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Bright bounces back

© Philip Northeast

Holden's Jason Bright became the first man to win two rounds of the V8 Supercar Championship Series in 2004 winning both of the two Sunday races at Barbagallo Raceway in Perth, adding to his second in Saturday's first race to take the round from current series champion Marcos Ambrose and young gun Rick Kelly.

"We had a couple of problems early in the weekend as we were trying a few things with our braking package, but as the weekend went on we got better and better," Bright said.

"It was great under brakes but getting the power down out of corners was a bit of a worry."

"Full credit to the guys, though, we made the right changes and had a pretty comfortable car to race with," he said.

His teammate, Paul Weel underlined the strength of the Paul Weel Racing team. Weel stated race one in 30th position after rain during qualifying stranded him in 30th position. He made up 20 places in the first race, held station in the second race and improved to 5th by the weekend's end.

Ambrose salvaged his weekend with the drive of the year so far on Saturday when he worked his way from 21st on the grid to third place, then followed it up with a fourth and a third. Rick Kelly was fourth, second and fourth for the weekend.

The second place overall gave Ambrose (Pirtek Racing) a healthy 50-point lead in the V8 Supercar Championship Series as he reassumed the championship lead from Rick Kelly, Steven Richards, Greg Murphy and Bright.

Six-time champion Mark Skaife won his first race of the year at this event on Saturday but a terrible mistake cost him any chance today. He earned a 'drive through' penalty in race two for exceeding the speed in pit lane - by a massive 20km/h.

Ambrose's big gain in the championship came in the opening race, when rival Steven Richards, failed to finish. Richards finished 14th overall and is now third in the championship chase behind Rick Kelly. The big break for Ambrose came at the end of just the second lap, when championship leader and pole sitter, Richards crashed out from the lead when he tangled with Skaife and Bright.

One of the only dramas for Ambrose came in the final race when he went to make his compulsory tyre stop only to find Greg Murphy had spun at the pit entry and partially blocked the track, but Ambrose squeezed by and made his stop.