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Brodie Kostecki has claimed his maiden Supercars title after Shane van Gisbergen was eliminated from the opening race of the Adelaide 500 in a first-lap crash.
Kostecki’s teammate Will Brown – who will replace van Gisbergen at the Red Bull team next year when the three-time champ departs for NASCAR – was pushed into the wall on the exit of just the fourth corner of the race by the Ford Mustang of Anton de Pasquale.
Brown was then hit from behind by an unsighted van Gisbergen, which ripped the right-rear wheel off the Brown car, and the left front off the van Gisbergen car.
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Both were out of the race on the spot.
Van Gisbergen entered the race with a 131-point deficit to Kostecki and needed to outscore the Erebus ace by 20 points to keep the championship alive heading into the final race of the year.
Kostecki lead the race early, but then drove conservatively to finish sixth and claim the title.
“I don’t actually think it’s really sunk in yet,” he told the broadcast on Fox Sports after the race.
“You don’t want to win a championship when your other contender (has been) knocked out of the race, but yeah it’s been a whirlwind of a year.
“We’ve worked so hard to do what we’ve done today, and I can’t thank everyone that’s been behind me my whole career.”
The win was also an emotional moment for team owner Betty Klimenko, who cameras captured in tears on the pit wall.
Klimenko ran GT cars for two seasons and entered Supercars when she took over the former Stone Brothers team for the 2013 season. They ran Mercedes E63s for three seasons before switching to Commodores for 2016.
Klimenko, who was adopted as a child by Westfield Group co-founder John Saunders, financed the team through a family trust she inherited when he died in 1997.
“It’s great to see them wear their emotion on their shoulder,” Kostecki said.
“Betty started this venture 13 years ago, and for myself to deliver her her first championship is something that I’m never going to forget.”
Despite clinching the championship, Kostecki said he and the team “sucked” in that race, and had work to do overnight to ensure they could come out in the final race of the year on Sunday and win.
Klimenko said the winning feeling was “very surreal”.
“It’s something you strive for and when people asked whether you would prefer to win Bathurst or the Championship, you always say Bathurst because you know that’s obtainable,” she said.
“Being a privateer team, we didn’t think (winning the championship) was ever obtainable, but now, we’ve done it and it shows every other privateer team down the lane that you can do it.
“You don’t need to be factory-backed, you can do it on your own and that’s, for me, a big thing.”
Kostecki will be confirmed as the winner of the championship following the final race on Sunday.
Earlier, Brown said he “hadn’t even worked up a sweat yet” when the crash happened.
“Everyone blocks on the inside … so I went for the outside.
“I knew I had a good overlap, I would have tucked in behind him if I wasn’t at least completely next to him. I thought (De Pasquale) would be able to see me and knew I was completely there, but obviously not.
“I’m not going to judge it too much, he probably just thought he’d run me a little bit wide, and then I ended up in the fence and unfortunately took out one of the championship leaders as well.
“So, tough day … it’s a bit disappointing.”
Triple Eight team boss Jamie Whincup lamented the relatively low starting positions of his two drivers.
“It was unfortunate, but when you qualify sixth and 11th you’re exposed to stuff like this happening, and that’s what happened,” he said.
“We’ll see what we’ll see but it’s pretty much all done for us unfortunately.”
Kostecki started the race from pole, and now effectively only needs to finish the race to secure the title.
The race was eventually won by Cameron Waters, who notched up the third consecutive race win for Ford Mustangs since a parity adjustment before the Gold Coast race meeting.
Mustangs filled the top four positions.
The Supercars season will conclude with the second and final race of the Adelaide 500 from 4.15pm AEDT.
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