Kiwi Supercars star Shane van Gisbergen has seen his Bathurst 1000 title defence crumble within sight of the finish, when a shredded tyre ended his bid for victory.
After securing the championship crown with a race left in the season, van Gisbergen had hoped to cap his success with a second consecutive victory in the 'Great Race', along with co-driver Garth Tander.
But challenging for the lead with seven circuits remaining in the 161-lap journey, he was forced to pit with a delaminated front tyre, effectively ending his chances of repeat success.
Instead, victory went to polesitter Chaz Mostert and co-driver Lee Holdsworth, who had dominated for six hours, but were made to work hard for their reward by a series of late safety-car incursions that repeatedly eroded their clear speed advantage.
Van Gisbergen limped home in 18th and could barely mask his disappointment, despite receiving the championship trophy afterwards.
"Bittersweet," he admits. "I really tried to win that race, and congrats to Chaz and Lee and their team.
"They were super-fast and we couldn't quite hold it together. It's been an awesome year otherwise and we'll drink a few out of this tonight."
Ironically, Mostert and Holdsworth experienced a similar mishap early in the race, but had sufficient speed and time to overcome the setback.
Mostert had qualified for pole with a lap record in Saturday's top-10 shootout and his support driver, who could not secure a fulltime contract this year, showed he was just as capable as many lead performers for rival teams, holding the fasest lap time for much of the main race, until his teammate began his charge.
Their car was clearly faster than anyone else, but the tyre issue set them on the backfoot early and a spate of on-track incidents - including a stray echidna (spiny anteater) - stalled their progress to set up a virtual sprint race for victory.
Tander and Van Gisbergen were consistently second best, and the latter threw the kitchen sink at Mostert, trying to peg him back over the closing laps, but overcooking his tyres in the process.
"It was a pretty tough race, when we did that [puncture], I knew it was going to be a tough slog, but credit to the guys - this car has been speedy all weekend," Mostert says.
"We started on pole and we won the race, and every time you start on pole, you never think you're going win it, so credit to this car and credit to the team."
Van Gisbergen's Red Bull stablemate, Jamie Whincup, entered retirement with a fourth-place finish and will now take the reins of the team, as former boss Roland Dane steps down.
