Will Davison fends off Mark Winterbottom and Jamie Whincup to win thrilling V8 Supercars race three at Barbagallo
Will Davison resisted huge pressure from Mark Winterbottom and Jamie Whincup to take his second victory of the day in the weekend's third V8 Supercars race at Barbagallo
The race turned on a safety car period that decided all the teams' strategies, and resulted in most of the field having to run much longer than they would have wanted to on the soft tyres.
In the opening stint, those on softs flew forward. Polesitter Whincup (Triple Eight Holden) established an early six-second lead over fellow soft runner Winterbottom (Ford Performance Racing), while Brad Jones Holden man Jason Bright used the softs to surge through from 16th on the grid to third, ahead of top hard tyre user Davison in the second FPR car.
A collision between Taz Douglas and Tony D'Alberto then prompted a safety car on lap 14, with pitstops for the whole field in a confusing pit sequence that saw controversy over whether the pace car picked up the correct cars at the right time.
The outcome was that Whincup, Winterbottom and Bright led the field at the restart, all on hard tyres with a queue of drivers on faster softs behind them, led by Davison and Tekno's Michael Patrizi (up from a pre-pitstop 11th), but with all the soft runners knowing that 33 racing laps on the less durable rubber would be tough.
It did not take long for Davison and Patrizi to blast into first and second places ahead of Whincup and Winterbottom, while Bright drifted further back.
But as expected, coming into the closing stages the drivers on hard tyres were in much better shape.
Whincup and Winterbottom got past Patrizi with six laps to go and set off after Davison, closing up to his tail on lap 48 of 50.
The reigning champion threw everything he had at his 2012 title rival, but Davison was able to hang on, and as Whincup focused on trying to take the lead, Winterbottom was able to sneak through into second at the very last corner to make it another FPR one-two in a top three covered by just half a second.
Bright regained ground as others' soft tyres wilted too and finished just behind the three leaders. Patrizi hung on for an impressive fifth.
Whincup's team-mate Craig Lowndes fell from second to fourth off the line, then lost out badly in the safety car confusion and dropped to 15th, before recovering to sixth.
Results - 50 laps: Pos Driver Team/Car Time/Gap 1. Will Davison FPR Ford 50m38.3093s 2. Mark Winterbottom FPR Ford + 0.4947s 3. Jamie Whincup Triple 8 Holden + 0.5534s 4. Jason Bright Brad Jones Holden + 1.9464s 5. Michael Patrizi Tekno Holden + 5.4920s 6. Craig Lowndes Triple 8 Holden + 14.4271s 7. Fabian Coulthard Brad Jones Holden + 17.2996s 8. Tim Slade Rosenberg/SBR Ford + 17.4375s 9. Michael Caruso Garry Rogers Holden + 21.0205s 10. Steven Johnson Dick Johnson Ford + 21.4483s 11. Greg Murphy Kelly Holden + 22.6970s 12. James Courtney HRT Holden + 25.9236s 13. Russell Ingall Walkinshaw Holden + 26.7369s 14. Garth Tander HRT Holden + 31.2808s 15. Dean Fiore Triple F Ford + 31.6787s 16. Steve Owen Dick Johnson Ford + 35.9661s 17. Karl Reindler Kelly Holden + 36.2146s 18. Shane van Gisbergen Stone Brothers Ford + 41.0404s 19. Rick Kelly Kelly Holden + 41.3609s 20. Jonathon Webb Tekno Holden + 43.1531s 21. Lee Holdsworth Stone Brothers Ford + 45.9684s 22. James Moffat Dick Johnson Ford + 49.1682s 23. Todd Kelly Kelly Holden + 59.2442s 24. Alexandre Premat Garry Rogers Holden + 1 lap 25. Taz Douglas Dumbrell Holden + 3 laps 26. David Reynolds Rod Nash/FPR Ford + 5 laps Retirements: David Wall Britek/BJR Holden 46 laps Tony D'Alberto D'Alberto Ford 14 laps
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