Brown: It's my fault we're not in the top 10
Will Brown to start 11th for opening race of 2025 Repco Supercars Championship
Reigning champion made critical mistake on all-important final run
Red Bull Ampol Racing teammate Broc Feeney to start second behind Cam Waters
Reigning Supercars champion Will Brown has admitted fault for qualifying outside of the top 10 in Boost Mobile Qualifying for Race 1 at the Thrifty Sydney 500 - Opening Round.
After flying to the fastest time of the day on Wednesday at the Destination NSW Sydney Test Day, Brown seemed set to pick up where he left off in Adelaide last year.
However, the cutthroat nature of the new-for-2025 two-part knockout qualifying format caught out Brown, who made a crucial mistake on his final run of the 10-minute opening part of qualifying.
The 26-year-old had no time to atone for his error, and was bundled out of qualifying in Q1, whilst teammate Broc Feeney will start from the front row alongside pole winner Cam Waters.
Speaking after climbing out of his car, Brown was quick to accept blame for the #1 Camaro starting outside of the first five rows of the grid.
"We were looking alright in the first run, it wasn't exactly where we wanted to be," admitted Brown post-Q1.
"In the second run the time was looking alright, but I locked up the front straight away heading into Turn 8 and ran wide, and I didn't end up doing the time that we wanted to do, so unfortunately not through to the top 10.
"First race of the year, I would've loved to be in the top 10, and loved to start up the front, but at the end of the day that's where we are and we'll fight tonight and reset for tomorrow."
After a 2024 season that was built on strong race performances, Brown is still full of belief in the race package that he and engineer Andrew Edwards have developed over the past few months.
It's also worth nothing that last time the Repco Supercars Championship raced, Brown became a VAILO Adelaide 500 winner after a stunning last-to-first charge, capping off a career year.
"I'm confident we do, this new tyre is a fair bit different, so it's something we're all learning on, and obviously a lot of people are doing good jobs," Brown added.
"I'll have to do a little bit better job as well, but there's different ways to phase it and all of that sort of stuff. If I didn't lock up at Turn 8, I'd be in, so it's my fault."
Race 1 of the 2025 Repco Supercars Championship will be a 100km, 26 lap sprint race under lights beginning at 7:50pm local time.
