V8 Supercars – Coates Hire Sydney 500 - day 2
The day 2 od final event of this year’s V8 Supercars championship decided 2015 champion and the Pepsi Max Crew Team driver, Mark Winterbottom is 2015 V8 Supercars champion. The Ford Falcon driver has well deserved his success and this is his first V8 Supercars title after years of participating in this highly interesting series.
Saturday in Sydney has started with fourth and final practice session in which Winterbottom has been the fastest beating van Gisbergen’s time from yesterday. Winterbottom’s blue Falcon has achieved 1.27.7116 time, proving that he is ready to give his best during Saturday’s races in order to win the championship. After the practice came qualifying session and Winterbottom was again the fastest puting his Ford on pole position in race one. Shane van Gisbergen was second and James Courtney was third. Second qualifying session had interesting outcome and last year’s champion Jamie Whincup won the pole position and Winterbottom was only fourth.
However, even with the pole position in race one, Winterbottom didn’t manage to win it and Jamie Whincup proved to be much faster winning the first race with Shane van Gisbergen on second. But, Winterbottom finished fifth and winning 55 points. He was obviously thinking that is better to finish the race and get points then to go for all out win and risk everything by crashing or worse. So in second race he was third (64 points). But in overall score he climbed to 3126 points which means there is no chance of Craig Lowndes to catch him and win the championship. So, today Mark Winterbottom and Pepsi Max Crew team started celebrating his first and well deserved V8 Supercars title. His closest rival was Craig Lowndes but his championship winning hopes all but evaporated after the first qualifying session. After problems in qualifying, Lowndes started from last position and his chances for points were slim.
It’s taken him 13 years but Mark Winterbottom has finally realised a lifelong dream by winning his first V8 Supercars championship. After running every season since 2004, Winterbottom has finished in the top five each year since 2006. One second place finish and five thirds has seen him labelled the bridesmaid. Now, he will take the number one into 2016. Congratulations!
Photos: v8supercars.au.co
