The Mountain, beckons. After three years, the Bathurst 12 Hours is back to full strength. A field of 28 cars is about to set off on this once around the clock odyssey at Mount Panorama in the Blue Mountains near Sydney, and the town of Bathurst, New South Wales, Australia. One of the world's many meccas of motor racing, right up there with Monaco, Le Mans, Spa Francorchamps, Indianapolis, and Daytona Beach. A full international field is back and ready to race. Sadly, due to pre-race accidents, a few entries have had to withdraw or have their cars replaced at the last moment. We will not see, after qualifying accidents, the MARC II V8 Mustang #52 Invitational class entry of Wheels/FX Racing. That car was to be driven by Keith Kassulke, Hadrian Morrall, and Keith McLeod, after a massive accident.
A massive crash also wrote off the SIN R1 supercar with a Chevrolet LS V8 crate engine in the back of it. This car, #66, was to have been entered by Daytona Sports Cars for the driving trio of Ben Schoots, Dylan Thomas, and Shane Woodman. Of these cars that wrecked on the mountain, I believe it was Keith Kassulke at the controls of the MARC II Mustang when he had a lurid offtrack excursion through The Chase, and absolutely clobbered the barrier totaling the car. A similar situation happened to the SIN R1 Chevrolet from Daytona Sports Cars, but I don't remember if it was Schoots, Thomas, or Woodman at the wheel of it, when the accident occurred.
Another Invitational exotic car also had trouble and was written off in a crash. The #50 KTM Crossbow GT2 car with it's Audi 5-cylinder motor had a massive shunt! But, the trio of Trent Harrison, Jayden Ojeda, and Glen Wood, they will compete at Bathurst today in a borrowed Melbourne Performance Audi R8 after working out a late race deal with Melbourne Performance Center to run a spare car from that team. The KTM Crossbow will have to be repaired. However, the team can still enter and start the race using the spare Audi. We shall see how things go over the course of the next dozen hours for the Harrison/Ojeda/Wood trio.
We do have one Invitational MARC Cars chassis starting this motor race. A MARC I Mazda 3 V8, car #111 for 111 Racing/MRA Motorsport, to be driven by Darren Currie, Grant Donaldson, and Geoff Taunton. With those notifications out of the way, it is now time to race. We join the commentary team of John Hindhaugh, Richard Craill, and Garth Tander, in the broadcast booth, and on pit lane, Mark Beretta, Chad Neylon, and Shea Adam will be taking care of things, providing reports and insight. The first Bathurst 12 Hour race was held in 1991. This marks the 20th edition of the 12 hour endurance race at Mount Panorama!
Happy anniversary, Bathurst 12 Hours! It is time to go racing. We have done the opening ten minutes in pitch darkness, behind the safety car, awaiting the sunrise. After a tough couple of years, the world is back! The Liqui Moly Bathurst 12 Hours is back to full strength! Green flag! We're underway on the mountain! Glad to have you with us on this Sunday morning at Mount Panorama! It's 5:45 A.M. Australian time on Sunday, February 5th, 2023, and the race is underway! You are going to see the brake rotors glowing cherry red, lighting up, and the cars bottoming out over the curbs as they charge towards Hell corner for the first time of asking.
Up Mountain Straight they go for the first time and into The Cutting, Quarry Corner, and Reid Park. Very little temperature in these Pirelli P Zero tires right now and drivers are weaving to build it into the tires as we speak. Across the top of the mountain, they go. We are seeing the blokes at the rear of the field of 24 cars come across the line now. Some top name drivers will have to work their way up through the pack. Philip Ellis, Maro Engel, Fabian Schiller, Lee Holdsworth, Brenton Grove, Alex Davison among them at the bottom of the pile and working their way up.
Some of these drivers are working their Pirelli tires really hard as once again, we are being guided through this race by the expert commentary team of John Hindhaugh, Richard Craill, and Garth Tander, throughout. Garth Tander, a man who has experience and wins here on The Mountain in an Australian Supercar in the Bathurst 1,000 and in this event, 20+ years ago when it was a 24 hour race and he was part of a team that drove a Holden Monaro 427 coupe to the winner's circle. They fly through The Cutting for the first time with the gorgeous rosy glow of dawn fingering the sky here in New South Wales.
Let me tell you. That picture we just saw is motor racing as art through The Cutting. Anyone at the circuit who had your phone camera out, I hope you got a snapshot or a video of that! What a sight to behold! They climb the hill in the darkness, screaming over the top of Reid Park for the first time. This takes you down to two more fabled corners on the Mount Panorama circuit at McPhillamy Park and Skyline corner, recently renamed for the late, great ten-time Bathurst winning driver, Peter Brock, who won this event when it was a 24-hour race and won a boatload of times at the Bathurst 1,000 too. There are two Peter Brock's of motor racing legend. One is the American designer of the Shelby Cobra Daytona Coupe. The other is the great Aussie motor racing driver who won so many races here at Mount Panorama. Respect to them both.
