Motorsport: The Kiwi sun shines in Hamilton

New Zealand driver, Shane van Gisbergen. Photo / Alan Gibson

The rain stayed away for the second V8 Supercars race yesterday and the sun shone on a Kiwi for the first time on the streets of Hamilton.

Young Shane van Gisbergen wrested his maiden V8 Supercars' win to back up his nine podium finishes and restore some of the local V8 glory from the Pukekohe days.

Lee Holdsworth was a close second with former champion Garth Tander in third.

"It was pretty cool to win. The team picked themselves up from Saturday and I had great car speed," said a very happy van Gisbergen.

"It's great to be sitting here in the middle [press conference] I haven't done that before. It was an emotional race and I had to work hard for it and when I passed Rick [Kelly], I could see everyone in the crowd cheering. It gets to you and I started to make mistakes then and had to pull it all together and concentrate on the racing. I told my engineer I didn't want to know how many laps were left."

It's a long time between drinks for SBR's Ross and Jimmy Stone, who last tasted success in New Zealand with Marcos Ambrose back in 2004.

"It's been a while since our last win and we've often made it hard work for ourselves," said Ross Stone. "Today it was tough and that was a hard fight. Holdsworth had good speed but we had enough to cover him. The team did a faultless job and we had good stops, a great strategy and that's what it takes."

The other half of Stone Brothers Racing, Jimmy, normally a bloke who leaves the talking to others, had one of the biggest grins seen in a while.

"We got roughed up a bit [on Saturday] and it just goes to show you everybody on the team did a great job to come back today," said Jimmy Stone. "Shane did the work today. We gave him the car and he did the rest."

Van Gisbergen was comfortably in control until a late safety car episode - four-car pile up with Mark Winterbottom, Jamie Whincup, Jason Bargwanna and Michael Caruso - with 11 laps to go allowed the pack to close up on him. Holdsworth pushed van Gisbergen hard over the closing laps from the restart but the New Zealander held his nerve and took the chequered flag.

"I saw Lee coming through and as soon as he passed Rick I was a bit worried. I didn't really need those late safety cars and Lee got real close," said van Gisbergen.

A great sight towards the end was fellow Kiwi Fabian Coulthard waving van Gisbergen on from trackside after being taken out by Tim Slade a lap earlier.

Van Gisbergen became the fifth different winner in six races over the opening three rounds of the championship and series leader Jamie Whincup, after a weekend he'd like to forget, heads back across the Ditch still in the lead but with a much-reduced buffer.

Whincup's first visit to the streets of Hamilton three years ago was a weekend to forget, and he'll be consigning this meeting to the bottom draw too. A 23rd and an 18th has reduced his lead to 81 points ahead of Rick Kelly and teammate Craig Lowndes who is a further 21 points back.

During race one on Saturday, working in pit lane was not the place to be. Mechanics, engineers and even cameramen were being skittled like ninepins as the cars slithered and slewed their way into their bays after the rain arrived. Established race plans were thrown out the window.

Rick Kelly managed the changing conditions the best to bring his Jack Daniel's Holden home first with the charging Lowndes following in his tracks for second. Todd Kelly looked like he was going to make it a one-two for the fledgling Kelly Racing Team, but had to settle for third after his windscreen wiper failed with 16 laps to go.