Supercars Sydney: van Gisbergen wins after Brown's pitstop disaster

Erebus Holden driver Brown made a perfect start to the race, holding off Triple Eight pair Jamie Whincup and van Gisbergen on the opening lap before settling into the lead.

The rookie continued to lead until lap six when he pitted to cover Whincup, who had stopped a lap earlier. However his race then unravelled as a faulty wheelnut led to a 20-odd second stop that took him out of the running.

That effectively left the two T8 drivers in control of the race, van Gisbergen leading for the next six laps as he went long on his set of hard compound Dunlops.

That meant he came out behind Whincup, who enjoyed the short-term benefit of the undercut, but the Kiwi had significantly better tyre condition. On lap 18, van Gisbergen eased his way past his team-mate to take over a lead he would hold until the finish.

His final winning margin over Whincup was 17s, the one-two coming in what is Triple Eight's 250th round in Supercars.

"I can't thank Red Bull Ampol Racing enough," said van Gisbergen.

"Admittedly the fastest car [practice pacesetter Anton de Pasquale] was at the back [after a gearbox issue in qualifying], so I'm excited to see how we go against them tomorrow. But the team has done a great job. I hope it was a good show."

The battle for third place boiled down to a tense scrap between Will Davison (Dick Johnson Racing) and Nick Percat (Brad Jones Racing) in the final third of the race.

Will Brown, Erebus Motorsport Holden

Photo by: Edge Photographics

Percat threw everything he had at a defensive Davison, particularly in the closing laps, but the Mustang driver held on by a few tenths. Post-race, however, Davison said he was more worried about lap one contact with van Gisbergen that sent him wide at Turn 2.

"I tried to go two wide with Shane through [Turn] 1, I don't know what his problem is with me but he tried to screw me in practice this morning, just had me off out of [Turn] 1," said Davison.

"Bit weird. But that's not my excuse, I wasn't quick enough early on the hard tyres."

Brodie Kostecki was in the hunt for that podium fight, only for the Erebus team's night to go from bad to worse early in the second stint. The #99 Holden driver was slapped with a drive-through for speeding in pitlane, 23rd the best he could manage at the finish.

Percat's BJR team-mate Todd Hazelwood finished fifth ahead of Jack Le Brocq, who was best of the drivers to run the 'alternate' strategy.

The Tickford driver started on the softs rather than the hards, and was able to work his way through to second place before switching to the hard.

He then resumed in what was effectively fourth, but lost spots to Percat and Hazelwood on the soft tyres.

Tim Slade (Blanchard Racing Team) and Cam Waters (Tickford) finished seventh and eighth, while Team 18 racer Scott Pye made good progress to finish ninth after starting outside the top 20.

Waklinshaw Andretti United's Bryce Fullwood came home 10th after echoing Le Brocq's softs-to-hards strategy.

Brown, meanwhile, recovered to 11th, one spot ahead of De Pasquale.

Supercars Sydney Race 1 Results (32 laps)

Cla	#	Driver	Car	Time	Gap	Interval
1	97	Shane van Gisbergen	Holden Commodore ZB	-
2	88	Jamie Whincup	Holden Commodore ZB	17.001	17.002	17.002
3	17	Will Davison	Ford Mustang GT	24.714	24.715	7.713
4	8	Nick Percat	Holden Commodore ZB	25.303	25.303	0.589
5	14	Todd Hazelwood	Holden Commodore ZB	26.214	26.214	0.911
6	5	Jack Le Brocq	Ford Mustang GT	30.398	30.398	4.184
7	3	Tim Slade	Ford Mustang GT	32.915	32.916	2.518
8	6	Cameron Waters	Ford Mustang GT	33.839	33.840	0.924
9	20	Scott Pye	Holden Commodore ZB	38.927	38.927	5.088
10	2	Bryce Fullwood	Holden Commodore ZB	38.948	38.948	0.021
11	9	Will Brown	Holden Commodore ZB	47.501	47.502	8.553
12	11	Anton De Pasquale	Ford Mustang GT	48.165	48.165	0.663
13	96	Macauley Jones	Holden Commodore ZB	50.481	50.482	2.317
14	25	Chaz Mostert	Holden Commodore ZB	54.330	54.330	3.848
15	44	James Courtney	Ford Mustang GT	55.684	55.685	1.354
16	34	Jake Kostecki	Holden Commodore ZB	57.694	57.694	2.009
17	19	Fabian Coulthard	Holden Commodore ZB	1'02.159	1'02.160	4.466
18	18	Mark Winterbottom	Holden Commodore ZB	1'03.021	1'03.021	0.862
19	4	Jack Smith	Holden Commodore ZB	1'03.982	1'03.983	0.961
20	22	Garry Jacobson	Holden Commodore ZB	1'06.469	1'06.469	2.487
21	35	Zane Goddard	Holden Commodore ZB	1'07.837	1'07.838	1.368
22	55	Thomas Randle	Ford Mustang GT	1'09.221	1'09.221	1.384
23	99	Brodie Kostecki	Holden Commodore ZB	1'09.588	1'09.588	0.367
24	26	Luke Youlden	Ford Mustang GT	1'19.162	1'19.162	9.574
25	27	Kurt Kostecki	Holden Commodore ZB	1'25.667	1'25.667	6.505
	7	Andre Heimgartner	Ford Mustang GT
View full results