» V8s: Whincup earns brilliant Clipsal 500 win

Defending V8 Supercars champion Jamie Whincup has kicked off his title defence in the style of the champion that he is, securing a thrilling last-lap victory to continue his domination of the Clipsal 500 Adelaide.

The TeamVodafone Holden driver took the lead on the final lap from Ford Performance Racing’s Will Davison, who was trying to run the 78-lap race on just two stops.

The 78-lap, 250-kilometre race around the concrete canyon that is the Adelaide street circuit is a daunting challenge for any V8 Supercar driver and team. Typically a three-stop race, the advent of a few safety car interruptions can tempt some outfits to gamble on a two-stop strategy.

For Whincup, the lead up to this weekend’s race had been terrible, with the sad news that his father had passed away only a week before. Confessing that he was underdone in his preparation and still racked with grief, Whincup was overly cautious in the Top-10 Qualifying Shootout, but was confident he could deliver come race day.

From the front row, pole-sitter and Whincup’s team-mate Craig Lowndes was beaten off the line by HRT’s Garth Tander, and Whincup quickly picked his way up to third position to be running behind Lowndes.

The two battled briefly and almost made contact, but mindful of the number of times that either TeamVodafone driver had lost out in pit stops when both cars tried to pit at once, Whincup opted to gamble on a three-stop strategy and peeled into the pits on the fifteenth lap.

The first of two safety cars came very early, when Tander’s team-mate James Courtney lost the rear of his Holden and hit the Turn 8 wall heavily, while Taz Douglas (Lucas Dumbrell Holden) and Jason Bright (Brad Jones Holden) both crashed out in sympathy. Bright was taken to hospital for precautionary checks after he complained of shoulder pains, and all three teams’ mechanics have major rebuilding work to get their damaged cars ready for tomorrow’s second race.

Not too much later, FPR debutant David Reynolds also crashed out at Turn 8, bringing out the second of the safety car periods.

Up at the front, Lowndes continued to harry Tander while the pair was chased by FPR team-mates Davison and Mark Winterbottom.

But then Lowndes suddenly slowed with a left-rear puncture, and he looked in major trouble as he hustled the stricken car back to the pits. Showing his trademark commitment, he had the car completely sideways on the approach to pit entry, in a thrilling example of precision driving. Reshod with a fresh tyre, he re-emerged in the action, but seemingly a long shot at a good result.

With all teams having made their final pit stops, the discussion was now going to be about which teams and drivers could eke out a good enough fuel consumption to get them to the finish without having to stop again.

With Whincup now back in front, he put the hammer down and drove a string of ten qualifying-style laps – breaking the lap record on multiple occasions – to build himself enough of a margin over Davison and Winterbottom (who were trying to go the distance without stopping again).

Whincup peeled into the pits with a dozen laps to go and rejoined in fifth, quickly passing Lee Hodsworth (Stone Brothers Ford).

Tander now took over the lead from Davison and faced the same dilemma: did he bash out some fast laps and go for a ‘splash-and-dash’ stop, or did he try to conserve his fuel and hope he wouldn’t get caught by the hard-charging Whincup?

In the end, Tander took to the pits, but the call came too late for him to charge back up and challenge for the win, but Whincup had that sole target in mind.

He passed the slowing Winterbottom with a handful of laps to go, and he needed to reel Davison in at over a second per lap to have a hope of catching and passing him.

With two laps to go, Davison’s fuel warning light went on. Instructed by his team to keep going, he managed to last until the back straight on the final lap before his Ford engine coughed on the last drops of fuel; Whincup sailed by to the cheers of the crowd, while a devastated Davison crawled over the finish line to claim a hard-fought, but bittersweet, second place.

Tander would claim a plucky third when Winterbottom pitted on the penultimate lap for a few dregs of petrol. while Lowndes came through it all to finish fourth, despite his mid-race dramas.

After the standard and level of excitement in today’s race, it’s no wonder why a teary Whincup described it as the best race of his career. It had everything: thrills and spills aplenty, and some brilliant wheel-to-wheel driving.

We could be in for a ripper of a V8 Supercars season.

2012 V8 Supercars Clipsal 500 Adelaide – Race 1 Final Standings (78 laps):

	Driver	Entry / Team	Laps	Result
1.	Jamie Whincup	Team Vodafone / Triple 8 Racing	78	1:56:34.291
2.	Will Davison	Trading Post / Ford Performance Racing	78	+ 5.525
3.	Garth Tander	TOLL / Holden Racing Team	78	+ 20.787
4.	Craig Lowndes	Team Vodafone / Triple 8 Racing	78	+ 39.278
5.	Lee Holdsworth	Irwin Racing / Stone Brothers Racing	78	+ 39.748
6.	Fabian Coulthard	Lockwood Racing / Brad Jones Racing	78	+ 40.821
7.	Rick Kelly	Jack Daniel’s / Kelly Racing	78	+ 41.777
8.	Todd Kelly	Jack Daniel’s / Kelly Racing	78	+ 42.509
9.	Mark Winterbottom	Orrcon Steel / Ford Performance Racing	78	+ 44.576
10.	Steven Johnson	Jim Beam Racing / Dick Johnson Racing	78	+ 45.724
11.	Shane van Gisbergen	SP Tools / Stone Brothers Racing	78	+ 47.041
12.	Tim Slade	Lucky 7 Racing / Stone Brothers Racing	78	+ 47.711
13.	Russell Ingall	Supercheap Auto / Walkinshaw Racing	78	+ 52.509
14.	Michael Patrizi	Tekno Autosports	78	+ 58.069
15.	James Moffat	Team Norton / Dick Johnson Racing	78	+ 59.758
16.	Dean Fiore	Jim Beam Racing / Dick Johnson Racing	78	+ 1:03.803
17.	Alexandre Prémat	Fujitsu Racing / Garry Rogers Motorsport	78	+ 1:16.392
18.	David Wall	Wilson Security / Brad Jones Racing	77	+ 1 lap
19.	Steve Owen	VIP Petfoods / Dick Johnson Racing	77	+ 1 lap
20.	Karl Reindler	Fair Dinkum Sheds / Kelly Racing	77	+ 1 lap
21.	Tony D’Alberto	Tony D’Alberto Racing	77	+ 1 lap
22.	Michael Caruso	Fujitsu Racing / Garry Rogers Motorsport	77	+ 1 lap
23.	Jonathon Webb	Tekno Autosports	76	+ 2 laps
24.	Greg Murphy	Pepsi Max Crew / Kelly Racing	67	+ 11 laps
	NOT CLASSIFIED
DNF.	David Reynolds	The Bottle-O Racing Team / Rod Nash	44	Accident
DNF.	James Courtney	TOLL / Holden Racing Team	4	Accident
DNF.	Taz Douglas	Lucas Dumbrell Motorsport	4	Accident
DNF.	Jason Bright	Team BOC / Brad Jones Racing	4	Accident