‘You’d do it for anyone’: SVG helps McLaughlin

Shane van Gisbergen was among the first on the scene to help Supercars championship rival Scott McLaughlin from the wreckage of his Gold Coast qualifying crash.

ARMOR ALL Qualifying ended in dramatic fashion when McLaughlin cannoned into the wall at the exit of the first chicane, turning the Shell Mustang onto its side.

Van Gisbergen stopped his Red Bull Holden Racing Team Commodore and rushed to McLaughlin’s aid, arriving at the car just after the first marshals.

McLaughlin emerged unscathed, but the car is too badly damaged to return to the circuit this afternoon.

“It’s not a nice feeling coming around the corner and seeing one of your mates on their side, way after the corner, meaning it must've been a big shunt,” said van Gisbergen.

“Helped him out, but the medical team were there fast and all the fire [crew].

“Thanks to them and saw him get out, he was pretty shaken but he's okay, he'll be fine, but not nice.”

McLaughlin’s crash means the Ford driver won’t seal the championship today, unless van Gisbergen fails to finish the race.

“It's irrelevant who it was, when I first saw it I just wanted to get there and help, you'd do it for anyone in the field,” added van Gisbergen.

“It wasn't a good thing, but yeah, I don't know what to say, it was shocking.”

Another Kiwi, Andre Heimgartner had been the car directly behind McLaughlin when the Shell Mustang clouted the wall.

“It was pretty crazy, actually,” he recounted.

“I was right up his bum going into that section and I thought I better back off in case something goes wrong here, so I don't become part of an accident.

“It was pretty violent, it was something that just kept getting worse as I was watching it.

“First he hit the inside wall and I thought ‘that's not good’, then he shot into the outside wall and then we know what happened from there.

“It’s horrible to see something like that.

“Obviously he's been pushing the limits this weekend, been clipping a few walls like we all have and it's horrible to see someone end up like that.

“I'm not sure if they'll be out again, I doubt it, but as long as he's alright.”

McLaughlin is the second driver to crash out of the weekend, following Chaz Mostert’s heavy hit in Saturday’s ARMOR ALL Top 10 Shootout.