It was a weekend of mayhem on the Darwin track as Shane van Gisbergen and his RED BULL Racing team won after starting from pole position, beating Tim Slade and Craig Lowndes.
The 70-lap sprint started and ended in chaos, with five cars forced to retire, including Coulthard, and one driver was hospitalized. Restarts, mismanaged pit stop strategies and driver mistakes saw the lead change several times, but the Red Bull Racing driver held his nerve and steered to victory ahead of Tim Slade and Craig Lowndes. Reigning champion Mark Winterbottom was caught up in the drama and hit with two drive-through penalties that contributed to the Ford driver’s slide down the championship standings.
But that was overshadowed by Holdsworth’s shocking lap-one crash. There was an early pile-up that ended Ford duo Fabian Coulthard and Chaz Mosert’s races. Holdsworth was then sent into a concrete wall at about 200km/h and was left stranded in his Preston Hire Racing Holden for several minutes.
