Hedge pinches Carrera Cup Sandown thriller from O’Keeffe.

Callum Hedge stamped his ticket to Europe in Race 2 of the Porsche Carrera Cup, performing a late move on O’Keeffe to take the Junior title and the Win.

With Jackson Walls falling early on, it was left to Hedge to finish the race to take the Michelin Junior crown, coming from third to win at the last corner.

O’Keeffe led for 99.9% of the race, and when it seemed like he had it, Hedge found some tyre life, with another international bound driver in Bayley Hall taking third.

With that win and his P3 in the morning, it also sees Hedge grow the overall championship lead over Walls.

The 31 lap Race 2 of the Porsche Carrera Cup Australia went green with O’Keeffe on pole over Hall, with Hedge and Russell on the second row.

Hall got a great jump but O’Keeffe took the first corner, with Wood jumping Russell into fourth.

Jackson Walls took two spots early into P8 as he tried to catch Hedge to keep his Junior title hopes alive with the Kiwi harassing Hall for second. But in a sudden blow to the Aussie, Walls took damage to his front bumper at Turn 4 to put him out, giving Hedge the Junior title and bringing out a safety car.

Dylan O’Keeffe led Bayley Hall, Callum Hedge and the rest of the field on lap one. Images: Mark Horsburgh EDGE Photographics

It also gave Hedge the chance to advance the overall Pro lead in the championship fight, whilst O’Keeffe rued the lost advantage from Hall and Hedge squabbling for second.

The SC went in on lap 9 and this time Hall held on to O’Keeffe to distance himself slightly from the chasing #17.

At the hallway point the gap was only 0.387 up the front, whilst in the Am Class, Cook (P15) held a lead over Flack and Shahin, with Flack pressuring the leader hard.

Hall was keeping his tyres well despite following the leader closely, whilst Hedge wasn’t letting the second split grow out, with the Kiwi also holding a near five second lead over Wood.

But Hall was suddenly dragged in after dropping a wheel off the road in Turn 9, giving Hedge P2 as the #28 then gave wild chase to get it back, drawing level in pit straight before the #17 consolidated his pass.

With seven laps to go O’Keeffe now had a 1.6s second lead and growing, and was looking like taking his second win of the day, and the year.

Hedge wouldn’t let up though, finding some tenths no narrow that gap, and in a blow to a nicely developing finish, Am driver Tim Miles went off into the grass, but the race stayed green.

On the last laps, nothing was separating the Am class front three, as Flack took that lead, whilst in the Pro front, the second lead of O’Keeffe had evaporated, with Hedge locked to his wing and starting to have a look.

Then on the last corner, Hedge put in a huge outside dive on the inside line to steal it on the line in a great finish, showing the talent that has been seeing him win races all over the globe this year.

Download the full Supercars Sandown 500 Round 9 Event Guide with track stats and facts and a full event schedule, plus extensive driver profiles here

For more of the latest motorsport news, pick up the latest issue of AUTO ACTION or subscribe HERE

Listen to our latest podcast episode here or on your podcast app of choice.

The Endurance is about to get underway with the Sandown 500 scheduled as the warm up to the Bathurst 1000 in 3 weeks time! Listen to the latest episode