Cam Waters Wins Supercars Darwin Triple Crown Despite Race Loss to De Pasquale

Cam Waters believes he did all he could to win Supercars' Darwin Triple Crown for the first time, although Anton De Pasquale's flawless driving secured victory in the final race at Hidden Valley Raceway.

After starting Sunday's 70-lap, 200km event in third place, Team 18's De Pasquale staved off a spirited effort from Grove Racing's Matt Payne to win by 1.4298 seconds in hot and humid conditions.

It was De Pasquale's second race victory of the season after his Sydney win in February and ended his team's relatively quiet weekend on a high.

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Waters Claims Triple Crown

But Waters emerged from the happiest, having secured the coveted Triple Crown — given to the driver who accumulates the most points over the weekend. The Tickford Racing star won Friday's sprint race, finished second in Saturday's 200km event and claimed third on Sunday to secure the crown.

"I feel like all the hard work's finally paying off, but we've still got obviously a lot of work to do," Waters said. "I wasn't really quick enough today. So when you're not quick enough, you have to maximise what you have, and I feel like I maximised that. We'll celebrate this one, but we'll get back to work."

It wasn't an easy battle for Sunday's pole-sitter, as he struggled to keep up with De Pasquale and Payne despite jostling with them in the early stages.

De Pasquale's Perfect Strategy

The race transformed when De Pasquale expertly undercut Payne and Waters to edge past the pair in lap 21. He opted to pit again in lap 45, and although Payne continued to up the ante, De Pasquale was faultless until the safety car appeared when last year's champion Chaz Mostert's engine malfunctioned with four laps to go.

As smoke billowed out of Mostert's vehicle, the safety car stayed until the end of the race, and De Pasquale cruised to victory. The win is especially important for Team 18, who have suffered criticism from pundits after a lacklustre start to the season.

"It is something that I couldn't really care less about, to be honest," De Pasquale said of the outside noise. "We're aiming forward. We've improved a lot in 12 months. We've improved a lot in six months. We haven't got enough of those (podiums), so adding another one is really good, but we probably want to be getting more persistent podiums."

Driver Changes and Championship Implications

Before the race, Tickford Racing's Thomas Randle - treated for heat stress on Saturday - was pulled from the grid and replaced by 45-year-old Mark Winterbottom. The 2015 champion, who hadn't competed in a solo race since 2024, was already in Darwin as a broadcast commentator, and finished 22nd.

Brodie Kostecki was also sitting out Sunday's action because of a viral infection, dashing his hopes for a sixth race win of the season. The Dick Johnson Racing star was replaced by his endurance co-driver Todd Hazelwood, who won the Bathurst 1000 with Erebus Motorsport and Kostecki in 2024. Hazelwood finished 12th.

With six of 14 rounds completed, championship leader Broc Feeney has had his lead cut to just 15 points after finishing fifth behind his Triple Eight Race Engineering teammate Will Brown.