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Whincup wins Queensland race one

Team Vodafone's Jamie Whincup took a narrow victory in the first race of the QueenslandHouseandLand.com 300 at Queensland Raceway

Whincup held off Jim Beam's James Courtney in the closing stages after a race-long duel between the duo, Whincup leading early before going off at turn three on lap eight, possibly on oil dropped a few laps earlier by Whincup's own team-mate Craig Lowndes, handing the lead to Courtney.

But Whincup closed back in and retook the lead nine laps later at the same point on the track, the two fighting it out the rest of the way to the finish.

The big news of the race, apart from the battle between the leading duo, was the retirements of three of the leading contenders in this year's title race.

First to go was Team Vodafone's Craig Lowndes on lap two, laying oil on the circuit, particularly at turn three. Just before half-distance Holden Racing Team's Will Davison pitted and stayed there.

With six laps remaining the other HRT car of Garth Tander pulled off the circuit in a cloud of smoke, with oil dropped from the car at turn one sending several cars through the gravel.

Amid the chaos Mark Winterbottom had a strong return to form with third place in his Ford Performance Racing Falcon, even if he was nearly 15 seconds behind the leading duo, though he lost about four seconds and four places on lap three when he went off on Lowndes' oil.

Courtney's team-mate Steven Johnson finished fourth, just ahead of Fabian Coulthard, a charging Todd Kelly on sprint tyres late in the race, Lee Holdsworth, Jason Bright and a fading Shane van Gisbergen, who ran sprint tyres throughout the race and dropped from third to ninth in the final seven laps.

Completing the top ten was Tim Slade, who followed up from one of his best qualifying performances in 17th to beat home team-mate Russell Ingall in the race results by two places, partly aided by using sprint tyres late in the race.

Rick Kelly put in a great drive, managing to climb up to 14th place after starting the race from the second-last row of the grid in 28th position.

Pos  Driver                Make                  Time
 1.  Jamie Whincup         Ford Falcon FG        40:43.7708
 2.  James Courtney        Ford Falcon FG        +   0.5863
 3.  Mark Winterbottom     Ford Falcon FG        +  14.5262
 4.  Steven Johnson        Ford Falcon FG        +  17.2449
 5.  Fabian Coulthard      Ford Falcon FG        +  18.1863
 6.  Todd Kelly            Holden Commodore VE   +  18.6355
 7.  Lee Holdsworth        Holden Commodore VE   +  19.4500
 8.  Jason Bright          Ford Falcon FG        +  20.6006
 9.  Shane Van Gisbergen   Ford Falcon FG        +  21.2785
10.  Tim Slade             Holden Commodore VE   +  41.9739
11.  Steven Richards       Ford Falcon FG        +  43.0414
12.  Russell Ingall        Holden Commodore VE   +  45.9790
13.  Alex Davison          Ford Falcon FG        +  47.1139
14.  Rick Kelly            Holden Commodore VE   +  47.8741
15.  Michael Patrizi       Ford Falcon BF        +  52.3818
16.  Tony D'Alberto        Holden Commodore VE   +  55.5379
17.  Greg Murphy           Holden Commodore VE   +  57.1100
18.  Jason Bargwanna       Holden Commodore VE   +  59.8111
19.  Michael Caruso        Holden Commodore VE   +1:04.0706
20.  David Reynolds        Holden Commodore VE   +1:06.5590
21.  Jason Richards        Holden Commodore VE   +1:06.9959
22.  Paul Dumbrell         Holden Commodore VE   +1:07.8856
23.  Jack Perkins          Holden Commodore VE   +1:11.3181
24.  Dean Fiore            Holden Commodore VE   +   1 lap
25.  Mark McNally          Holden Commodore VE   +   1 lap

Not classified/retirements:

     Driver                Make                  Laps
     Garth Tander          Holden Commodore VE    27
     Cameron McConville    Holden Commodore VE    18
     Will Davison          Holden Commodore VE    14
     Craig Lowndes         Ford Falcon FG          1

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