Sandown 500: Whincup/Dumbrell lead Triple Eight trifecta

The reigning series champion and his vastly-experienced teammate were untouchable in the opening enduro of the season, cruising to victory ahead of teammates Shane van Gisbergen/Earl Bamber and Craig Lowndes/Steve Richards.

It's the third Sandown 500 win for Whincup and Dumbrell as an enduro duo.

Dumbrell made light work of the first stint, bolting from the outside of the front row and into the lead. His advantage over Alex Premat in the #17 Penske Ford was 6s after 10 laps, and over 10s just five laps later.

The lead got as high as 17s before a Lap 23 Safety Car forced the leaders into the lane for the first time.

The caution was thanks to Dean Fiore's Nissan being left temporarily stranded on the back straight, having had its front-right wheel dislodged by an out-of-control James Courtney at Turn 3.

Dumbrell's advantage was enough that he was able to wait for the Safety Car to be called before pitting, coming out in front of Steve Richards in the #888 Holden who had pitted several laps earlier, while Premat dropped the third.

Richards proved a little tougher to shake after the Lap 26 restart, but Dumbrell was able to slowly eke out an advantage. As the race reached the end of its first quarter the #1 Commodore was 8s clear of the sister #888 car, Premat another three seconds down the road.

The gap was out to almost 20s when the next round of stops started on Lap 55, most of the Top 10 diving in to make driver changes while Dumbrell stayed out.

Once again the Safety Car coincided with the leader's stop, Dumbrell pitting at the very moment Jason Bright found himself stranded at Turn 9.

That meant Whincup came back out in the lead, but Dumbrell's hard work was once again undone by the caution.

The race restarted on Lap 62, Whincup leading Lowndes (who replaced Richards) and Fabian Coulthard (who replaced D'Alberto).

On Lap 81 Shane van Gisbergen made it a Triple Eight one-two-three. The Kiwi had been handed the car in sixth place, following an action-packed pair of stints from co-driver Earl Bamber.

The Le Mans winner had mostly run around the back end of the Top 10, and was lucky to survive a heart-in-mouth moment between Turns 3 and 4 when he was fired across the grass by Luke Youlden as they scrapped over ninth.

Bamber was ultimately able to climb to sixth before his second stop on Lap 55, Triple Eight then getting van Gisbergen out ahead of McLaughlin but behind Coulthard.

Van Gisbergen quickly got on the back of Coulthard, but it wasn't until the race hit the midway point that he was able to finally break down the Penske driver's defence and move into third.

At that point there was a 12s split across those three T8 Holdens, Whincup 5s clear of Lowndes with van Gisbergen a further 7s behind.

Lowndes pitted on Lap 89 for a pads stop, followed by van Gisbergen on Lap 92 and Whincup on Lap 93. There was a small undercut effect for #888, the gap to Whincup closer to 2s as they settled into the fourth stint of the race.

Once again Whincup was able to slowly stretch the advantage out to 10s before the fourth and final round of stops, the leader coming in on Lap 133.

From there it was a case of controlling the race to put the finishing touches on a perfect 6.8s lights-to-flag win.

"Couldn't be happier, the car's been awesome all weekend," said Whincup.

"PD did a fantastic job, but it's not over until it's over. We just kept our head down and kept concentrating. This race has gotten away from us a few times, but thankfully it was a nice and clean race."

The race ended in a top three lockout for Triple Eight, although there was a change of position between two of those cars at the back end of the penultimate stint. With little threat from behind, Lowndes opted to back off and hand second over to points leader van Gisbergen on Lap 123.

That mean van Gisbergen came home two spots clear of title rival McLaughlin, extending his gap at the top of the standings to 55 points.

David Reynolds and Luke Youlden came home fifth, followed by an under-the-radar Scott Pye/Warren Luff combo.

Coulthard and D'Alberto fell back to seventh over the last two stints.

Cla	#	Driver	Car	Laps	Time
1	1	Jamie Whincup Paul Dumbrell	Holden Commodore ZB	161
2	97	Earl Bamber Shane van Gisbergen	Holden Commodore ZB	161	6.8312
3	888	Steven Richards Craig Lowndes	Holden Commodore ZB	161	8.2566
4	17	Alexandre Prémat Scott McLaughlin	Ford Falcon FG X	161	25.1772
5	9	David Reynolds Luke Youlden	Holden Commodore ZB	161	25.7498
6	2	Warren Luff Scott Pye	Holden Commodore ZB	161	34.2220
7	12	Tony D'Alberto Fabian Coulthard	Ford Falcon FG X	161	38.7343
8	15	Rick Kelly Garry Jacobson	Nissan Altima	161	48.8165
9	33	Garth Tander Chris Pither	Holden Commodore ZB	161	51.8138
10	55	Chaz Mostert James Moffat	Ford Falcon FG X	161	58.1830
11	230	Alex Davison Will Davison	Ford Falcon FG X	161	58.2697
12	99	Will Brown Anton de	Holden Commodore ZB	160	1 lap
13	6	David Russell Cameron Waters	Ford Falcon FG X	160	1 lap
14	7	Andre Heimgartner Aaren Russell	Nissan Altima	160	1 lap
15	14	Tim Slade Ash Walsh	Holden Commodore ZB	160	1 lap
16	25	James Courtney Jack Perkins	Holden Commodore ZB	160	1 lap
17	5	Mark Winterbottom Dean Canto	Ford Falcon FG X	160	1 lap
18	34	James Golding Richard Muscat	Holden Commodore ZB	160	1 lap
19	21	Dale Wood Tim Blanchard	Holden Commodore ZB	160	1 lap
20	56	Richie Stanaway Steven Owen	Ford Falcon FG X	160	1 lap
21	35	Bryce Fullwood Todd Hazelwood	Ford Falcon FG X	160	1 lap
22	19	Jonathon Webb Jack Le Brocq	Holden Commodore ZB	156	5 laps
23	18	Lee Holdsworth Jason Bright	Holden Commodore ZB	145	16 laps
24	8	Nick Percat Macauley Jones	Holden Commodore ZB	142	19 laps
25	23	Michael Caruso Dean Fiore	Nissan Altima	134	27 laps
	78	Simona de Silvestro Alex Rullo	Nissan Altima	129