Mercedes, Coulthard take V8 wins in Winton

Mercedes earned a debut win and Fabian Coulthard emerged as a genuine V8 Supercars championship contender on a day of drama at Winton Raceway.

Erebus Motorsport owner Betty Klimenko and Lee Holdsworth embraced trackside after the Mercedes driver claimed the young team’s maiden victory in race two on Saturday.

The win came after a dramatic week for Holdsworth, who scared an intruder out of his Gold Coast home on Wednesday night before heading to the Victorian race track.

Holdsworth overtook Coulthard – who won the opening race – with three laps to go and held off a fast-finishing Mark Winterbottom for just his third career race win.

Holdsworth said the win brought forth a release of emotions.

“It’s been an emotional twelve months, it’s been so tough,” he said.

“We’ve had up and down results, most of them have been down.

“But we’ve come into this year with a much better car, it’s caught me by surprise that we’ve made that massive step over the break.”

But while the champagne flowed for Holdsworth, Coulthard insisted he couldn’t care less about his race-one win taking him to within a whisker of the series lead.

“It’s good on paper but it’s such a long year… I’d prefer that in December,” he said.

The New Zealander is the weekend’s big mover and sits just 19 points behind championship leader Craig Lowndes.

After earning two pole positions, tyre wear stopped Coulthard from completing a perfect day and winning race two.

Winterbottom also improved to fourth place in the title race, predicting another helter-skelter race on Sunday on the tricky Winton circuit.

“It’s very hard to pass until people have (tyre) degradation, and once they do you can charge on through,” he said.

The day’s big losers were Red Bull Racing and Volvo driver Scott McLaughlin.

Lowndes and Jamie Whincup improved their 23rd and 21st grid placings respectively to finish 16th and 19th.

McLaughlin was forced to retire in race one and finished dead last in race two.

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