Whincup won by a whopping 2.3s on the incredibly short Tasmanian track, leading home Triple Eight teammate Craig Lowndes and James Courtney.

The race was all about early pitstops, the front-runners making stops within in the first 11 laps.

The first to hit the lane was van Gisbergen, who dived into the pits after leading the first five laps of the race. Two laps later McLaughlin did likewise, going from running fourth in the early stages to just missing out on grabbing the effective lead from van Gisbergen.

On Lap 11, the next round of crucial stops took place when Whincup and Lowndes, running first and second following van Gisbergen's stop, came in for service. While Whincup came out with a reasonable margin, Lowndes emerged alongside van Gisbergen – the Kiwi ultimately winning out on the braking zone to the hairpin thanks to being on warm tyres.

From there it was effectively an all-Triple Eight battle, the team's three cars running nose-to-tail. That was until Lap 26, when van Gisbergen started to fall back through the field.

The first to get by was Lowndes, who slotted into second behind Whincup. Courtney, David Reynolds, and Fabian Coulthard followed suit in the following laps, van Gisbergen dropping back to sixth as tyre deg took hold thanks to that early stop.

Whincup had no such dramas, doing more than enough to hold of Lowndes to take his second win of the season.

"The crew gave me a rocket today," said the reigning champion. "It was really intense at the start; SVG pitted early and I just bolted to try and get track position. I came out in a good lead, and was able to control it from there."

Lowndes held off Courtney to take second, with David Reynolds not far behind in fourth.

Fabian Coulthard pulled off an impressive comeback from 11th on the grid to come home fifth, while van Gisbergen finished sixth, with mirrors full of Tim Slade.

Scott Pye finished eighth, while McLaughlin dropped back to ninth in the second half of the race, his top speed hampered by an electrical issue.

Rookie Jack Le Brocq capped off an impressive day to round out the Top 10.

Both Tickford and Nissan missed out on a Top 10 spot, Winterbottom the best of the Tickford entries in 14th, while Rick Kelly led the way for the Altimas in 15th.

There was no fairytale comeback for Chaz Mostert after his tough qualifying session, his Tickford Ford catching fire after its pitstop. He was the only DNF from the race.

Race Results:

Cla	#	Driver	Car	Gap
1	1	Jamie Whincup	Holden Commodore ZB
2	888	Craig Lowndes	Holden Commodore ZB	2.3457
3	25	James Courtney	Holden Commodore ZB	3.5874
4	9	David Reynolds	Holden Commodore ZB	4.7927
5	12	Fabian Coulthard	Ford Falcon FG X	8.7263
6	97	Shane van Gisbergen	Holden Commodore ZB	14.3481
7	14	Tim Slade	Holden Commodore ZB	14.6397
8	2	Scott Pye	Holden Commodore ZB	15.0225
9	17	Scott McLaughlin	Ford Falcon FG X	15.8197
10	19	Jack Le Brocq	Holden Commodore ZB	16.3784
11	18	Lee Holdsworth	Holden Commodore ZB	16.5533
12	8	Nick Percat	Holden Commodore ZB	19.6312
13	33	Garth Tander	Holden Commodore ZB	23.8659
14	5	Mark Winterbottom	Ford Falcon FG X	24.0998
15	15	Rick Kelly	Nissan Altima	25.7530
16	23	Michael Caruso	Nissan Altima	26.0549
17	7	Andre Heimgartner	Nissan Altima	33.4381
18	230	Will Davison	Ford Falcon FG X	34.4240
19	99	Anton de Pasquale	Holden Commodore ZB	34.9266
20	6	Cameron Waters	Ford Falcon FG X	39.7353
21	21	Tim Blanchard	Holden Commodore ZB	40.2498
22	35	Todd Hazelwood	Ford Falcon FG X	42.7756
23	78	Simona de Silvestro	Nissan Altima	47.0689
24	34	James Golding	Holden Commodore ZB	48.6915
25	56	Richie Stanaway	Ford Falcon FG X	7 laps
	55	Chaz Mostert	Ford Falcon FG X