MOTORSPORT: Fair dinkum Ford v. Holden contest

Ford Performance Racing has jumped out of the blocks brilliantly after its strong form at the end of last season. If it can sustain its weekend performances in Adelaide it may well counter Holden's recent dominance.

Will Davison's victory on Sunday was his first since Bathurst in 2009, when he was in his first year with Holden Racing Team. He reckoned that being back on the top step of the podium was a "pretty magic" feeling, especially after seeing a win on Saturday snatched from him on the last lap by his good mate and defending champion Jamie Whincup in a Triple Eight Race Engineering Holden.

Being caught just a little short on fuel that day could have been heartbreaking for Davison but FPR was already on the right track and Sunday proved that.

Davison and Mark Winterbottom gave Ford's factory team its first one-two race finish for four years. The podium positions both days were filled by drivers from the big three teams -- Triple Eight, FPR and HRT -- courtesy of Garth Tander, while James Courtney began the new season with a continuation of the rotten form from most of 2011.

Stone Brothers Racing and the Kelly Brothers, in their last season with Holden before bringing Nissan back into Australia's premier motor racing championship next year, are in the hunt too, but it's not hard to see the big three teams taking most of the wins in the final season before the arrival of Car of the Future in 2013.

At least it looks as though the spoils will be more evenly shared than last year, when Holden scored seven wins for every one by Ford.

International newcomer to the series, Frenchman Alex Premat, had a mixed introduction -- comprehensively outqualified by Garry Rogers Motorsport teammate Michael Caruso both times but finishing ahead of Caruso in both races (17th versus 22nd on Saturday and 16th versus 22nd on Sunday).

V8 Supercar Championship standings after opening round -- 1. Will Davison (Ford) 288 points; 2. Jamie Whincup (Holden) 270; 3. Garth Tander (H) 258; 4. Mark Winterbottom (F) 222; 5. Craig Lowndes (H) 206; 6. Lee Holdsworth (F) 201; 7. Fabian Coulthard (H); 86; 8. Shane Van Gisbergen (F) 174; 9. Rick Kelly (H) 168; 10. Tim Slade (F) 147; 11. Russell Ingall (H) 132; 12. Steve Johnson (F) 132; 13. Todd Kelly (H) 126; 14. Michael Patrizi (F) 123; 15. Tony D'Alberto (F) 111; 16. Steve Owen (H) 111; 17. Dean Fiore (F) 105; 18. Alexandre Premat (H) 105; 19. David Reynolds (F) 96; 20. David Wall (H) 93; 21. Karl Reindler (H) 90; 22. Michael Caruso (H) 78; 23. James Moffat (F) 60; 24. Jason Bright (H) 57; 25. Jonathon Webb (F) 36; 26. Greg Murphy (H) 33; 27. Taz Douglas (H) 33; 28. James Courtney (H) 30.

V8 Supercar teams championship standings -- 1. Ford Performance Racing 510 points; 2. Triple Eight Race Engineering 501; 3. Stone Brothers Racing 375; 4. Kelly Brothers 294; 5. Holden Racing Team 288; 6. Brad Jones Racing 243; 7. Garry Rogers Motorsport 183.

V8 Supercars would want the South Australian government to foot the bill for the lighting. However, an Adelaide associate with vast experience of South Australian politics has told us: "There's more chance of Adelaide getting the Olympic Games than the SA Labor government spending $10 million on circuit lights.

"They can't pay the nurses, teachers or bus and train driver pay rises... On top of that, the East End tree-huggers would cut the cable.

"[Adelaide event sponsor] Clipsal has announced it's not going to throw in more dosh than at present.

"The day-night 12-hour Le Mans race [in Adelaide at the turn of the century 12 years ago] was a [financial] 'washout' and fans complained they couldn't tell one car from another."

Might be a big hurdle to overcome, even for master deal-doer Cochrane.

F1 pre-season testing is winding up in Spain and Mercedes and Lotus (nee Renault) loom as the big improvers this year, while Ferrari's technical chief has expressed doubts about the Italian team's competitiveness and publicly doubted it can be a podium finisher in Melbourne.

Returning 2007 world champion Kimi Raikkonen completed an impressive race distance for Lotus overnight in Spain, while Mercedes team chief Ross Brawn says the new W03 model is "very much" an improvement on last year's car. However, there are concerns -- not admitted to by Brawn -- about tyre wear on the Mercedes. Brawn reckons the front-running teams will be bunched tighter this season.

"There are five or six teams in a much closer grouping perhaps than we have seen for a number of years," he said.

Meanwhile, Ferrari's still relatively new technical director Pat Fry has said he does not believe the team's somewhat radical F2012 car is competitive enough yet to be a podium finisher in the season-opener at the Albert Park track. However, Fry admitted that he was "always slightly pessimistic".

Ferrari has been playing with the position of its exhausts. "I'm disappointed by our performance level at the moment," Fry said. "[But] we'll have new bits to test in Melbourne... We've still got a reasonable amount of work to do."

Denny Hamlin won the race in a Toyota with the crew chief (Darian Grubb) that Tony Stewart sacked on the way to last year's title. Hamlin held off Kevin Harvick (Chevrolet), with Greg Biffle (Ford) third, ahead of Jimmie Johnson (Chevrolet), Brad Keselowski (Dodge) and Kyle Busch (Toyota).

It was hard luck for Ambrose, who had been third in the late stages and is now regularly racing at the pointy end with the big boys of NASCAR. In the end he was classified only 32nd today, 17 laps down, leaving him 21st  in the championship standings and equal with new Richard Petty Motorsports teammate Aric Almirola.

Hamlin leads the series from Biffle, Harvick and Daytona 500 winner Matt Kenseth.

The V8 spun out of control coming on to the main straight of the Calder Park road circuit, hit the end of a concrete barrier side-on, ripping off the passenger side door and leaving the floor below the co-driver's seat looking as though a bomb had exploded under it. Francis escaped with a dislocated bone on his left side, while the driver was only shaken. The car, entered to add excitement to the new two-wheel drive era in the ARC, was a write-off.

Honda scored its maiden ARC round victory on the debut of its Jazz G2, with Eli Evans and co-driver Glen Weston winning all three heats.

South Australians Jack Monkhouse (Nissan Sylvia S15) and Michael Busby (Mazda RX7) filled the other podium positions, squeezing out the second Honda Jazz driven by Mark Pedder.

West Australian youngster Tom Wilde clinched his first ARC round win driving a Mitsubishi Evolution X Lancer in the final year of the four-wheel drive championship. Wilde, last year's Australian Junior Rally Challenge champion, grabbed the win as Queenslander Steven Shepheard had a driveshaft break in his Mitsubishi Evo IX on the final stage, dropping him to fourth.

Another West Australian, Nathan Box, in another Evo IX, took second in his ARC debut, with NSW driver Michael Boaden completing the podium in yet another Mitsubishi after winning the final heat and the concluding "power stage".

Multiple national champion Neal Bates won the classic section in his 1980 Toyota Celica ahead of Porsche driver Jeff David with David Thompson third in his Triumph TR8, while another multiple national champion Cody Crocker won the first round of the new Side by Side Rally Challenge in a Polaris RZR 900 XP.

Image: EDGE Photographics