Mr. Tander echos are great point. Right here, as a driver, on cold tires with low pressure across the top of the mountain, you have no idea what you've got. You, the driver, are as nervous as a cat in a room full of rocking chairs! Low grip, no idea what the tires are doing or how the car will behave. Let's fast forward in our highlight's package to half an hour into the motor race. We can see the sky is certainly lightening. Dawn is here at Mount Panorama as the pack flies into Hell corner again, down the front stretch, pouring out of Murray's corner, the final turn on this great circuit which has 23 corners in total.
The two WRT entered BMW M4 GT3's are beginning to make their moves, car's #32 and #46. We'll get to that in a wee while because in the background, look, there's mayhem! Two Audi's playing a game of dodge 'em cars on the straight! Fredric Vervisch wants by Christopher Haase! Argy bargy through turn one! Too early for that, boys, biffing and barging through Hell corner! Settle down, lads. Settle down. Raffaele Marciello looks like he too wants a bite of the cherry but he's not getting anything at this moment at least.
It's time to push already. Make hay while the sun shines as they say, and in this case, make hay while the sun rises. Ricardo Feller puts a move on Christopher Haase. Audi on Audi! Fred Vervisch we saw earlier, is sharing the #55 Fuchs Lubricants Racing Audi alongside Brad Schumacher, the car and team owner, and Australian Supercars veteran James Golding. Christopher Haase, the vastly experienced German Audi GT3 pilot has the wheel of the #74 Audi Sport entry he shares with Mattia Drudi and Patric Niederhauser. Haase from Germany, sharing with the Italian and the Belgian. Early doors, you can get away going 'round the outside at turn two, Griffin Bend.
Later in the day, Griffin Bend, you must go through there single file, or it is calamity corner. Vervisch, Feller, and Haase, the three Audi's are scrapping hard. But, watch out! We've got a spin and... ker-runch! Someone has hit the wall and hit it hard! It is one of the Audi's that has crunched the wall and it is Haase in the Pro car! #74 has big damage, look, to the tail! The bumper and the right rear taillight are missing. Christopher Haase is one of the most experienced Audi GT3 drivers out there. He does not drop it by himself, and so, someone had to have plowed into the back of him without him even knowing!
Into Griffin's Bend, he spins the car, and backs it into the fence, hard! Did he jump? Was he pushed off the road? There was a multicolored Mercedes AMG GT3 up the inside. Let's see what happened from the onboard camera. He got tipped by someone and the right rear suspension is damaged completely from the impact. We go onboard with Haase. This is going to hurt! Brakes! He's spinning, and... crash! Heavy contact and heavy damage to the Audi #74! Game over. He and his co-drivers are done for the day. We've gone past the one-hour mark as we continue the coverage, and it is pit stop time with 77 minutes now on the board.
Alex Davison driving the #222 Mercedes AMG GT3 is in the lane for the prostate cancer research car, has damage to the left front corner. Break out the bear bond, the very stick racing tape that comes in large bandage type sheets. This is the #222 Scott Taylor Motorsport Mercedes AMG GT3. Alex Davison sharing with team owner Scott Taylor, Aussie touring cars and Aussie Supercars veteran as well as GT3 veteran, Craig Lowndes, and Geoff Emery, the fourth driver on this Pro-Am team. All crew members bar the car controller with the lollipop have to be over the delineation line before the car can be dropped off the air jacks and leave the lane. No inside pit wall like we see at an American track such as Daytona International Speedway. The garages are in the pit lane here at Mount Panorama.
We also saw the defending champion car in this race, taking service. That is the #65 Melbourne Performance Center Audi R8 LMS Evo 2 being shared by Chaz Mostert, Fraser Ross, and Liam Talbot. Maxi Goetz has pitted from second place, and we'll get to that. Chaz Mostert, wriggling his way off pit lane on stone cold tires! Easy there, sunbeam. Don't mash the gas too hard. Mostert crossed the blend line between pit lane and the racing line. Now, we have to check the rulebook because the stewards could ping him with a penalty for that. We also saw Maximilian Goetz pit the #888 Mercedes AMG GT3 from second place.
Goetz, the experienced German GT3 racer sharing the Supercheap Auto Racing Mercedes for Triple Eight Racing with their Australian Supercar regulars Shane van Gisbergen, the champion, the legend, and his Aussie Supercars teammate, Broc Feeney. Ten minutes shy of two hours, and now, more trouble. The #50 Audi R8 has backed it hard into the fence! Remember, this is the replacement automobile for the written off KTM Crossbow for MMotorsport/Vantage Racing who were originally entered in the Invitational cars category. Trent Harrison, Jayden Ojeda, Glen Wood, and David Crampton, their weekend has gone from bad to worse!
