Mountain time: Counting down to the 2025 Bathurst 12 Hour

Yahoo

28-01-2025

The Bathurst 12 Hour may not boast the number of manufacturers of Daytona or Le Mans, but what it does have is a classic 3.86 mile/6.213km circuit that many internationals rate as the best on the world. This year's event does not even have a huge grid, but it just may be the last showdown between the three German makes that have dominated the event.
Since the race switched from a production car format to GT3 regulations in 2011, Mercedes-Benz and Audi each have three 12 Hour wins and Porsche has two. Each make is, in their own way, pushing hard for another win – and so is BMW, which ironically won the last production car 12 Hour in 2010.
There is a slightly different look to this year's 23-car entry list, down seven from a year ago. Some of the names of regular 12 Hour drivers are missing, including Christopher Mies, the Vanthoor brothers, and Christopher Haase.
But numbers are not much shorter in the 'outright' class; 19 GT3 entries is close to the average. Where the entries have fallen away is in the Invitational and GT4 classes, which appear to be victims of their own recent expansion in Australia. The fleet of locally-made IRC or MARC cars that have bulked out Class I now have their own series down under and many competitors have opted for more, shorter races, rather than one long (and expensive) one. In GT4, providing they make the finish, all three entries are guaranteed 'podium' results, while KTM has the Invitational Class to its own with its X-Bow.
Another factor in the smaller field may be the Australian GT3 competitors which are skipping the 12 Hour and participating in Middle Eastern events, which fall in the same calendar quarter, instead.
Separate to that there is a view that the 2025 12 Hour is something of a watershed event – perhaps the last one in which Audi, a long-term supporter of the event, will be competitive, as the manufacturer's focus fully shifts to Formula 1. Through the other door, there is already talk that the 2026 12 Hour may feature the likes of Chevrolet's Corvette GT3.R (possibly in a link with Supercars team Triple 8, which has run Mercedes-Benzes in past 12 Hours) and Ford's Mustang GT3.
The entry list may be smaller but the quality looks high. Porsche won a tense 2024 12 Hour and two 911GT3Rs line up in Class A (for GT3 cars).
Double 12 Hour winner and Porsche Penske Motorsport IMSA SportsCar Championship driver Matt Campbell, Ayhcancan Güven and Alessio Picariello line up in the lead Absolute Racing entry, while Bathurst rookies and rising Porsche stars Laurin Heinrich and Morris Schuring join Bronze drivers Sam and Yasser Shahin in the Manthey entry, which won the Pro Am class last year.
Last year Güven was the anchor driver in the race-winning Porsche 911 GT3R, driving 127 laps and running just as fast as his more experienced co-driver Campbell, who did 99 laps but completed the vital final stint. Look for much of the same this year.
The 2025 Bathurst 12 Hours is likely to be the last time an Audi has a shot at overall victory against its German rivals on the Mountain. Audi Media Canter
And the Porsche has what could be considered 'sneaky speed' at Bathurst, a track with a long uphill straight and an even longer one downhill. Campbell, who finished third overall at last weekend's Rolex 24 at Daytona, may have qualified 'only' sixth last year but the winners led 195 laps out of 275 laps a year ago.
For 75 Express, the script looks the same; by entering a Mercedes-Benz AMG GT3 Evo in the Pro class, team owner Kenny Habul gets to sidestep the minimum laps he would be required to complete as a Bronze driver. Getting his laps done early leaves Luca Stolz and Jules Gounon to chase, respectively, a third and fourth Bathurst 12 Hour win.
Mercedes-Benz's other contenders look like GruppeM with the eternally-unlucky-at Bathurst Maro Engel, Mikaël Grenier and Maxime Martine, and Craft-Bamboo's trio of Lucas Auer, Maxy Götz and rising Supercars driver Jayden Ojeda. Scott Taylor Motorsport is running its usual trio of Supercars drivers in Craig Lowndes, Cameron Waters and Thomas Randle; at 50, could Lowndes, a seven-time Bathurst 1000, be looking for a final win at the Mountain?
Audi's hopes of a fourth 12-Hour win were significantly boosted 10 days out from the event. Up to that point the Pro Am entry of Bathurst 1000 winner Lee Holdsworth, Dean Fiore, and Marc Cini looked to be the best hope until Melbourne-based Melbourne Performance Centre/Audi Customer Sport Racing confirmed a second entry, in the Pro class, for Supercars ace Broc Feeney, reigning GT World Challenge Australia champion Liam Talbot and 2024 Nürburgring 24 Hour winner Ricardo Feller.
Team WRT has entered an impressive lineup in its BMW M4 GT3s. Valentino Rossi has swept away any notions that he would be less competitive on four wheels than he was on two with a stellar performance in last year's race, and the Italian legend has already nominated Bathurst as one of his favorite circuits. Raffaele Marciello and Charles Weerts will share the No. 46 entry, while the No. 32 will feature the van der Linde brothers Kelvin and Sheldon share the driving with Augusto Farfus.
If any make can upset the notion of a German win, it could be Ferrari. Arise Racing GT may not have a high profile on the global scene but in a short space of time the Perth-based team has set some high achievements, including winning the 2024 Australian title with Talbot.
Its Pro 296 GT3 entry matches Risi Competizione regular Daniel Serra with Supercars Champion Will Brown and Chaz Mostert, and in the second, Pro Am entry, AF Corse regular Alessio Rovera and Supercars driver Jaxon Evans join Bronze drivers Brad Schumacher and Elliot Schutte.
There is a change in the event's qualifying format this year, with the grid to be determined by two 30-minute sessions on Saturday February 1 that will be split into the slower and faster groups before the top 10 grid positions are determined by the 15-minute Pirelli Pole Battle, set for 4:05pm AEDT (12:05am ET). The race will commence at its traditional time of 5:45am local time on Sunday February 2 (1:45pm ET on Saturday February 1).
Story originally appeared on Racer