Shane Van Gisbergen has won Race 22 of the Supercars season, claiming his second victory of the weekend at The Bend. Finishing in second behind the Red Bull was Chaz Mostert, with James Courtney rounding out the top three.
The race was marred by a sickening incident on Lap 1, which saw Thomas Randle stall on the front row of the grid. Cars behind swerved to avoid an impact with the Castrol Tickford car, however Andre Heimgartner was blinded by the cars in front and made impact with the back of Randle at over 120km/h.
Nick Percat was the unlucky third wheel in the incident, with Randle’s car rebounding into his, causing irreparable damage to resume the race. All three drivers were sore after the incident and required to head to the fields medical centre.
Heimgartner has since been taken to hospital, along with Randle, with tenderness in his abdomen, according to team owner Brad Jones. Jones also believes the car may be a write-off but has a team of “magicians” who may be able to fix it in time for Sandown.
The red flag was immediate which saw a full race restart.
Time constraints came into play due to the red flag, reducing it from 24 laps down to 18. This affected team strategies as they were still required to make a compulsory stop.
Waters battled from pole on from restart, with oil on track from the earlier incident hampering his acceleration, seeing him drop down to fifth behind Van Gisbergen. Mostert was the benefactor on the opening lap, gaining five spots to take the lead ahead of Courtney.
As was the case yesterday, Van Gisbergen remained out on track whilst everyone else stopped and built a 41 second lead over Mostert. Courtney had also remained up front from the start, running a tidy third.
The Red Bull of Van Gisbergen finally took his stop on Lap 16, rejoining with the lead by less than a second. This was how things remained, Van Gisbergen winning his second race of the weekend ahead of Mostert and Courtney.
Waters came home in fourth, ahead of Anton de Pasquale and Broc Feeney.
Chris Pither was impressive, coming home just outside the top 10 in 12th.
The damage sustained to the cars of Heimgartner and Randle mean the pair will most likely not compete in this evenings proceedings. Suspension damage to the car of Percat is also jeopardizing his chance of rejoining for Race 23, with Percat saying it “is touch and go” if they will make the grid.
The win sees Van Gisbergen extend his championship lead to 354 points over de Pasquale, meaning he is over one full round ahead in the standings.
Race 23 starts at 6.45pm tonight, with Van Gisbergen aiming for his fifth win in a row and second straight clean-sweep of events.