Crampton is at the controls right now and he has backed it into the fence! This team entered and practiced the GT2 spec KTM Crossbow with the Audi 5-cylinder turbo motor. But the engine went bang on the KTM in Free Practice 2. They swapped cars and leased this Audi from Melbourne Performance Center on Friday afternoon. Now, their weekend may be going even more pear shaped. Crampton is a lucky bloke because he has gotten out of the tire barriers. He might save their bacon yet. Crampton might have gotten a get out of jail free card on this one. Pass go and collect $200, if this were monopoly. But it's motor racing.
He did not catch the curb. Crampton had the Audi swap ends on him, he runs through and destroys the Shannon's Insurance advertising signage, and just kisses the front end of the car. The Audi has launch control on it where you have to hold a button on the steering wheel to get the car to accelerate. Now then, we can see another battle brewing and speaking of Audi, it is Chaz Mostert racing with the Mercedes AMG GT3, the red Makita Tools entry in the hands of Tony Bates. That is the #24 Mercedes AMG GT3 for Tony Bates Racing with Makita Tools & C Tech Laser sponsorship. Bates sharing with European based Aussie GT3 racer Jordan Love, and with Australian Supercars driver, David Reynolds.
Bates goes offline and slithers his way onto the grass with the car facing tail first towards the concrete barrier! This isn't going to be pretty. He slides backwards and hits the wing on the... boom. Ouch! He's dragging dust back onto the course and the team will have to be careful. The support braces on the wings of these GT3 cars are very delicate. Poor old "Batesy" just gets a tank slapper over the crown in the road which here at Mount Panorama is difficult to see. These are public roads like Circuit de la Sarthe in Le Mans, France, and so trucks and cars and so on, drive on them each day when there is not a race going on. At least I think so. Bates just had to change his line as Mostert was going to his inside and he simply ran out of road.
Oh my! Just over two hours into this race and we have a big accident! This is massive with major damage over the top of Brock's Skyline. Oh no! This is one of our major contenders for overall victory, the #4 Pro-Am Grove Racing Porsche 911 GT3R! Stephen Grove sharing with his dad Brenton Grove and with Aussie Supercars driver Anton De Pasquale. But this Porsche is going nowhere fast. Race Director James Taylor from Supercars makes the radio call, "safety car boards and flags. Safety car boards and flags." This will be an opening on strategy for some. But it will be an ice cream headache for those who had their pit strategy planned and are now seeing their original strategic idea have t get torn up and tossed in the trash.
Rip up that paper in the recycler and draw up a new plan. Grove spins 180 degrees in McPhillamy Park and plows backwards into the concrete wall! Ouch! That's one of those sore in the morning kind of deals. Ker-runch! He got both ends of the stick and the front corner. That's a thoroughly used up Porsche! That's two years in a row where Grove Racing have wrecked a Porsche GT3 here at Bathurst. They want to do all the Intercontinental GT Challenge races this year. All four of them. Well, they will have repairs to make because the very next race on the championship trail in South Africa, the Kyalami 9 Hours is only a few weeks away.
Indeed, I tell you we will have coverage of that race in full. So, don't miss it. Meanwhile, back to Bathurst, and the carnage continues! Just over four hours into the race, almost four and a quarter hours in. At the top of the mountain, the #6 Lamborghini Huracan is in trouble! This is the Wall Racing entry in the iconic BASF bulls eye BMW M1 and Sauber BMW Group C sports car livery from the very early 1980s in the FIA World Sportscar Championship. The car is bouncing along the wall and is damaged. It is very likely game over for the trio of David Wall, the car and team owner, and his teammates, Tony D'Alberto, race car driver/television host Grant Denyer, and Adrian Deitz. Right rear suspension damage on that car with the toe in knocked out and the rear end knocked out of square, cattywampus.
In replay, he has come into The Cutting way too hot, and... crunch! The wall collects yet another victim. More trouble for the bullseye liveried Lambo. Deitz now at the wheel of it and he has spun off the road in a cloud of dust. That is on the uphill run into The Chase which takes you downhill and back towards Murray's corner at the start/finish line here at Mount Panorama. Dust hangs in the air. The 5.2 -liter V10 is running and so Deitz might be able to get himself out of the current pickle he is in. That said, there's big damage on the car as it is already.
The front splitter, rear bumper, and rear diffuser are all hanging off the car. Aerodynamically, that Lambo is a mess. Poor old Adrian Deitz lost control in The Chase due to right rear suspension damage, wiping out two of the Liqui Moly signboards in the process. Needless to say, car #6 has had enough for one day. I think it is game over for Wall Racing. Nicky Catsburg in the Craft Bamboo Mercedes AMG GT3, car #77 drives by. Catsburg, the highly experienced Dutch production sports car racer, teamed up with Daniel Juncadella from Spain and Philip Ellis, the German, in that automobile.
