The story of Eastern Creek was not one of motor racing. It was one of controversy, one of inconsistency and one we will talk about for the rest of the year. Ford felt robbed, and Holden justified.

There were nearly three hours between races at Eastern Creek, and in that idle time a race winner was decided. Kmart driver Greg Murphy appealed to race stewards about what he felt were rule infringements against him in the first race.

He said eventual race winner Craig Lowndes passed him to take the lead when the Safety Car boards were out. He said Marcos Ambrose unfairly bumped him out of the way in a passing move for second spot a few laps later. With those two acts, Murphy claimed, he finished third instead of first.

Discussions went on for a good hour and eventually Murphy's protests were upheld. Sitting there with abacus and slide rule, the powers that be determined stop-go penalties would have been handed out in the race, and this, they thought, would have cost each driver around 29 seconds.

Bang: 29 seconds was added to Lowndes' and Ambrose's race times - Lowndes was now credited with 13th and Ambrose 14th. Murphy was the new race winner, with Mark Skaife and Jason Bright next.

The Ford one-two had become a Holden trifecta.

"I came out of the pits in the lead and Lowndes passed me," Murphy said before the start of the second race. "I am glad to see the system works - that gets a stop-go penalty. It was just and consistent."

Lowndes, Ambrose and the thousands of Ford fans were not in the slightest bit happy.

Let's look at the Lowndes incident. Watching the video from inside Lowndes' car, there was no sign of a yellow flag or a Safety Car board when he entered Turn 1. Murphy came onto the track in front of him, and Lowndes passed the Kmart car for the lead going into T1.

It looked OK from the lounge chair, but the little Safety Car boards were apparently out - Murphy saw it as he exited pitlane - but they weren't visible in T1.

That doesn't matter according to the rules, and rightly so, too - the Safety Car is theoretically used for situations that involve high danger. Whether the system works is another question, and one which will no doubt provoke lots of head scratching as people search for a better system.

In second spot, Murphy was now at the mercy of pole winner Ambrose. There is little doubt Ambrose is one of the stars of the year so far, scoring two poles out of four races. With blinding speed and a racer's edge, he has put the Pirtek Falcon back at the front.

Ambrose worked his way onto Murphy's tail, who moved over to block a pass coming into T2. Ambrose says he was on the dirty line and that as Murphy squeezed him tighter it became harder to slow the Falcon, and he tapped him and then scooted up the inside for second.

What seemed to annoy the 'Devil Racer' most was that he couldn't work out what is acceptable. He wondered why this was deemed worse than being turned around in a straight line in Adelaide.

"Murphy was squirming," Ambrose said of his view. "I just wanted to get him. I race fairly, I race aggressively and I race safely. They called what happened to me in Adelaide a racing incident, and then this? They've set a new precedent again."

The first race looked like a definite Ford affair. Glenn Seton led the race easily from Lowndes, Ambrose and Murphy and then Steve Richards. Paul Romano beached his Commodore, the Safety Car came onto the track and Seton and Richards still hadn't completed their compulsory pitstop - race over for the two FTR cars.

The second race was marked by its lack of racing, and Mark Skaife cruised to an easy win from Jason Bright; that was where they finished overall. Murphy had jumped the start and scored a controversial stop-go penalty, and then climbed back up the order enough to claim third on the day.

Incidentally, Murphy's stop-go penalty, the only one for the race, took just 21 seconds - controversy #1. In addition, he didn't appear to stop in his stop-go penalty - controversy #2. That had people talking about consistency and Ford people calling for blood. John Bowe, who finished fourth overall, could well be upset at his lost opportunity on the podium.

The third round of this year's championship will be remembered for a very long time, but unfortunately not for its motor racing.