» V8s Townsville: Whincup leads Team Vodafone 1-2 in Race 2

Team Vodafone took an important 1-2 in the second race of the Sucrogen Townsville 400 today, with championship leader Jamie Whincup leading home team-mate Craig Lowndes on the streets of Townsville.

The win – Whincup’s sixth of the year and his third overall at this circuit – came off the back of a hard-charging opening stint of the 72-lap race that brought him into contention at the front of the field after a disappointing qualifying session. He then saved his switch to the softer-compound Dunlop tyres until the end of the race, allowing a late surge to overtake Mark Winterbottom for second place and Lowndes for the lead with under 10 laps to go.

Lowndes has opted for a different tyre strategy that didn’t quite pay off, but second place helped to cement his position in the Drivers’ Championship race and keep his hopes alive of challenging runaway leader Whincup. Winterbottom completed the podium places.

James Courtney opted to run his soft-compound tyres in the opening stint, and it took little time for the Holden Racing Team driver to showcase the skills that had earned him the title last season. The former Jaguar F1 test driver sliced through the field to take the lead, but was later slapped with a drive-through penalty for making contact with Tim Slade. He finished a disconsolate 19th.

Fourth place went to Alex Davison, who made remarkable progress after an awful qualifying session that saw him start from 22nd place. He finished one place ahead of Stone Brothers Racing team-mate Shane van Gisbergen.

Slade survived contact with Courtney and Jason Bright to finish a creditable seventh, using his soft tyres to great effect in the final stint of the race. He finished one place behind Lee Holdsworth.

Fabian Coulthard, Russell Ingall and Paul Dumbrell rounded out the top ten.

Yesterday’s race winner Garth Tander looked strong for another healthy points haul until a broken shock absorber mount ended his hopes.

The series now takes a well-deserved break before resuming action in mid-August at Queensland Raceway for the three-race Ipswich 300.

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V8 Supercars Sucrogen Townsville 400 Final Classification (Race 2 – 72 laps):

	Driver	Entry / Team	Result
1.	Jamie Whincup	Team Vodafone / Triple 8 Race Engineering	1:32:45.8802
2.	Craig Lowndes	Team Vodafone / Triple 8 Race Engineering	+ 4.3938
3.	Mark Winterbottom	Orrcon Steel / Ford Performance Racing	+ 11.2406
4.	Alex Davison	Irwin / Stone Brothers Racing	+ 13.9425
5.	Shane van Gisbergen	SP Tools / Stone Brothers Racing	+ 19.9231
6.	Lee Holdsworth	Fujitsu Racing / Garry Rogers Motorsport	+ 20.4439
7.	Tim Slade	Lucky 7 / Stone Brothers Racing	+ 27.3169
8.	Fabian Coulthard	Bundaberg / Walkinsaw Racing	+ 29.4344
9.	Russell Ingall	Supercheap Auto / Paul Morris Motorsport	+ 30.1509
10.	Paul Dumbrell	The Bottle-O Racing Team / Rod Nash	+ 32.3014
11.	Jason Bargwanna	Jana Living / Brad Jones Racing	+ 32.7764
12.	Steven Johnson	Jim Beam / Dick Johnson Racing	+ 35.6316
13.	Rick Kelly	Jack Daniel’s / Kelly Racing	+ 35.6504
14.	Steve Owen	VIP Petfoods / Paul Morris Motorsport	+ 35.9723
15.	James Moffat	Jim Beam / Dick Johnson Racing	+ 36.5500
16.	Michael Caruso	Fujitsu Racing / Garry Rogers Motorsport	+ 42.3529
17.	Todd Kelly	Jack Daniel’s / Kelly Racing	+ 43.3410
18.	Will Davison	Trading Post / Ford Performance Racing	+ 44.8740
19.	James Courtney	TOLL / Holden Racing Team	+ 48.8695
20.	Greg Murphy	Pepsi Max Crew / Kelly Racing	+ 52.7639
21.	Warren Luff	Gulf Western Oil Racing / Lucas Dumbrell	+ 55.5833
22.	Jason Bright	Team BOC / Brad Jones Racing	+ 56.8638
23.	David Reynolds	Stratco Racing / Kelly Racing	+ 1:09.2312
24.	Karl Reindler	Fair Dinkum Sheds / Brad Jones Racing	+ 4 laps
25.	Tony D’Alberto	Wilson Security / Tony D’Alberto Racing	+ 5 laps
26.	Garth Tander	TOLL / Holden Racing Team	+ 10 laps

	NOT CLASSIFIED
DNF.	Dean Fiore	Triple F Racing	39 laps
DNF.	Jonathon Webb	Mother Energy Racing Team / Tekno	1 lap