Oh my! More carnage! Forget ice cream headaches. All these wrecks are giving yours truly a real headache! Oh, the pain! The throbbing, burning, pressure and pain! Ugh! OK. Not a real headache, but a figurative headache. Three and a half hours in, almost, and another massive accident! Car #47 is buried into the wall at the Sparesbox Dipper! Now, Sparesbox is auto parts store in Australia. Hello, Sparesbox. We need some parts for a race car, a Mercedes AMG GT3 race car, ASAP! Send a truckload immediately!
That is the #44 Silver rated Valmont Racing Mercedes AMG GT3, Aaron Cameron at the wheel of it, sharing with Marcel Zalloua, Sergio Pires (not to be confused with the Mexican Red Bull Formula 1 driver, Sergio Perez), and Duvashyn Padayachee. Aaron Cameron has buried that car into the fence! This will trigger a rash of pit stops. There is a second car involved in this mess and that is the #47 Supabarn Supermarkets Audi R8 in the hands of Theo Koundouris in a car he was sharing with his brother James Kondouris and with Aussie Supercars veterans turned GT3 racers, David Russell and Jonathon Webb.
Koundouris we can see is trying to get the Audi pointed in the right direction. But the Valmont Racing Mercedes AMG has gone from being a contending race car to a worthless pile of junk. To add insult to injury, the #44 in ninth place in the overall was in the lead of the Silver division! How heartbreaking is that! Aaron Cameron, per lap he was running in his stint was only 3/10ths to 4/10ths of a second slower than Shane van Gisbergen! Holy smokes! He was right in the fight with the big boys at the top of the shop, and then, this happened! Running again into the Sparesbox Dipper... screech! Crunch! Both of them spun and plowed backwards into the barriers!
Jordan Love in the #24 Tony Bates Racing Mercedes AMG we saw in trouble earlier on, was a lucky, lucky luck boy to not get caught up in yet another shemozzle! Now we move ahead in our broadcast to the green flag on the restart having started the race's fifth hour. This is a huge scrum into Hell corner with Shane van Gisbergen sweeping right 'round Augusto Farfus. van Gisbergen now at the wheel of the #888 Supercheap Auto Racing Mercedes AMG GT3. Farfus, the Brazilian BMW veteran, sharing the #46 Team WRT BMW M4 GT3 with two other notables, including Belgian BMW veteran and sports car race winner Maxime Martin, and "The Doctor", Valentino Rossi, the nine-time FIM World Grand Prix and MotoGP motorcycle racing champion.
Farfus makes a pass on SVG and now, Maro Engel also wants a piece of this in the #999 GruppeM Racing Mercedes AMG GT3, the yellow and green Mann Filter sponsored entry. Engel, the German, who has done a lot of racing here in Australia, sharing that car with Canadian Mikael Grenier and with Swiss domiciled Italian Raffaele Marciello who has won everything there is to win in GT3 racing in the last year or so. Marciello I should say, I believe he is Italian but races under a Swiss license. Oh criminy! Engel is on the wrong side of the road and has to feel the wrath of the rapid South African Sheldon van der Linde now at the wheel of the #32 WRT BMW M4 GT3.
van der Linde sharing with Belgian Chartles Weerts (his dad Yves, is one of the co-owners of WRT, with Thierry Tassin, experienced racer turned team boss, Rene Verbist, and another well-known former GT racer, Vincent Vosse), and with Belgian Dries Vanthoor. Is van der Linde going to close the door on Engel? They touch and rub fenders up Mountain Straight and into Griffins Bend and The Cutting another time! Wow! I think van der Linde held on. We can see oil all over the back of the BMW M4 GT3. Now, maybe that is just a characteristic of this car where it spits oil out the overflow, but it is covered on the tail with oil. It couldn't have been absolutely puking oil out of the motor because we haven't seen plumes of the telltale very expensive smoke at all.
Five hours into the race, beginning the sixth hour and the BMW is in the pit lane absolutely clobbering the pit board and sending it flying towards a mechanic who is liable to get creamed by it! We have wholesale pit stops and the lane is jammed. Both of the WRT BMW M4 GT3's are in and so is the Manthey Racing Porsche 911 GT3R, a team that has been extremely successful especially at the Nurburgring through the years. This is the #912 Manthey EMA Porsche 911 GT3R, Manthey Racing pairing up with EMA from Australia for the trio of Aussie Matt Campbell, Frenchman Matthieu Jaminet, and German driver Thomas Preining.
We saw Campbell and Jaminet last weekend at the 24 Hours of Daytona running the new Porsche 963 GTP LMDh prototypes in the IMSA WeatherTech Sports Car Championship for Roger Penske of course. Matthieu Jaminet takes over the "Grello" Porsche. So, "Jam Jam" will be in the car for the next stint. At WRT and the #46 team, Augusto Farfus finishes his stint, and "The Doctor" is in the house. Valentino Rossi will get behind the wheel for this stint. The sister #32 WRT BMW M4 GT3 is also in the lane. Sheldon van der Linde, the South African, finishes his stint and Belgium's Dries Vanthoor is taking over the car.
