Rain hits Homebush hard for second race

Torrential rain has hit Sydney Olympic Park in the day's final race at the Sydney NRMA 500.

The race was suspended for around 20 minutes, and restarted under Safety Car for the finish - which constitutes a full race, and will be awarded points.

Jamie Whincup pounced off the start, and takes the win ahead of Shane van Gisbergen and Scott McLaughlin after the reduced 23-lap race.

"That's probably the worst conditions I've even driven in," his teammate Craig Lowndes said."It's terrible, there's rivers everywhere."

While his teammate jumped into the lead of the race, Lowndes was caught up with returning star Marcos Ambrose at the back of the pack.

As the 26 V8 Supercars circulated there was one question - will or won't the rain come?

Todd Kelly was the first to pit for wet weather tyres, with Red Bull Racing timing Whincup's compulsory pit stop perfectly three laps later.

As the field filed into the pits when the water hit, David Wall stayed out on track and crashed his Falcon.

Whincup was leading van Gisbergen and Scott McLaughlin when the Safety Car was called, and shortly after the race was red flagged, with 18 laps to go.

Cars queued in pit lane and 20 minutes later the race was restarted under Safety Car, and ran five minutes until the time certain finish.

A bit of an anti-climax for winner Whincup - but he's hoping for a close contest tomorrow.

"I got a good start, we came in right time for tyres and put ourselves in a good position," Whincup said.

"Credit where credit's due to race control ... they did a good job.

"I'm looking forward to tomorrow, hope the sun will be out tomorrow and we'll go hard."

Drivers were reporting "rivers" around the circuit.

"That was not safe restarting that so they made the right call there," van Gisbergen said.

"I'm still excited to get some pretty good points today.

"I don't know where the other guys finished, hopefully we're close to them and have an exciting race tomorrow."

Van Gisbergen has eclipsed Lowndes in the Championship race by 26 points, jumping to third on the table, and is now 87 away from Mark Winterbottom.

McLaughlin rounded out the podium, with pole sitter Jason Bright fourth and Winterbottom, James Courtney, Tim Slade, Michael Caruso, Scott Pye and Garth Tander completing the top 10.

Lowndes finished 19th and Ambrose 20th.

Click here for full results.

Tomorrow marks the final race of the 2014 V8 Supercars Championship, with one 250km race, an ARMOR ALL Top 10 Shootout and qualifying session to be staged tomorrow.