Asian Motor Sports

Championship leader Jamie Whincup kept his nose clean to pull off the win for race two at Symmons Plains this weekend.

Championship leader Jamie Whincup kept his nose clean to pull off the win for race two at Symmons Plains this weekend.

And teammate Craig Lowndes put in an 11th hour move on Jack Daniel’s Racing’s Todd Kelly for a TeamVodafone one-two finish.

The dry conditions were a stark contrast to yesterday’s wet weather, yet the expected carnage in the first lap did not occur.

Instead, Whincup got the jump on Kelly and stayed in that position for the race.

“At the moment it’s just all about staying clean and if we pick up an occasional race win here and there, that’s a bonus,” Whincup said.

“The tyres were a little bit worn out (at the end) but we had pace at the start of the race, so you can’t have everything.

“It’s either go at the start or go at the end and we went at the start, got the position and was able to hold it out.”

The sole Safety Car of the race was brought out on lap 20 when Tony D’Alberto’s Commodore ran off the track and went into a sand trap.

A few laps later, Supercheap Auto Racing’s Russell Ingall also went off the track and into a sand trap, but managed to keep going and went into the pits for his crew to clear grass out of the front of his car.

However, he later got two black flags, one for loose bodywork at the back of his car and another for spinning Jack Daniel’s Racing’s Jack Perkins.

On lap 45, Ford Performance Racing’s Steve Richards suffered power problems with his car and it was left off the road for the rest of the race.

But by lap 47, Kelly was all over the back of Whincup, and on lap 48 Lowndes passed Richards’ teammate, Mark Winterbottom, for third spot.

Surrounded by TeamVodafone Falcons, Kelly and his Commodore were forced to defend track position while trying to take the lead.

On the last lap, Kelly had his car side-by-side with Whincup going into the hairpin but Whincup ran wide and threw Kelly off guard.

With Whincup still in first, Lowndes saw his opportunity and ran side-by-side with Kelly until he overtook him just before the last corner.

“I suppose if you’re stuck in that position you’ve got to make the right choice,” Lowndes mused.

“(Kelly) tried to squeeze me right down the back straight off the road, really, but we stuck to our guns and we got him under brakes down at the end.”

Kelly had no ill feelings towards the TeamVodafone duo.

“I went round the outside of (Whincup) like that in the wet and wanted to do the same thing but obviously he saw Craig there and they kind of helped each other out, but I’ve got no drama with it, we would have done the same thing,” he said.

Whincup said he was too busy concentrating on his race to watch the scrap behind him.

“But it was great to see Craig, my teammate come through,” he said.

“That was great but for me it was just eyes to the front and trying to do the best I can.”

Lowndes, who with Whincup pulled off the first one-two round finish for TeamVodafone in Bahrain, said the race two results were great.

“We’ve just got to finish it off now,” he said.

“The car was really good, it was just disappointing yesterday that we qualified so poorly but the car was working really well; it looked after the tyres.”

Kelly, who was concerned about his car’s dry set-up prior to the race, said the car was better than he expected.

“I just played with it a bit in the middle part of the race and just tried to look after the tyres and then pressed on at the end,” he said.

“It looked like Jamie did the opposite and he started to come back a bit. “We’re well within the pace of all the guys up the front to race so that’s good.”

Race Two Top 10

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