All three drivers have had time at the wheel and time to rest up for remaining stints. We move ahead in our highlighted coverage to near the end of the sixth hour. We have gone well past the halfway mark here at Bathurst. SunEnergy1 the defending champions of this race, are now in the lead in the #75 Mercedes AMG GT3 with Jules Gounon driving, and there is a car in the wall, again! Deary me. Oh no! It is the Scott Taylor Motorsports Mercedes AMG GT3 in the fence, the #222 that was doing so well and raising money for prostate cancer awareness as a charity here in Australia! Game over for Aussie Supercars legend Craig Lowndes, team boss Scott Taylor, Alex Davison and Geoff Emory.
Mercedes #222, over and out. Dust swirled into the air between Skyline and The Dipper and you knew there was trouble. Race Director James Taylor makes the call on the radio. "Safety car boards and flags." Scott Taylor, the rear end of the Mercedes up in the air, on the two front wheels absolutely plows into the concrete barrier through the Sparesbox Dipper. Once again it is "hello, Sparesbox. We need spare parts, and we need them, now. Thank you! Your check is in the mail." But Sparesbox will be of no use to the Scott Taylor Motorsports team. The Mercedes AMG GT3 is done for the day.
Team boss Scott Taylor was actually driving that car when it wrecked and Jules Gounon in the race leading #75 SunEnergy1 Mercedes AMG GT3, he was the first chap to see that accident unfold right in front of his face! Harrowing stuff here on The Mountain. Maro Engel and Shane van Gisbergen are running dangerously close together as there is a rule in Australian motorsports that dictates you cannot leave a gap of more than five car lengths to the car in front of you. Green flag with four hours and 45 minutes to go. So, we have reached seven hours and 15 minutes into this motor race with Jules Gounon as your leader.
The battle is on now with everyone else having been waved by, between the V8 Mercedes', the flat six Porsche, and the turbo inline six BMW's. Seven contenders all scrapping for the overall lead! This is great racing! We have Jules Gounon, Thomas Preining, Maro Engel, Philip Ellis, Shane van Gisbergen, Sheldon van der Linde, and Maxime Martin all in this queue. van Gisbergen in Mercedes #888 wants by Ellis in Mercedes #777! Martin goes offline and van der Linde says, "thanks, mate!" and needs no second invitation from the sister car to squeeze right by. The door was open and Sheldon van der Linde said, "thanks a bunch" and walked right on through.
There must be something wrong with the #888 Mercedes. Poor old Shane van Gisbergen, who is the winningest driver in Australian Supercars in the modern era, he has to be losing steam. Sometimes van Gisbergen struggles on cold tires on the restarts after a safety car scramble but that can't be the trouble today. What is going on with the #888 Mercedes? We shall have to find an answer to that question. It sounds like van Gisbergen has a heap of clag on his Pirelli P Zero tires.
We have now gone past the eight-hour mark, and we wish all the best to Lucas Auer, or "Lukey" as he is known to his friends in the sports car racing paddock after his massive accident in Free Practice before the Rolex 24 last weekend. Now, watch this. We have a good battle on our hands, look, between a couple of Audi R8 LMS Evo's. Christopher Mies makes a clean pass on Fraser Ross. That is the #777 The Bend Motorsports Park Audi R8, and Mies sharing with Ricardo Feller and Yasser Shahin, making the move on the #65 Melbourne Performance Center entry Ross is sharing of course with Liam Talbot and Chaz Mostert.
A standard internecine battle between the Audi drivers there. We have witnessed a lot of those scraps in GT3 competition across the globe for many years. Nearly nine hours into the race now, as we move ahead. The eight hour and 45-minute mark. Race Director James Taylor clicks the radio. "Race Control to all teams. Pit lane penalty to car triple eight for a breach of pit stop procedure." Now, what are the specifics of this breach of pit stop procedure? Mandatory equipment usage is what is being looked at. There is mandatory equipment that can be taken over the red line in pit lane and equipment that cannot.
There are two lines in pit lane. A red line and a yellow line. The red line is where the pit crew is supposed to stand between the garages and the pit boxes. Triple Eight, they have done the driver change, and the drink bottle. The rattle guns are in use for changing tires. The air spike for the air jacks is still plugged into the car. Two mechanics are doing work at the back of the car that could very well be unauthorized. They are taking blanking off the front radiator grill that was explained for usage by Triple Eight team manager, Mark Dutton. However, as we switch to a rearward angle, maybe we can see this whole conundrum with "unauthorized equipment" in the lane.
