Lee Holdsworth

While the three-way fight for the Australian V8 Supercar Championship went down to the wire between James Courtney, Jamie Whincup and

Mark Winterbottom, the star driver at the Homebush season finale was Lee Holdsworth.

The 27-year-old Australian claimed pole position for both races around the former Sydney Olympic Games site in December and took a dominant victory in the second.

Not only did that help the Gary Rogers Holden driver end the year 195th in the Castrol Rankings - 131 places higher than he began it - but it also made him the final EDGE Performer of the Month of 2010.

Holdsworth's closest rival for December's EDGE Performer of the Month award was Frenchman Frederic Makowiecki, who won the final round of the GT1 World Championship at San Luis in Argentina.

Makowiecki's Hexis Aston Martin team-mate Yann Clairay, Jonathon Webb - who won the first V8 race at Homebush - and GT1 pairing Richard Westbrook and Thomas Mutsch completed the top six for December.

Ranking Year

Unlike most of his contemporaries, Holdsworth did not come up through the single-seater ranks. Instead, he made his racing debut, at the age of 17 in the Holden Commodore Cup National Series.

In 2002, his second year of racing, he finished fifth in that series, before taking third in the overall championship the following year, and sealing his graduation to the V8 Development Series.

His maiden season in the Development Series was not a good one, as he finished only 13th in a championship in a Robert Smith Racing Holden. His performances were deemed impressive enough to earn him a call-up to Smith's V8 Supercar squad for the Bathurst 1000, although he and his co-driver Mark Noske did not finish.

In 2005 he split his efforts across two championships, Holdsworth dovetailing a second V8 Development season with one in his domestic Formula Ford series. Eleventh in Formula Ford and 13th again in the saloons, was followed by a couple of enduro outings in V8 Supercars, again at Bathurst, and also at the Sandown 500.

Despite these two drives - both in a Garry Rogers Motorsport Holden shared with Phillip Scifleet - producing a best finish of 20th at Sandown, team boss Rogers was impressed enough to give Holdsworth a full-time drive in V8 Supercars for '06.

It was a slow start for the graduate as he finished only 20th in his rookie season at the top level, but he did find form in the latter stages of the year and secured his maiden podium finish at the Oran Park finale.

Oran Park turned out to be a very good venue for the Melbourne resident as he took his first series victory there the following season on his way to 15th in the championship.

Things really began to take a step up in 2008. Despite no wins, there were three podium finishes and 11th in the championship, while he cracked the top 10 in the points for the first time in '09. That season also provided him with his first two series pole positions, at the Townsville and Homebush street circuits.

And it was Homebush in December where he again excelled. Pole position for both races and a dominant drive in race two (the opener had brought seventh spot after rain hit the track at mid-distance) brought him his first victory for three years and gave him a career-best seventh in the championship. This year promises to be even better.