Ford Performance Racing's Mark Winterbottom extended his V8 Supercar Championship Series lead at Queensland Raceway on Saturday when he finished second in race 1.
The 27-year-old, who qualified in P2 earlier in the day, hounded race winner James Courtney for the entire 38 laps, never getting more than 0.6s adrift and setting the fastest lap of the race.
FPR executed a perfect pit stop, delivering 'Frosty' back on track wheel-to-wheel with the rival Ford driver, but Courtney had the racing line and did not make any errors.
"I didn't give up; if I had, Russell (Ingall) would have been on me for sure!" said Winterbottom, who drives the Orrcon Steel Ford Credit FPR Falcon.
"You keep pressuring but it just didn't happen for me; James stayed on it the whole time and when he does that, you can't do much more."
Winterbottom's FPR team-mate Steve Richards meanwhile started from 11th on the grid after a slight error in qualifying.
He survived a chaotic first lap, making up two places in the process, but was then held back by Will Davison.
Despite trying every trick in the book, Richo could not find a way past and finished seventh, closing in on fourth-place Rick Kelly in the championship standings.
"The first lap was chaotic but you're just calm, concentrating on any gap that opens up in front of you, muscling yourself into them and making forward progress," he added.
"There's no sense of euphoria or panic. In this race I was effectively boxed in on lap one. I couldn't go sideways, I couldn't go forward. Where I was, was where I was going to stay!"