Ah. There is a hand tool being used which is not permitted. Only the air tools like the air jack connector and the rattle guns may be used. You can clearly see it. A mechanic has a wrench in his hand and looks to be going for some kind of adjustment on the rear wing, the rear decklid of the Mercedes AMG GT3. It is a breach of the regulations as hand tools can only be used in the garage while fixing an internal issue on the car and cannot be used to make adjustments in the pit lane itself. Wow! It is not an excuse, but it is hard for an Australian Supercars team to come into GT3 racing and a different governing body like SRO, and get used to an entirely different set of rules.
Aussie Supercars I believe is governed by the FIA and by CAMS which is the Commission for Australian Motorsport. Somebody please correct me if I am wrong as I have followed the Supercars championship through the years as well as the sports cars. Rules are rules and you have to abide by them. But, that said, Triple Eight have two different pit crews and two different teams. They have an Aussie Supercars team and a GT3 team. We fast forward now to nine hours and 20 minutes into the race. It could be game over for the #55 Fuchs Lubricants Racing Audi R8 and team boss/driver Brad Schumacher.
Schumacher, sharing with James Golding from Australian Supercars and Audi GT3 regular, Belgian Fredric Vervisch, says that he feels the car has dropped a cylinder and is now running on nine of the engine's ten cylinders. Two mechanics are figuring out the problem according to pit reporter Shea Adam. The pit lane microphone picks up the car idling in the garage, and it sounds wonky. It has a raspy sputter, a ticking sound to it. Sounds like a misfire in one of the cylinders even at low RPM and so this could very well mean game over for the Golding/Vervisch/Schumacher car. The mechanic signals to turn off the engine. Game over.
Such a shame for Fuchs Lubricants Racing who were in a great position in the Pro-Am category. Just a hair over two and a half hours left in the Bathurst 12 Hours. Nearly ten and a half hours into the race as we have a pit lane visitor, and it is the #46 Team WRT BMW M4 GT3 with the combination of Valentino Rossi's blue and white color scheme and the white BMW M scheme with the signature red, purple, and blue racing stripes. This is an earlier stop than we expected from this team who are refueling and doing a driver change, swapping over from Augusto Farfus to Maxime Martin.
The dollies are out to roll the car back into the garage and the marshals have deemed that the rear taillights on BMW #46 are not working and they need to be there. You can see that this car is absolutely caked and crusted with oil, and we talked earlier about this relatively new car, having oiling problems, perhaps from the turbo. It is normal. But at the same time, it has made a mess, a total pig's breakfast of the tail of the car with oil smudged all over the shop. The team puts the car up on the air jacks, roll the dollies under it, and will clean the tail and reconnect a few loose electrical plug in sockets and maybe the taillights will be back in order again.
You cannot run an endurance race without headlights or taillights. It is impossible. I don't care if you are running in the daylight or hours of darkness like we saw earlier this morning. Lights are imperative for endurance sports car racing. End of discussion. It is such a darn shame though because the #46 WRT BMW was a contender for a podium finish here at Mount Panorama. Not anymore. OK. A critical pit stop, with just over two hours of this motor race left. Car #75, the leading SunEnergy1 Mercedes AMG GT3 going for two in a row here on The Mountain, is in the lane. Luca Stolz brings it in, hitting the marks, clanging the pit board out of the way.
Jules Gounon should take the car to the flag. Now then, an hour and 44 minutes to go as the current leader, the #999 GruppeM Racing Mercedes AMG GT3 is ready to pit. Raffaele Marciello now leads the #911 Manthey/EMA Porsche of Matt Campbell by 32 seconds. We have a meeting of the minds at the back of the garage here at GruppeM and there is discussion with Paul Martin, Supercars chief steward. Martin has a copy of the rulebook handy, and so there may be a penalty coming the way of GruppeM, very possibly.
Raffaele Marciello in the lead of the motor race, but we are hearing there is trouble in paradise at GruppeM. Nothing is mechanically wrong with that Mercedes AMG GT3. The 6.2-liter V8 is running perfectly fine and performing beautifully. The trouble is that the data logging system each and every car in the race must carry to transmit data on a live basis to Race Control and to the marshals, is not working. Is there an issue with the memory card collecting the data that the marshals want to look at? Or is there an actual problem with a live link, a wire or modem or something (just like your computer at home being connected to the internet so you can read this blog), that is having an issue?
#999 to the pit lane. This is the make-or-break moment of the motor race. It is incredible the way motor races can turn on their head. An unconnected or faulty electronic device could determine who the winner of this motor race will be. Porsche #912 is in the pit lane as well, look. The "Grello", green and yellow Manthey Racing/EMA Porsche 911 GT3R is in the pit lane! Well, well, well. The plot doth thicken as we come to the climax here at Mount Panorama as it always does. It does not matter if it is the 12 Hours we are running today or the Bathurst 1,000 for the Australian Supercars. There is always a spanner thrown in the works towards the end of a Bathurst race.
