Toll Holden Racing Team’s, Garth Tander and Nick Percat won the Bathurst 1000 in what proved to be the closest competitive finish in the 49 year history of the Great Race, claiming victory by 0.29 of a second from last year’s winning combination of Craig Lowndes and Mark Skaife in the Vodafone 888 Commodore.

After six-and-a-half hours of racing and 1000 kilometres, in a nail-biting final 10 laps, Tander had to hold off a fast finishing Lowndes who was coming from a long way back to reduce the margin to half a second from the HRT machine with a lap to go. No matter what Lowndes did on the last lap, he could not overtake Tander and had to settle for a close second.

New Zealander Greg Murphy beat the elements to record the fastest time in his Pepsi Max Commodore in Saturday’s shoot out for pole and top ten grid positions.

Murphy, who went out for his lap dash mid way through the session, was lucky enough to finish with the fastest time before the heavens opened and killed the performance of the fastest four cars who took to the wet and slippery track on slicks – tyres were chosen prior to the lap-dash session and under the rules cannot be changed under any circumstances.

Holden took out its 28th victory on the mountain – HRT’s 200th Australian touring car victory and seventh Bathurst win.

Due to the driver pairings in each car, the victory gave Garth Tander’s South Australian rookie co-driver 22 year old Nick Percat victory in his first Bathurst 1000 start since Jacky Ickx in 1977 and just the third rookie after Ickx and Rauno Aaltonen in 1966 to win the Mount Panorama 1000.

In a clean sweep, Holden dominated all three major placings with four time champions and pole sitters for the race, Greg Murphy and Allan Simonsen taking third position. Mark Winterbottom and Steven Richards were fourth in the highest-placed Ford of the weekend’s racing.

Whincup’s race came to an unusual stop when his Holden lost power early in the 138th lap and the pre-Bathurst V8 Supercar championship points leader agonisingly had to slow down and nurse his car into the pits, but his race was run. His eventual finish in 21st position cost him valuable points and, with four rounds left in the season, also the lead on the Championship table.

Ford driver David Besnard had a lucky escape after a spectacular crash and burn on lap 112. The Jim Beam Racing Falcon failed to brake, hit the tyre wall on turn two and bounced back on the track when his red hot brake discs ignited Ethanol from the Falcon’s ruptured fuel tank and surrounded the car in flames.

Quick thinking from safety stewards and a rookie fire marshal who disregarded their own safety stepping onto a live track (the race was still in progress) and onto the burning tarmac, extinguishing the fireball and saving David Besnard’s life, who walked away from the burning wreck unharmed.

The youngest driver in the race, Holden rookie Cameron Waters, 17, also missed turning at the end of Conrod Straight, hit the tyre wall and spent a lot of time in the pits. Eventually the car was repaired and he rejoined the race to become the youngest finisher ever at a Bathurst 1000.

The next V8 Supercars event is the Gold Coast 600 on 22 and 23 October.