Whincup and Bourdais avoid carnage for Gold Coast win
Team Vodafone’s Jamie Whincup and his international co-driver Sébastien Bourdais have won Saturday’s V8 Supercars race at the Gold Coast. The result has been overshadowed by carnage on the starting grid which saw the race red flagged twice.
A slow start from James Hinchcliffe on the original start saw him collected by Vitantonio Liuzzi, who in turn was hit by Simon Pagenaud. Behind them Ricky Taylor had nowhere to go, with the Garry Rogers Motorsport Commodore launched into a roll on the front straight after making contact with Pagenaud’s Falcon, with the car landing on its roof. This saw all four cars out and bought out the first red flag.
V8 Supercars’ second attempt at a race start saw Nicholas Minassian stall his Brad Jones Racing Commodore, which was collected by Franck Montagny as a result. This bought out the second red flag. Fifty minutes after the initial start time the race finally got started on the third attempt, with the start line carnage meaning the race finish was time certain, with those cars on the leading lap completing only 79 laps of the scheduled 102.
It was Ford Performance Racing’s Mika Salo who lead the field into the first corner after the second race restart, ahead of polesitter Sébastien Bourdais and third placed Graham Rahal. After a close battle for third Marc Lieb was able to overtake Rahal for the position on lap 11.
The first safety car of the race was called out five laps later after Jamie Campbell-Walter made contact with Gianni Morbidelli, which saw the latter car end up in the wall at the final corner. The race was restarted on lap 19, only to be yellow flagged again after Peter Kox made contact with the wall at Turn 11. The Falcon was removed and the race restarted on lap 23.
Bourdais was one of the first leading cars to pit, with Jamie Whincup taking over the driver’s seat on lap 35. Race leader Salo pitted two laps later to swap with Will Davison. Davison rejoined behind Whincup after the stop and was in trouble only a few laps later, making heavy contact with the wall at Turn 11. The Ford Performance Racing Falcon limped back to the pits with broken steering.
After the pit stops Whincup lead from Holden Racing Team driver James Courtney and Tekno Autosports’ Jonathon Webb. Webb was able to overtake Courtney on lap 55 to move into second. The third safety car of the race was called a lap later for debris at Turn 11, erasing Whincup’s leading margin. Mark Winterbottom was a man on a mission after the lap 60 restart, moving from eighth to third in six laps.
This was how they finished after 79 laps with Jamie Whincup and Sébastien Bourdais first, Jonathon Webb and Marc Lieb in second and Mark Winterbottom and Will Power third. The second race will be held on the streets of the Gold Coast tomorrow, where another qualifying session will set the grid at 11:10am local time with the race at 13:40.
