Supercars Darwin: Feeney and Brown dominate Sunday race

The Triple Eight duo led from the start, Feeney from pole position and Brown for third on the grid, the pair split by a fired-up Brodie Kostecki.

Points leader Brown shadowed his younger team-mate in the opening half of the 48-lap journey, but Feeney’s three-lap-earlier pitstop allowed him to stretch a nearly 3s lead. Brown chipped away at the gap in the final 20 laps, but at the flag Feeney was 1.2255s to the good.

“I hadn’t won on a Sunday all year,” smiled Feeney after his second win of the weekend and fifth of the season.

“Two wins this weekend, I am pretty stoked with that. The pace the whole race was insane, high sevens the whole race. But I knew once he got to a second [behind], it would be pretty hard work.”

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For Brown, second place and a slightly smaller points lead were a strong reward for a consistent weekend.

“I worked really hard, we pitted a couple of laps later hoping to come back at him in the end,” said Brown.

“Got a really good start, two good starts this weekend, which is positive. We are both so fast, the guy who just won is clawing me back in the championship.”

Will Brown, Triple Eight Race Engineering Chevrolet Camaro ZL1

Will Brown, Triple Eight Race Engineering Chevrolet Camaro ZL1

Photo by: Edge Photographics

Third place was a fine reward for Kostecki, who looked like his old 2023 title-winning self for the first time this season. His Saturday woes were defeated when his Erebus Motorsport crew worked overnight to change engine, transmission and even brakes on the largely unsponsored #1 Camaro.

“I think that missing the two days of running with the gremlins we had put us behind these guys,” he said.

“The guys worked really hard last night, they worked their butts off.”

The concern for the team (and everyone else) must be that he was a distant 16 seconds (0.33s a lap) from the similar Red Bull cars.

There was a great battle behind, James Golding maintaining his fourth place on the grid at the flag, his PremiAir Chevrolet repeating his Saturday finish. He was just ahead of the Matt Stone Racing example of Nick Percat and Jack Le Brocq (Erebus Motorsport).

Behind the six-pack of Chevrolets came the first of the Ford Mustangs, with Will Davison leading home Dick Johnson Racing teammate Anton De Pasquale to take ‘class honours’. For the second race in a row, the lack of pace from the Fords (there were just three Mustangs in the top 13 finishers) must be raising some eyebrows, even if the statistics come from a relatively small sample.

To underline how tough the going was for the Ford teams, Cam Waters could only make it to 15th, after starting from 19th.

After his heroics on Saturday, Chaz Mostert again struggled in qualifying and this time, from 20th on the grid, could only make it as far as 16th as more drivers in front of him followed his Saturday example to take four tyres, not two, at their mandatory pitstops.

Feeney’s stellar weekend has seen him cut Brown’s points lead to 108, with Brown on 1353 and Feeney on 1245. Mostert remains third on 1074 ahead of Nick Percat on 855. The big mover of the weekend was James Golding, who moved from 12th before the weekend to fifth on 845.

The Supercars Championship will next move to Queensland, for two races around the Reid Park Street circuit in Townsville, on 6-7 July.