Shane van Gisbergen and Jamie Whincup have claimed a stunning 1-2 finish at the last Sydney Motorsport Park SuperNight event, following one of the most intriguing and strategic races of the season.
Van Gisbergen recovered from a harsh double-stack situation in pit-lane, coming from ninth to the win in a rain-impacted race where both Red Bull cars rarely featured in the equation as potential race winners.
Instead, Cameron Waters led most of the race, before effectively being a sitting duck in the latter stages. Both of Erebus Motorsport’s drivers, Brodie Kostecki and Will Brown, looked set to be Waters’ biggest rivals. But, in the long 60-lap format, both ended up succumbing to tyre condition late in the race, with Waters retaining third.
Van Gisbergen now leads the championship by a whopping 349 points over teammate Whincup. So long as his margin to Whincup remains over 300 points at the end of tomorrow’s racing, he will be Supercars ‘champion elect’ with an insurmountable lead heading into the Bathurst 1000 series finale.
The last of the Sydney Motorsport Park SuperNight races packed plenty of intrigue early, with all the talk centering around tyres and weather.
It had been teased all day that rain would be coming, but the race was to start in dry conditions with the thought that rain may arrive part-way through the race. This would have implications to tyres, with each car set to run the Dunlop Super Soft compound at least once.
A small of drivers bolted them on for the opening leg, so that they wouldn’t be negated by the potential rains. On the flipside, those opting to use them later in the race would be hoping for a late safety car.
It was Whincup that had by far the best start of the leaders, taking first off De Pasquale, with Will Davison, van Gisbergen, and Todd Hazelwood until the BJR driver got shuffled wide at turn six by teammate Nick Percat.
The Red Bull drivers started the race on the Super Softs, allowing Whincup to scoot away. By lap two van Gisbergen had gotten around De Pasquale for second. Scott Pye, Zane Goddard, and David Reynolds were the only other drivers to opt for the stickier rubber.
By lap six soft-tyre runners made out the top four. But their progress was set to evaporate shortly via a safety car; the race neutralised over the parked and thoroughly smokey Coke Commodore of Macauley Jones (an engine failure was eventually confirmed).
Everyone made their first stops on lap eight under yellow, meaning bad news for all the drivers having to double-stack in the pit lane. This meant a torrid time for van Gisbergen, Davison, Hazelwood, and a raft of others.
The order had a very different complexion after the stops. Whincup now led Pye, De Pasquale, Goddard, Reynolds, Brodie Kostecki, Chaz Mostert, and Cameron Waters.
Van Gisbergen ended up way down in ninth, with Davison 13th and Hazelwood an effective last in 23rd thanks to a poor stop for teammate Percat. In terms of tyres, most were now on the hard tyre apart from Waters, Le Brocq, Will Brown, James Courtney, and Bryce Fullwood.
The race restarted on lap nine, with Waters immediately laying waste to the pointy end of the field thanks to his softs. By lap 12 Waters was in the lead, and by lap 14 Le Brocq had joined him in second place. Soon enough Brown and Courtney joined them in the top four. It was a chaotic phase, with plenty of passing among the soft runners and those wronged by pit-lane stacking, with a lot of strategy pieces up in the air.
Polesitter De Pasquale was copping plenty of abuse at the bottom end of the top 10 following physical exchanges with Brodie Kostecki and Fullwood. The Shell Mustang battled on with a stoved in rear bumper, which would occasionally clamp onto the right-rear tyre causing puffs of smoke.
By lap 21 De Pasquale had also lost a spot to van Gisbergen too. Waters, Le Brocq, Brown, and Courtney were the soft-laden leaders (Waters leading Le Brocq by five seconds). Whincup was first of the hard tyre runners, with Pye, Brodie Kostecki, Fullwood, van Gisbergen, and De Pasquale filling the top 10.
It wasn’t until 21 laps on the softs that drivers were starting to complain about tyre condition. Le Brocq was going backwards (losing second to Brown) and Fullwood had to stop due to a rear tyre shredding apart. Le Brocq pitted on lap 33, with Waters following suit on the following lap.
The big ones were De Pasquale and Mostert. The duo stopped on lap 35, with a fresh set of softs on each car. The tyres would need to last for 27 laps. A raft of others followed the duo’s lead, deploying a similar strategy in the trailing laps.