Matt Campbell appears to be getting out of the car and there will be a driver change. Will it be Mathieu Jaminet getting into the car? I believe Thomas Preining has now used all his driving time or the time he would be available to run stints in the car. Oh cripes. Campbell and company have run out of gas. They need a splash and a dash and their maximum fuel stint length they can run around The Mountain is 35 laps. Well, well, well. It is all happening. Jules Gounon is off the leash. He can motor. He can run as far as he needs to run. This might fall directly, a win in the Bathurst 12 Hours, into SunEnergy1's lap for the second time in only nine months.
Remember, the last time we ran this race was last May in 2022, approaching the Australian winter because of the worldwide pandemic shuffling the date. But now, this race is back to it's traditional February date of course as the pandemic is subsiding and easing with most of the world back to the way of life we knew before. GruppeM Mercedes in the lane, changing the dud modem. The marshals and Race Control must have come to consensus to give them special dispensation to do that. Holy cow. New boots being bolted onto the GruppeM Mercedes. We are going to keep an eye out for where Gounon is on the road and the question is what is the strategy for the #912 Porsche?
GruppeM are changing tires while fixing that modem for the data logger before they give the car a hefty glug of fuel and poke the probe into the tank. Holy guacamole! The Manthey EMA team is going to bolt new boots onto Campbell's Porsche! Jeepers creepers! All the Christmases have come at once. This is manna from Heaven for the SunEnergy1 boys! Jackpot! Campbell is down and away. GruppeM, their problems are solved. Door shut. The car is down off the air jacks. Holy smokes! GruppeM's lead has evaporated.
They are still in front, but just by a whisker! Just a wee bit over an hour to go before we decide this motor race and who the champions will be at Mount Panorama for the Bathurst 12 Hours in 2023. Campbell racing through The Elbow. SunEnergy1 in the lane. Do they put new tires onto this Mercedes with just over an hour left on the board before the checkered flag? This will be a sprint to the finish, folks. Read on to find out more. This novel has at least one more chapter and it is getting spicy! Will SunEnergy1 do fuel and tires? Will they do fuel only? Do you go for track position? Will they do the play fake on the tires?
If SunEnergy1 gambles and puts tires on, Maro Engel will be squeaky clean leading this motor race, whistling off into the distance, cackling like a madman. Gounon was right on Campbell's six when the Porsche came to the lane. The Mercedes is still thirsty. It's drinking, it's drinking, it's drinking. Now what? Screech! Rumbling out of the lane. He's down and gone. No tires! I told you so! I told you that was a play fake. That was a brilliant call. Whoever runs the strategy for SunEnergy1, mate, you are a legend! They are your race leaders! SunEnergy1, the defending Bathurst 12 Hours champions are at the top of the shop.
47 minutes to go and it is the battle of the Mercedes AMG GT3's. Engel is right on top of Gounon. Engel to the inside of Gounon through The Chase! There's a coming together between the two Mercedes' and Gounon spins off the road! Gounon is rotating through the gravel! #999 goes through to the lead of this motor race! That was on the cards, definitely. You know Gounon is going to be driving angry. A fired-up race car driver is a fast race car driver. He will be channeling his aggression and anger into uncorking fast lap after fast lap. Keep in mind, these two were teammates for Mercedes Benz who went on to win the Rolex 24 in GT Daytona Pro which is IMSA's professional level GT3 class.
These two blokes shared a car and shared a victory at Daytona last weekend and this weekend they crash into each other at Bathurst, on the other side of the world! Unbelievable! Engel jumped in behind Gounon to make it appear he wasn't going to lunge down the inside, but then, being cheeky, he poked his nose out and absolutely went full send! We look at it all again in slow motion, and Engel was way off from where he should have been, completely on the curb into The Chase and he just tagged Gounon into a rotation. Gounon had no chance of saving that baby from spinning like a top.
It was a long way into the corner before the inevitable. Thump, screech! Engel does the fake and then sends it diagonally to the apex of the turn throwing Gounon off into the weeds. We've seen very little of this argy bargy and crazy driving today at Mount Panorama, at least until all the money is on the line. For that reckless maneuver, the stewards have it, and Engel cops a drive through penalty for a driving standards infringement. This is another one of those "I hate to say I told you so, but I told you so" kind of scenarios. Uh um. Now, as we were. Or, maybe, as we haven't been yet.
The shoe is on the other foot now. Engel knows he is going to have a time penalty in his future. If you are Engel, you put your head down and you punch it! A drive through penalty will be something completely different. Oh dear. Another Mercedes, and a spin! Daniel Juncadella spins off in the #77 Craft Bamboo MSI Mercedes AMG GT3. Juncadella had that car in sixth place sharing with Phillip Ellis and Nicky Catsburg. The marshals and Race Control will do everything possible and give this car every opportunity to rotate back in the right direction under it's own steam.
