kostecki said it's been an evolving battle with the Mount Panorama circuit.

"The trophy's on Sunday so I'm just taking it day by day and I'm trying to keep up to speed with the track, which is progressing quite quickly with the rubber, so that's been a bit tricky

"We've just been trying to tick boxes and focus on ourselves and Dave [Russell] has done an awesome job. We've had him in the car a lot this week and his feedback has been good."

Kostecki expressed his disappointment to see misfortune strike his Erebus teammate.

"Obviously it wasn't great to see Will go in. If he didn't do it I'm sure he'd be up here with myself," he said.

"The car's been fast all weekend. They'll get it right tonight and have it ready for racing on Sunday."

Five minutes into the 40-minute session Brown locked up his car on the entry to turn two and buried his car in the tyre wall.

An even bigger incident unfolded just a few minutes into the resumption of qualifying when Goddard made heavy contact with the wall at Reid Park.

Scott Pye also made contact with the way on his run into McPhillamy Park but avoided any major damage and was able to qualify in 12^th.

Thomas Randle was the unfortunate driver to get pushed out of the top 10 in the dying seconds of the session by van Gisbergen's last-ditch effort.