Bowe fights back.

After conceding an extra pit stop in race two, John Bowe has fought back in his OzEmail Falcon to take 12th position in the final encounter at the New Zealand round of the V8 Supercars at Pukekohe Raceway.

The day started promising for the former champ, finishing tenth in his milestone 175th touring car race but a pit stop to clean an oil smeared windscreen in race two put pay to any chance of a fruitful round result, bringing home his OzEmail Falcon in 22nd place.

Determination become the order of the day in the third and final race, with Bowe gaining a massive 10 spots on his way to 12th. The feat extenuated due to the shortened race format with the cancellation of yesterday's race. With all three races run on Sunday, each was reduced to 36 laps without pit stops.

"We had a very good car package in the last race, it's just a pity we started so far back on the grid. It was a lot of hard to work just to get 12th," said Bowe.

"We got off to a reasonable start this morning and to finish inside the top ten for my 175th race was nice. I didn't get a very good start off the line and lost a couple of positions on the first lap but once the race pace had settled, the OzEmail Falcon was capable of keeping up with the big boys," Bowe added.

"The second race was a huge disappointment. Some car had dropped some sort of oil on the circuit which sprayed all over my windscreen and all the wipers did was make it worse."

"In the end I couldn't see a thing so I had to come in to get it cleaned. It was a costly stop and ruined our chances but there was no way that I could stay out there [on the track] with the way that it was," Bowe concluded.

Bowe holds onto his top ten standing in the 2004 Championship and will be looking to cement himself even further at the next round in Darwin, in just three weeks time.

Brad Jones was forced to fight hard all day. In race one, he was pushed onto the grass when Russell Ingall spun on the opening lap, relegating him to 29th position. He managed to fight his was back to 20th by race end.

In the second race he was 'turned around' by an over zealous Steve Ellery who was subsequently served a drive through penalty for his actions. Jones' spin sending him to 26th but again clawing his way back to another 20th place finish.

The highlight for Jones came in the final race where he passed reigning champion Mark Skaife on the line, to finish in a credible 18th position. Like Bowe he was very happy with the speed of his OzEmail Falcon in the final race - "My car was the best it has been all year, which is a extremely encouraging for us. For the last 10 laps, [Mark] Skaife was actually holding me up," Jones concluded.