Scott McLaughlin Runs Out Of Fuel After Winning

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Jamie Whincup leads the Virgin Australia Supercars Championship, but don't be fooled.

Scott McLaughlin is the bloke he's worried about.

The 24 year old came away from Bathurst with 0 points and had some shockers through qualifying at Surfers.

But Sunday's win at the Gold Coast 600 tells you everything you need to know about how this year's title will be won.

The Red Bull Holden Racing Team boys were outsmarted in the garage by the Shell V-Power Racing mob on fuel strategy.

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Put simply, McLaughlin pitted a lap before his rivals and ended up in front.

Red Bull boss Mark Dutton told Supercars.com they played it too safe.

“In hindsight, we should have taken a bit more risk, but we were definitely looking at the bigger picture the whole time and not wanting to put undue stress on that when we could see where everyone was playing out.”

Unlike some of the others, McLaughlin and co-driver Alex Premat kept their Ford out of the wall and on the limit to keep the 24 year old Kiwi firmly in the hunt for the goods at season's end.

It's a remarkable result on the narrow and unforgiving streets of Surfers Paradise and gives McLaughlin his seventh win of the season.

Proving how slim the margin for error was, McLaughlin was forced to push his car back to the pits after running out of fuel during the celebration burnout.

“I don’t mind pushing my car if it’s pushing it into victory lane,” he said.

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“This guy here [Premat] did an unbelievable job in the first stint. He set us up. This is so good after Bathurst.”

Six-time champion Whincup will take a 17 point lead over Fabian Coulthard to New Zealand for the next round in Auckland.

McLaughlin is just 27 points adrift of the championship leader.

The reality is it's still anyone's fight to win with just 189 points separating the top five and plenty more up for grabs in Auckland and at the final round in Newcastle.

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Sean Maynard

22 October 2017

Article by:

Sean Maynard




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