Kostecki and Erebus Holden co-driver David Russell were contenders throughout Sunday's blue ribband event, sitting second behind eventual winners Shane van Gisbergen and Garth Tander for the middle part of the race.
Still sitting second with less than 20 laps to go, Kostecki had just served his final stop of the race when the race fell under caution thanks to Will Davison hitting the wall at Griffins Bend.
As Kostecki emerged from the pitlane, he found himself behind a recovery vehicle which was heading up Mountain Straight to retrieve Davison's Dick Johnson Racing Mustang.
At the same time Chaz Mostert, who had been running third and stopped his WAU Holden a lap earlier, arrived on the scene and beat Kostecki to the control line when he was forced to lift.
Mostert was allowed to keep the position for the restart several laps later, the defending event winner going on to finish second while Kostecki ultimately slipped back to fourth behind Cam Waters' Tickford Mustang.
Despite remonstrating angrily over the radio at the time, Kostecki kept his cool when speaking to media about the incident post-race, saying he backed the safety first approach.
"Unfortunately we were a bit unlucky, so we got the wrong side of the timing," said Kostecki.
"There was a car stuck in the fence and safety comes first and unfortunately we got a bit of bad luck there.
"I thought I was in front of Chaz but it was really hard to see, as he was in my blind spot. I definitely saw that he wasn't in front of me to the point where I lifted - but that is not the line and I was trying to navigate the safety truck as well as him.
"I saw him coming last minute as well. I had to lift so we didn’t have a monumental [impact] with the safety truck.
"It is a bit disappointing as it might have put us on the podium. I’m not really sure. But we didn’t have a fast enough car today [to win]. We will have to try again next year."
When asked if the recovery vehicle systems needs assessing, Kostecki added: "I’m not really sure to be honest. I mean I’m not sure where else you can park one of those safety trucks to get access to Turn 2 as there are walls all along [Mountain Straight].
"It is a bit of tricky one. The safety crew in Supercars always do an awesome job with that sort of thing. I think it is a one-off thing here. I don’t think it has ever happened before."
Tickford slams Kostecki for Waters contact
Tickford Racing boss Tim Edwards says Waters and James Moffat could have won the race without the run-in with "buffoon" Kostecki on lap 46, when Moffat was tagged by Kostecki at The Cutting.
While Moffat managed to keep his spinning Mustang off the wall, the delay dropped him 21st on the road.
Edwards believes Waters had the pace to hold on to victory had he been ahead of van Gisbergen and Mostert at the business end of the race and criticised Kostecki for his move.
"We didn't come here to finish third. I said before the race, and my view hasn't changed, our approach was win it or bin it," Edwards told Autosport. "Unfortunately a bloody buffoon took us out.
"It came down to a race of track position, and we didn't have it. We had to use every cunning thing we could do, every chip we had, because we lost 15 places. That gave us nothing left to manoeuvre with.
"That was a race of track position at the end. If we had the track position, which we did when Brodie turned us around, we would have had a good chance of winning the race.
"They were all so close [on pace]. And the guys behind, they're the ones that suffer with the overheating tyres.
"Thanks to Brodie, we didn't get that opportunity."
Moffat was equally unimpressed with Kostecki's driving, labelling the Erebus Motorsport driver a "dickhead".
“It was probably going okay for us until Brodie just drove like a dickhead at The Cutting and turned us around and put us on the back foot, really, for the rest of the day,” said Moffat.
“I'm proud of the team for just putting their heads down and not giving up and Cam drove the wheels off it, like he always does. To get back up on the podium is nice.”
When asked about the clash post-race Kostecki suggested Moffat didn't give him enough space.
"Just don't turn in," he said.
Meanwhile, Zane Goddard has been fined $10,000 for triggering a lap five crash that took himself, Matt Campbell's Grove Mustang and Dale Wood's Brad Jones Racing Holden out of the race.
