Ford driver Mark Winterbottom will start Sunday’s 200km Supercars race in Townsville from pole position.

The defending series champion posted a fastest lap of one minute and 12.4077 seconds in the top 10 shootout to claim his fourth pole position at the Reid Park street circuit.

Winterbottom will start alongside Holden veteran Craig Lowndes (1:12.5012), who is still searching for his first victory in north Queensland.

Lowndes’ stablemates Jamie Whincup and Shane Van Gisbergen make up the second row of the grid.

Whincup (1:12.5576) is chasing his 100th Supercars race win after picking up victory 99 in Saturday’s 200km race.

If the championship leader can claim victory, he’ll become just the second driver in Supercars history after Lowndes to win a century of races.

Van Gisbergen qualified fastest for the shootout but couldn’t match the pace of Winterbottom, who said a two-hour window between qualifying and the shootout had proved crucial.

“The car in qualifying was average,” Winterbottom said.

“Two-hour window and the boys worked hard to get it right, the car was fast.

“Awesome to get pole, I’m rapt.”

Sunday’s race gets underway at 4.10pm.