Motorsport: Mark Winterbottom holds on

Mark Winterbottom in his Ford FGX Falcon in Townsville. Photo / Getty Images

Ford's Mark Winterbottom extended his V8 Supercars championship lead as he held his nerve and held off his team-mate to win yesterday's 200km race in Townsville.

The Prodrive Racing Australia driver claimed his fifth win of the season in a thrilling finish to the 70-lap race. Winterbottom, who held a 95-point lead in the standings going into the race, finished a mere 0.2706 seconds ahead of team-mate David Reynolds.

Holden's Fabian Coulthard came home third a further second behind the two Fords and fellow Kiwi Scott McLaughlin, who has struggled in his Volvo in his second season in the V8s Supercars, was fourth.

Shane van Gisbergen rounded out the top 10, which was an impressive result given he started the race from last on the grid.

He had been excluded from yesterday's qualifying session, pushing him to the back of the grid after being deemed to have run two warm-up tyres on the rear of his Darrell Lea Commodore and two green tyres on the front during the 20-minute qualifying run, which is against the rules.

He also missed the majority of two practice sessions on Friday with a nasty vibration in the car.

Prodrive Racing have now won eight races from 16 starts this season and yesterday's result saw Winterbottom jump out to a commanding 176-point lead over Coulthard, who leapfrogged Holden's Craig Lowndes in the standings after the Red Bull Racing driver finished 14th.

Coulthard's performance was also impressive, improving from eighth on the grid to the podium and he even threatened Winterbottom and Reynolds in the final 10 laps of the race.

"I drove the wheels off it," Coulthard said. "The strategy was awesome, Phil [Keed] my engineer was coaching me the whole way. He was a little bit stressed there with the way I was murdering the tyres in the early stages, but we made it in the end."

Winterbottom started from second on the grid alongside team-mate Chaz Mostert and grabbed the lead at the first corner in his Falcon FG X.

"That was awesome," he said. "We pushed the tyre and there was nothing left at the end. To see Dave second " at the end he was really close and I thought he might've had a go. To have a team one-two was awesome. It's a well-earned one. It's a tough race."

Defending champion Jamie Whincup continued to struggle, finishing ninth.

"It was an improvement on his recent finishes but he's still well off the pace in the championship standings.

Mostert faded late to finish eighth, also giving up crucial points to Winterbottom in the title race.

The Townsville 400 wraps up today with another 200km race.