Jamie Whincup & Paul Dumbrell win the Sandown 500

Triple Eight Race Engineering have won their second consecutive Sandown 500 with Jamie Whincup and Paul Dumbrell, with the Holden pair almost unchallenged throughout the race. The duo finished ahead of the Holden Racing Team pair of James Courtney/Greg Murphy and Garth Tander/Warren Luff in the first endurance event of the 2014 season.

With the exception of the #55 Rod Nash Racing entry, every team fielded their co-driver for the start of the race, while Rod Nash Racing opted for a strategy which would involve changing the driver twice change strategy in the race, with David Reynolds starting the car before handing the car over to Dean Canto, and then taking over the reins for the final stint.

The strategy worked well at the start, with Reynolds gaining four spots and was up to fourth by the end of the first lap, while Paul Dumbrell led the way in the #1 Triple Eight Holden ahead of the Tekno Autosports Holden of Jonathon Webb and Greg Murphy’s HRT Commodore.

Reynolds would continue to make further progress following a close battle with Volvo’s Alexandre Prémat in the early stages, going on to pass Murphy for third shortly before the first pit stop sequence which began around lap 20.

The first stops saw the first retirement of the race for the #360 Nissan Altima of Taz Douglas, with damage to the rear-right of the car meaning it was not possible to correctly fuel the car, with the fuel rig jammed and leaking fuel all over the back of the Altima V8 Supercar.

Volvo’s Alexandre Prémat stayed out late during the first pit stop sequence, which allowed a number of drivers to get the undercut on him, but the French driver was able to carve his way back up the order with fresher tyres, working his way up to eighth position before the safety car was called on lap 44 due to the displacement of the corner marker cones on the back straight.

The safety car triggered a craze of pit stops, with every car except Cameron Waters in the Charlie Schwerkolt Racing entry heading into the pits. The usual stacking issue with each team having only one pit stall for their driver pairing caused delays for each team’s second positioned driver, but there was an extraordinary hold-up for Prémat, who was unable to exit his pit stall as he was blocked in by a queuing Oliver Gavin, who was waiting for his Walkinshaw Racing team-mate Tony D’Alberto to clear the way ahead of him. The delay cost Prémat another four positions.

Ford Performance Racing were the first to get the mandatory driver change out of the way, with Paul Morris pitted shortly after the 55 lap minimum limit and handing the #6 Ford Falcon to regular driver Chaz Mostert, putting them on an alternative strategy for the remainder of the race which would involve an extra pit stop.

Greg Murphy overtook Jonathon Webb on lap 69, putting the HRT Commodore in second position with a careful pass at the final corner.

The safety car had altered all the teams plans to complete their driver change at the minimum, due to the stops that had taken place under the safety car on lap 44, with the majority of the co-drivers now racing all the way up to lap 80 when the third sequence of pit stops took place. During this phase, both Michael Caruso in the #36 Nissan and David Reynolds in the #55 RNR Ford picked up drive-through penalties for spinning their wheels during their stops.

On lap 86, Nissan’s Todd Kelly was spun out at the final corner by the Erebus Mercedes of Lee Holdsworth, with Holdsworth picking up a drive-through penalty for his part in the incident.

The final sequence of pit stops took place around lap 123, but a slow stop for Triple Eight’s Craig Lowndes saw him drop behind Garth Tander’s HRT Commodore on the track.

The only major incident of the race took occurred on lap 133, when the Erebus Mercedes E63 of Lee Holdsworth crashed out hard into the tyre barriers, sustaining major front-end damage and winded Holdsworth. An errant wheel was also collected by the Brad Jones Racing Holden of Jason Bright, which was already several laps down due to an an earlier radiator change, which finally put the #8 car out of the race.

An extended safety car period followed, closing up the gaps, but Whincup was able to restart with a three lapped car buffer between himself and HRT’s James Courtney, comprised of the LDM car of Russell Ingall, CS Racing’s Jack Perkins and Volvo’s Robert Dahlgren. It took Courtney five laps to navigate through the backmarkers, but by then Whincup had rebuilt a comfortable margin, and went on to take the victory, 2.6 seconds ahead of Courtney.

The main fight after this was the battle between the #2 Holden of Garth Tander, who was defending hard from Triple Eight’s Craig Lowndes during the final stages.

Scott Pye took the best result for Ford, with team-mate Ash Walsh having driven the car up into the top ten during his stint before handing over to Pye, who in turn worked his way forward to take a great result for Dick Johnson Racing.

Shane Van Gisbergen and Jonathon Webb finished sixth in the Tekno Autosports Holden, struggling with a power steering failure during the final stages, while Chaz Mostert and Paul Morris’s alternative strategy paid off, rewarding them with a seventh place finish with the FPR Falcon showing great pace during the closing stages.

Scott McLaughlin and Alexandre Prémat finished eighth in the Volvo S60, with David Reynolds/Dean Canto in the RNR Ford and Mark Winterbottom/Steve Owen completing the top ten.

The best placed of the Nissans was the #15 car of Rick Kelly & David Russell in 13th, the final car on the lead lap.

Whincup’s victory now means his points lead is now 273 points heading into next month’s Bathurst 1000km, but the driver in second is now team-mate Craig Lowndes, who has moved six points ahead of Ford Performance Racing’s Mark Winterbottom.