WESTERN Bulldogs star Jason Akermanis has escaped unhurt after rolling his car before the start of a Mini Challenge race at Symmons Plains.

Akermanis was on the warm-up lap on a wet track and steering from side to side to get some heat into the car's tyres when he overdid it and the Mini clipped the edge of the bitumen and rolled.

The star midfielder was embarrassed rather than injured as he clambered from the car shaking his head.

"Well, I just went to warm up the tyres and next thing you know it got away from me and over it went," he said afterwards.

"I'm most worried about my wife though - we have to cover the damage bill.

"The crew will have to work hard overnight unfortunately, but they're confident that we can get back out there tomorrow and hopefully, I will be able to complete the race and put in a good performance.

"It's a real shame, because the weekend has gone better than I had anticipated up until this point."

Australian golfer Stuart Appleby, who was competing in the same race, made the start line and finished third last but was just a few seconds off the pace throughout.

Appleby is an enthusiastic amateur race driver who has finished 10th outright in the testing Targa Tasmania, driving a Lamborghini.

The Mini Challenge is one of the support races to the V8 Supercar round - the second last meeting of the championship.