** Shares of Australia's Woolworths WOW.AX reverse course after falling 2.2% earlier in the day

** Stock last up 1.7% at A$27.41; smaller rival Coles COL.AX trading 0.1% lower

** WOW beats estimates for Q1 sales as deeper discounts, lower pricing and focus on e-commerce pulled in more value-conscious shoppers

** Reports Q1 group sales of A$18.48 billion ($12.01 billion), higher than Visible Alpha's consensus estimate of A$17.91 billion

** WOW adds Q2 sales-to-date up 3.2% in food; Jarden analysts suggest Q2 sales could give market some confidence in co's ability to accelerate growth into Christmas

** Jarden flags if WOW's Q1 proves to be trough and October-to-date trends continue, stock should do well but brokerage needs to see COL's Q1 sales on Thursday

** Analysts at another brokerage, Jefferies, say sales gap for WOW to COL matters more than the update, which means the full picture would not be known till Thursday

($1 = 1.5389 Australian dollars)

(Reporting by Rishav Chatterjee in Bengaluru)

((Rishav.Chatterjee@thomsonreuters.com))