Brown pitted out of the lead on lap 37, having used the Super Soft for 31 laps. He rejoined behind Waters, with numerous runners staying out for longer. Most of these were the drivers that used the softs in the opening stint, including both Red Bull drivers. Indeed Whincup and van Gisbergen held the lead after the first wave of stoppers had resolved. These drivers were prepping to bolt on the soft tyres again that they’d abandoned after the early safety car.
Van Gisbergen and Whincup’s final stops had been resolved by lap 45, with Goddard finally completing the last of the stops a lap later. With the field finally cleaned, we finally had a full picture of the state of play. Waters led Brown by eight seconds, with Le Brocq third.
Brodie Kostecki had emerged as the surprise leader of those running the Super Soft until the end in fourth. With 18 laps to go he was 20 seconds behind Waters, and just ahead of an ailing Courtney. Mostert had got by De Pasquale after an exciting multi-lap battle, with Whincup also getting by the polesitter. They were sixth, seventh, and eighth, with van Gisbergen and Pye rounding out the top 10.
Just as the race looked to be a simple gunfight between Waters and Kostecki, the rain everyone had expected finally landed. It had been pitter pattering for several laps, but by lap 47 it was raining enough to turn the track greasy. This would play into the hands of those on the soft tyres, and hurt Waters, due to the added grip of the softer compound. The rain was there to stay too, as its intensity increased at the back end of the circuit.
The other driver making hay in the rain was van Gisbergen. In a very brief order, he was able to get around both De Pasquale and Whincup. Bizarrely, the re-used Super Softs on the Red Bull Commodores was more competitive than the fresh Super Softs on De Pasquale’s Mustang. With 15 laps to go, Kostecki needed to be making a second a lap to challenge Waters for the win. He had little threat from behind him, too, with Mostert some five seconds back.
As the laps wound down, another interesting potential outcome emerged, with Brown chipping away at Waters’ margin. The Tickford driver was struggling on his tyre-set, as was his teammate Le Brocq. Kostecki was able to get by the latter with 10 laps to go thanks to an aggressive dive at turn four (which included a punch in Le Brocq’s door).
By lap 56 Brown was just one second behind Waters, and continuing to gain. The attention by this point had swung away from Kostecki’s push, particularly given that Mostert appeared to be dealing with the wet weather better than the Boost Mobile rookie. He was close enough to threaten the Erebus driver and, with six laps to go, he got by Kostecki for the last spot on the podium.
But Mostert wasn’t alone. Van Gisbergen was also in with a shot. Having seemingly looked after his tyres better than his rivals, he quickly passed both Kostecki and Mostert to snap up third place. By this point, there were just four laps to go, just six tenths separated first and second.
Van Gisbergen quickly went from being three seconds behind to being less than one second behind the lead. With three laps to go, van Gisbergen made his first breakthrough pass, getting Brown on the inside and turn two and then around the outside of turn three; resolving the pass well before turn four.
From there, it didn’t take long for the Kiwi to take the lead. By turn six he was under Waters’ rear wing, and a great run out of turn eight saw him get alongside and then past Waters for an unlikely first place.
Van Gisbergen had lugged Whincup up the order, too, with both Red Bull drivers seemingly relishing their re-used Super Softs. With two laps to go, Whincup was by Waters for second place. This sealed what seemed like an unlikely Red Bull 1-2 finish, in a race where their strategy deviated from most of their rivals.
The battle from third place down to 10th was a chaotic one in the dying laps. Both Erebus cars, Brown and Kostecki were struggling, with the latter already back in ninth. After all of his dramas with damage, De Pasquale was able to get by Brown before also snapping up fourth from Mostert. But, it wasn’t quite enough for him to steal the podium from a steely and determined Waters.
The top 10 ended up being full of surprises. Behind Waters, De Pasquale and Mostert were fourth and fifth. Pye nabbed a quiet-achiever sixth, with Brown and Kostecki ending up seventh and eighth respectively after looking like potential race winners in waiting. Davison and Percat completed the top 10.
Percat’s 10th place slot ended up being removed from his grasp post-race, with officals handing him a five-second penalty for a driving infringement. This gave 10th to Le Brocq, with Percat slotting in 11th ahead of Mark Winterbottom, Tim Slade, Hazelwood, Andre Heimgartner, Jack Smith, Reynolds, Jake Kostecki, Goddard, and Courtney in 20th.
