Garth Tander has beaten home Jason Richards to win Race 2 of the Albert Park 400.

The two Holden drivers started the 25 lap race on alternate strategies, resulting in Tander sprinting home on the softer rubber to win by 6.4s.

Richards battled with a soft-shod Alex Davison for the lead in the opening laps, before pitting on Lap 14 – jumping the IRWIN Ford which pitted a lap earlier.

Tander had switched to the softs on Lap 10, and soon hunted down Richards and Davison to take the lead by Lap 17.

Davison hung on for third, while Jamie Whincup overcame Rick Kelly to take fourth by 0.02s.

Whincup charged his way into contention in the closing stages, having received a 10s addition to his pitstop courtesy of jumping the start.

The two-time champion had dropped from first to fourth on the run to Turn 1 due to his messy start, and spectacularly brushed the outside wall at Turn 11 on consecutive laps in the closing stages.

Craig Lowndes was sixth in the second TeamVodafone Commodore, ahead of Tim Slade, Fabian Coulthard, Jason Bright and Shane van Gisbergen.

Van Gisbergen started from 12th after his Race 1 penalty, and dropped to the rear of the field after being involved in a Lap 1 incident between James Courtney and Steven Johnson, before clawing his way back into the top 10.

Also in trouble on Lap 1 was Warren Luff – the Gulf Western Commodore rotating at Turn 6 after a tap from Slade.

Mark Winterbottom finished down in 22nd after dropping out of contention with a wheel nut issue in his pitstop.

See below for the Race 2 result