Mostert wary of curveball amid qualifying woes

Chaz Mostert is determined to nail one-lap pace at the first ever Super 440 event amid his third worst start to a season in qualifying.

The Walkinshaw Andretti United driver slipped from third to fourth in the championship across the Grand Prix event last month.

While he has moved forward in the races, Mostert’s start to 2025 has been hamstrung by poor qualifying performance.

The two-time Bathurst winner's qualifying average through two rounds is 11.86; only in 2022 (12.60) and 2014 (12.83) did Mostert have a worse average after two rounds.

Such are Mostert’s struggles in qualifying, that younger teammate Ryan Wood leads the qualifying head-to-head 4-3.

The WAU star’s focus on qualifying comes ahead of the biggest format shake-up in recent memory, courtesy of the new-for-2025 Super 440 format.

Saturday’s two qualifying sessions will be split across the Soft and Super Soft tyre, matching the corresponding race compound.

Qualifying itself is a knockout format, where the top 10 drivers from the 10-minute Part 1 go through to an eight-minute all-in session in Part 2 to decide pole.

In a bid to keep pace with the championship leaders, Mostert knows what he needs to get right come Saturday.

“Qualifying is a big focus for us this weekend,” Mostert said.

“We have back-to-back qualifying [on Saturday] with the Soft tyre up first then the Super Soft for the second session.“It’ll make that second session pretty interesting as that’ll be our first time on the Super Soft this season.”

Supercars will hit the track in New Zealand for two practice sessions on Friday.