Skaife matched, Brock in his sights: Race 5 takeaways

The last time a driver opened a season with five consecutive race wins, Shane van Gisbergen was five years old.

Van Gisbergen’s Race 5 win at the Penrite Oil Sandown SuperSprint helped the Red Bull Ampol Racing driver retain his unbeaten start to the 2021 season.

The last time a driver won as many wins from the start of the season was 1994, when Mark Skaife recorded six straight wins to open the 1994 season.

Skaife scored the sextuple across the Amaroo, Sandown and Symmons Plains events.

Over a quarter of a century later, van Gisbergen brought up the marker after visits to Mount Panorama and Sandown, with the Kiwi also on an active win streak of six dating back to his Bathurst 1000 win last October.

It was van Gisbergen’s 45th career win, bringing the Kiwi to within three of Peter Brock’s marker of 48 victories.

It was also the Holden Commodore ZB’s 45th win, bringing the model level with the Commodore VX and Ford Falcon FG X.

Erebus Motorsport rookie Brodie Kostecki recorded his maiden championship race podium in just his 11th race start.

Kostecki vaulted from seventh to second in the wet race, with the 23-year-old scoring Erebus’ first podium since Anton De Pasquale at Tailem Bend last year.

The race also saw David Reynolds score his first podium since Surfers Paradise in 2019, when he was driving for Erebus.

The race was Reynolds’ 350th championship race start, and the result his 31st career podium.

Only 22 drivers in championship history have started more races than Reynolds, with six of them active on the 2021 grid.

The field will return to Symmons Plains for the Beaurepaires Tasmania SuperSprint across April 10-11.