Whincup wins Race 15

TeamVodafone's Jamie Whincup took out Race 15 at Townsville in the V8 Supercars on Saturday.

Whincup saluted in a time of 1 hour, 31 minutes, 16 seconds, more than nine seconds ahead of second-placed Garth Tander driving for Toll Holden Racing Team.
Mark Winterbottom was the highest-placed Ford driver, finishing third almost ten seconds back from Tander.

Lee Holdsworth came fourth for Fujitsu Racing/GRM a further 10 seconds adrift from Winterbottom, while the No.1 driver in the championship in Courtney was less than a second behind Holdsworth.

Team BOC's Jason Richards had to endure starting from 25th spot, but some great strategy saw the Holden driver finish in seventh place, although was as high as sixth before Russell Ingall hauled him in the dying stages of the race.

Richards says he was rapt with his effort to gain so many places after a poor qualifying.

"When you come from 25th all the way through the pack with great race pace and still have some left for the end, that’s just awesome. I’m pretty proud of my lads; you couldn’t pass that many people if you haven’t got the car under you," Richards said.

"It was good strategy over the race distance; we basically just ran in clear air and we had a fast car."

Whincup's TeamVodafone team mate Craig Lowndes failed to finish the race, completing 61 of the 72 laps in the race.

Others that failed to finish were Trading Post Racing's Jason Bright, Centaur Racing's Tony D'Alberto and Bundaberg Red Racing Team's Andrew Thompson.