Supercars champion and multiple Bathurst 1000 winner Mark Skaife. Image: Richard Gresham
Kostecki edged Triple Eight Camaro driver Broc Feeney to provisional pole by 0.0064s before teeing off at Supercars over a proposed tweak to the Ford engine being denied.
Supercars had proposed air restrictor and camshaft timing adjustments to help the Ford after a study into the impact of barometric pressure on the two engines revealed a discrepancy.
However, the proposal was essentially blocked by GM, as in-season changes to such engine specifications requires sign-off from rival teams.
While the Supercars report essentially validated Ford’s long-held views of being at a disadvantage at Bathurst, Skaife defended the category’s parity efforts.
“I can’t believe it, to be honest. We’ve done so much work as a business to make sure these two cars are as close as they can be,” said Skaife in his role as a Fox Sports analyst.
“Yesterday was absolutely epic. That top 10 was the closest top 10 in history at this place.
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“The top six cars are separated by less than a tenth of a second and when you think about three Mustangs and three Camaros in the top six, separated by nothing, is extraordinary.
“So to claim there’s some kind of parity issue, I’m bewildered by that. That blows me away.
“And speed is speed. The thing they’re talking about is that it won’t correlate to the race. Well, it certainly correlates to how fast you can go around this place.
“I look at the microsectors and in the straightline sectors, Brodie was faster than Broc Feeney. There’s obviously just a lot of games being played in the background.
“Disappointing for me for that because we saw the press conference, we saw the reactions, some of the other guys were laughing at the same time.
“Obviously, Brodie is pretty bullish about it, so there’s a lot going on in the background.”
Supercars utilises a ‘technical parity’ system that is based on equalising key parameters of the different machinery, rather than attempting to equalise lap times via ‘sporting parity’.
While Triple Eight boss Jamie Whincup declined to weigh into the debate on Friday evening, reigning champion Will Brown gave his view to the broadcast.
A close friend of Kostecki, Brown somewhat boldly declared “we’ve got parity” based on the qualifying results.
“It’s an interesting one, after getting pole to make those comments and not just celebrate is a very interesting way to go about it,” said Brown.
“I think their team is obviously unhappy, but the funny thing is they were quicker than us in both straightline sectors on the timesheets.
“It’s a weird one. It’s the closest top 10 at Bathurst we’ve ever seen. I think get into the racing, everyone put their heads down and have a good race and leave that side out of it.
“Unless they think they’re four tenths quicker than the field, I think we’ve got parity.
“[Brodie] seemed pretty happy last year, he said they’re just a bunch of whingers, but who knows.”