GruppeM in third place, Engel might be screaming on the radio saying, "put out the bloody safety car right now so we can get back in this thing!" Race Director James Taylor tells the marshals to stand aside as the car is moving. Spot on. Great move. Excellent marshaling there. That is how you do it. Don't throw a Full Course Yellow if it isn't necessary. Sheldon van der Linde and the #32 WRT BMW M4 GT3 team, they could very well do a free kick and head for the lane for fresh tires. This is a Formula 1 tactic, and they might very well be able to use it.
Fresh tires before the end of the motor race could put these chaps in the pound seats. Well, we'll see I suppose. Matt Campbell, in second place, he could still make a move. In this race in 2019, he went for the win, diving to the inside of Jake Dennis in the Aston Martin V12 Vantage GT3 through The Elbow. At that time, there was just about a piece of paper between those two cars and we could see a similar deal play out before the end of this motor race if Campbell tries to send it and whistle past Gounon before the end.
That 2019 passing maneuver. I think I watched the Bathurst 12 Hours in 2019 and I saw that happen. I remember. Memories get fuzzy as the seasons of racing pass by. But I think I still remember Campbell putting the move on Jake Dennis in the Aston Martin through The Elbow. It seems familiar. OK. This is it. Just over a minute to go and into The Chase one more time, there is a car off the road, hurtling through the grass on the opposite side, and he might just miss the barriers, hopefully!
That is Jordan Love in the Makita tools sponsored #24 Mercedes AMG GT3 from Tony Bates Racing that we saw in the wars earlier. Jordan Love sharing with the team and car owner Tony Bates, and with David Reynolds as well. Gounon is fine as wine getting through there, past Love. Campbell on the other hand will have to do the squeeze play. The gaps are shrinking as we are into the final minute or so of the motor race before we have the one lap dash to the end. 6.213 kilometers multiplied by 322 laps equals 2,000 and a half kilometers!
We should break the 2,000-kilometer barrier for the Bathurst 12 Hours! Unreal! In mileage estimates, Mount Panorama is just shy of four miles. A 3.883-mile circuit, multiplied by 322 laps in total, equals 1,250 miles. Yes. 2,000 kilometers is exactly 1,250 miles. Me fuzzy math was indeed right! 2,000 clicks in half a day! Here is a list of drivers who have won three straight endurance races in a row at Mount Panorama including both the Bathurst 1,000 and the Bathurst 12 Hours. Peter Brock, Larry Perkins, Jim Richards, Craig Lowndes, and Jamie Whincup.
We will see 323 laps. 1,254 miles. I stand corrected on the mileage. Campbell and Engel are still closing on Gounon through The Elbow and across the top of Brock Skyline for the final time of asking. This will be a record-breaking distance with the least intervention of safety cars we have ever seen here at Mount Panorama. I'll bet you dollars to donuts that Maro Engel sends it through The Chase on the final lap. Through The Chase, and now, Engel is not going to be able to do a doggone thing to catch Matty Campbell nor Jules Gounon for that matter.
Forget the bet. I'll buy the donuts, but the bet is off. Donuts and espresso on me tomorrow morning, mate. The sand in the hourglass has run out for Engel. The fastest race in Bathurst history. Luca Stolz goes back-to-back, but for Jules Gounon, it is the hat trick at Mount Panorama! Bentley in 2020, SunEnergy1 Racing and Mercedes Benz in 2022 and 2023! The top three covered by a blanket! 1.4 seconds after 323 laps, 2,000+ kilometers of GT3 racing!
Overall/Pro: #75 Habul/Gounon/Stolz SunEnergy1 Racing Mercedes AMG GT3
Pro-Am Cup: #65 Mostert/Ross/Talbot Sportsbet Team MPC Audi R8 LMS Evo 2
Silver: #10 Gaunt/Fawcet/O'Keeffe Myland Audi R8 LMS Evo 2
Invitational: #111 Currie/Donaldson/Taunton 111 Racing/MRA Motorsport
MARC I Mazda V8
Myland led for a long-time finishing 12th. The older MARC I V8 Mazda3 sedan still has fight left in it as Darren Currie, Grant Donaldson, and Geoff Taunton take the MARC I Mazda V8 to victory in the Invitiational division. Good for a car that has been in circulation now for six or seven years and nowhere near the pace of a GT3 car which it really is not intended to have. Kudos to that trio for their class win.
17 of the 24 starters finish the motor race. Kenny Habul will be having a victory party at his pad on Conrod Straight! What a race! We'll see you for more action at Mount Panorama, next year! But don't despair. The Intercontinental GT Challenge is just getting started. Round two of the championship for 2023 SRO Intercontinental GT Challenge is in less than three weeks with the Kyalami 9 Hours at the Kyalami circuit in Johannesburg, South Africa. We'll see you all there for more GT3 endurance motor racing. For now, hooroo from Bathurst, New South Wales, Australia. So long, everybody. Take care.
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