Asian Motor Sports

TeamVodafone’s Jamie Whincup has virtually wrapped up the 2008 V8 Supercar Championship by claiming the penultimate round at Symmons Plains, Tasmania this weekend.

Whincup won both races today (Sunday) on his way to claiming the round. In Race Three he crossed the finish line in formation with his teammate Craig Lowndes, who took second place in both of today’s races.

Lowndes finished the round third behind yesterday’s race one winner, Jack Daniel’s Racing’s Todd Kelly.

Whincup now only needs to score 67 points at the final round at Sydney’s Oran Park in a fortnight to secure the Championship.

The only man mathematically capable of stealing the series is Ford Performance Racing’s Mark Winterbottom, who fished fourth in both Race Three and the round today - but it would take a miracle for Frosty to snatch the crown.

Coming into this round, three drivers were still in the fight for the title, but it is now impossible for Toll Holden Racing Team’s Garth Tander to win the Championship.

Whincup said he could almost feel the Championship trophy in his hands.

“It feels a lot closer now that’s for sure,” he said.

“I don’t see any reason why I can’t get another 67 points at Oran Park. I really like the place; however, I am not going to relax. Every race and every round is an opportunity to prove myself, so we’ll prepare as we usually do and get out there and try to round the year off as strong as we possibly can.”

Symmons Plains was Whincup’s fourth round win in a row and his sixth for the season.

However, the weekend wasn’t without its dramas for the TeamVodafone Falcon driver. He had a deflating tyre towards the end of Race Two and was lucky to make it to the finish line, and thought he had a similar problem in Race Three.

“When you are out in front you notice every noise, ding or rattle in the car and I thought I had a similar issue in that last race to what I had in race two with a deflating tyre, but luckily enough it was just some pick up (debris) collected under the safety car and luckily that came off,” he said.

“I radioed in because I thought Craig (Lowndes) might have had to cover me more than he did, but as it happened the car was excellent. Both cars were excellent. We proved it all weekend.

“I can’t stress enough that this weekend was so important for us and I’m just so happy to come out on top.

“Everything ran like clockwork today; the cars are really quick.”

Encouraged by television commentator, Matthew White, Whincup celebrated the round victory with a doughnut, but lost control and ended up in a ditch at the side of the circuit. Luckily damage to his TeamVodafone Falcon was minimal.

“I didn’t think anyone saw that,” he laughed.

“Matt White was egging me on and I thought it wasn’t really the right place on the track; it was a bit narrow… it just shows that you shouldn’t be silly.”

Lowndes, who rode shotgun for Whincup in both races today, said he was happy to help Whincup move clear of Winterbottom in the Championship standings.

“We spoke about it (before the race); we wanted to get through the first couple of corners cleanly… at the end of the day it was important for Jamie to score as many points as he could,” Lowndes said.

Tander finished Race Three fifth and was eighth in the round.

Race Three was reasonably incident free with the Championship contenders pitting early. The only major drama was when Michael Patrizi and Jason Bright came together at the hairpin, which resulted in a safety car period to extradite the latter’s Fujitsu Falcon.

Race Three Top 10

Jamie Whincup, Falcon
Craig Lowndes, Falcon
Todd Kelly, Commodore
Mark Winterbottom, Falcon
Garth Tander, Commodore
Will Davison, Falcon
Steve Johnson, Falcon
Rick Kelly, Commodore
Lee Holdsworth, Commodore
James Courtney, Falcon

Round points

Jamie Whincup, Falcon, 292
Todd Kelly, Commodore, 272
Craig Lowndes, Falcon, 252
Mark Winterbottom, Falcon, 246
Will Davison, Falcon, 222
Steven Johnson, Falcon, 192
Lee Holdsworth, Commodore, 172
Garth Tander, Commodore, 164
Fabian Coulthard, Falcon, 156
Rick Kelly, Commodore, 148

Championship points (Rd 13 of 14)

Jamie Whincup, Falcon, 3208
Mark Winterbottom, Falcon, 2975
Garth Tander, Commodore, 2788
Craig Lowndes, Falcon, 2619
Will Davison, Falcon, 2375
James Courtney, Falcon, 2224
Steve Richards, Falcon, 2214
Rick Kelly, Commodore, 2194
Steve Johnson, Falcon, 2029
Russell Ingall, Commodore, 2010