Fourth place fell to James Courtney, the Stone Brothers' driver maintaining his grid position, but only after making a slow start that saw him slip to fifth on the opening lap.
The Jeld-Wen Ford stayed clear of the first-lap carnage and later re-passed Lee Holdsworth to reclaim fourth.
“I got a little too much wheel spin off the line," Courtney revealed, “Once we got past the safety car periods at the start, the car was very good, we had a good clean stop and got back out there in the same position we came in. We were probably quicker than the two cars ahead of me at the end, but I couldn’t use the advantage because this track is quite hard to pass on. We just settled for the solid result to set us up to have a red hot got at it tomorrow.”
Holdsworth took fifth spot ahead of Team WOW's Cameron McConville, while rookie Fabian Coulthard produced both his and the Glenfords Racing team's best finish in seventh. Todd Kelly, Will Davison and Mark Winterbottom rounded out the top ten, but there was no fairytale result for another Kiwi, as Shane van Gisbergen paid the price for being outside the top ten at the time of Jamie Whincup's qualifying crash by being restricted to just 21st position at the finish.
The youngster had produced an impressive drive from twelfth on the grid and had picked off numerous positions to challenge for eighth place by lap 21. However, while hustling Kelly for position on lap 32, the SP Tools Falcon suffered a flat front tyre after nudging the tyre bail at the chicane and the ensuing pit-stop dropped him back.
