Hard-charging Brown reveals late-race scare

Will Brown felt he was a "millimetre away from looping it at Turn 6” during his stunning late-race charge onto the podium in Townsville.

Brown extended his championship lead over teammate Broc Feeney after powering from 13th on the grid to third in Race 13, which was won by Cam Waters.

The #87 Red Bull Ampol Camaro driver had it all to do on Saturday, but emerged in contention for a top seven finish after the stops.

However, as the leading Fords battled, Brown picked off driver after driver — including Feeney — and was in the hunt for a podium in the closing laps.

A tense battle with Thomas Randle ultimately ensured third was the best Brown could do, but it was a welcome result after he fluffed his lines in qualifying.

Post-race, Brown revealed that, as a shower lashed Reid Park, his efforts nearly came undone in a scare at Turn 6.

"I think I was about a millimetre away from looping it at Turn 6, I got out on the painted stuff, and thought, 'Oh, I'm going in here,' so that wasn't real good,” Brown said.

"It was just about managing that little bit of wet because I didn't think it was going to be enough for wet tyres."

On the Randle battle, Brown said: "Me and Randle had a pretty good fight there and that sort of slowed my progression after that, I got my tyres a bit hot and couldn't get to them, but great job to Cam and Chaz [Mostert].

"When I got about halfway into the race I thought, 'Okay I can keep on coming here,' and the last stint was really good. It phased the tyres pretty well and the car was fast, so can't thank the crew enough."

The Queenslander admitted he had nerves going into the race after his qualifying miss, but was confident he had a good race car at his disposal.

"I was pretty nervous after qualifying to be honest, we've been struggling a little bit, but I know Andrew [Edwards] always gets the car great for the race run,” Brown said.

"We were slowly picking them off one-by-one, and I thought, 'Oh, will we get top five?' and then got in the top three.”

Supercars action will resume on Sunday with Boost Mobile Qualifying at 9:30am AEST, which will set the running order for the Top Ten Shootout at 12:05pm.

The NTI Townsville 500 will conclude with Race 14 at 2:40pm.