OzRacingWrap

V8 SUPERCARS championship leader Jamie Whincup will start from pole position for the opening race of the Desert 400 in Bahrain.

The Ford young gun topped the charts in the qualifying session with a lap of one minute and 25.0415 seconds on the world class Bahrain International Circuit, to secure his fifth pole of the year.

He will be joined on the front row by Triple Eight Racing teammate Craig Lowndes, who clocked 1:25.0624 following his impressive performance in practice.

Whincup's closest championship rival and last year's Desert 400 winner Mark Winterbottom (1:25.5967) will start from ninth while Holden's reigning champion Garth Tander, the other man in the title race, qualified fifth fastest with a 1:25.4116.

Holden's Todd Kelly (1:25.1556) qualified third fastest with Jim Beam Racing's Steven Johnson (1:25.3974) in fourth.

Whincup holds a 75-point lead over Winterbottom in the championship with Tander a further 31 points behind with three rounds to go.

The series leader is hoping for a much-improved performance in Bahrain after he failed to register a point at the event last year, in a performance that effectively cost him the championship.

"It's great to be back in Bahrain and have a much quicker car than last year," Whincup said.

"We've done a lot of work and it's sort of a bogey track where we struggled last year, especially in qualifying."

Bahraini driver Fahad Al Musalam, who is driving for Team Kiwi after winning the Middle Eastern Chevy Lumina series, will start from the back of the grid despite improving on his practice time with a 1:28.8069.

Bathurst runners up Greg Murphy and Jason Richards failed to survive the first session
of qualifying and will start from 23rd and 24th on the grid respectively, while retiring Holden legend Mark Skaife qualified in 16th.

Article: AAP