Indeed the lenghty qualification provides a nice way to boost your SR - just make sure you wait for the pack to move out enough so you have a clear track.
On a side note - I had not played for a week. I've been stuck in SR:S/DR
for a while and found it impossible to move up. Strangely in my daily races I got very mixed lobbies - DR A and B would be thrown in the mix of D's making it event harder. Yesterday I had two races and my qualification was mediocre - had only two laps on Suzuka and had a lap time I know I could push even a second down. Additionally the gr3 WRX is not particularly fast. Yet instead of my normal position I got in top 3, and finished there respectively without too many issues.
Has there been a shake up of DR or change in lobby creation? Because I am sure I have not become any faster, yet I get higher positions.