Dick Johnson Racing have failed in a bid for adjustment to the Ford Mustang engine, a day after star Brodie Kostecki fired up over the Supercars' parity issue.
Despite setting a new qualifying record to take provisional pole for the Bathurst 1000, DJR driver Kostecki blasted Supercars ahead of the top-10 shootout for a lack of action over a perceived engine deficiency.
Ford have concerns of a straight-line speed disadvantage after recent testing by Supercars on the barometric pressure on the different engines.
DJR submitted a last-ditch protest ahead of Sunday's 161-lap race over "failure to implement an engine parity adjustment", but it was dismissed by Motorsport Australia.
Kostecki claimed pole position for the third year in a row with a lap time of two minutes and 4.0413 seconds in Saturday's top-10 shootout.
He had shaved 0.241 seconds off his 2023 Gen3 qualifying record to take out provisional pole the day before.
Kostecki insisted then that the qualifying lap speed "doesn't matter" in terms of race pace.
"The best way to put it is we're at our biggest race of the year and it's like a footy grand final, points are tied," Kostecki said after qualifying on Friday.
"There's a free kick and you have to ask the other side to miss the free kick to win the grand final."
Kostecki wouldn't be drawn on the issue when asked after claiming pole position, with five-time Supercars champion Mark Skaife rubbishing the claim earlier on Saturday.
Skaife pointed out the top six cars - equally divided between Ford and Chevrolet - in qualifying were separated by less than a 10th of a second.
"To claim that there's some parity issue, I'm bewildered by that. That blows me away," Skaife told Fox Sports.
"In fact, in the straight-line sectors, Brodie was faster than Broc Feeney (in the Chevrolet Camaro).
"There's obviously just a lot of games being played in the background."
Triple Eight star Will Brown, who co-hosts a podcast with former Erebus teammate Kostecki, was also baffled.
"Unless they think they're four 10ths better than the field, I think we've got parity," Brown told Fox Sports.
"I don't think Brodie was blowing about it last year when he was in a different car (with Erebus).
"He seemed pretty happy last year. He said they're just a bunch of whingers."
Aerodynamic changes were made to the Mustang last month, with Kostecki and co-driver Todd Hazelwood leading a Ford podium at The Bend 500.
