Bentley Team M-Sport have finally tasted success at Mount Panorama with the #7 of Jules Gounon, Maxime Soulet and Jordan Pepper winning the Liqui-Moly Bathurst 12 Hour.
Second home was the Parente/Barnicoat/Blomqvist McLaren with Kiwi Shane van Gisbergen third in the #888 Triple Eight Race Engineering Mercedes-AMG GT3 along with Maximilian Gotz and Jamie Whincup
Van Gisbergen held off Porsche’s Matt Campbell for third while Engel, Marciello, Preining, Kodric, Laurens Vanthoor and Ben Barker rounded out the top ten finishers overall. Kodric/Fraser Ross/Dominic Storey and Barker/Steven Grove/Brenton Grove won their respective classes within the GT competition while GT4 was won by Daren E. Jorgensen/Brett Strom/Danny van Dongen.
“It’s awesome to have the support of AMG this weekend, I think it stepped up our team,” commented van Gisbergen. “At Triple Eight, we’re still learning about this car and GT racing, and Jamie and myself are adapting to this car, especially at this track where we’re used to the V8s. It was a cool finish, I had a good race with Matty (Campbell). He was trying to put me off, flashing his lights and stuff, so I put my hazard lights on to put him off, but it was a bit of fun and a nice surprise to get a podium when we crossed the line fourth.”
The many safety car phases turned the long-distance classic on the Mount Panorama Circuit into a turbulent race, with the interruptions causing the field to bunch up several times. Last year’s winner Campbell took up the race on home turf from pole position. Over long stretches, the Porsche 911 GT3 R ran amongst the leading pack. However, tyre damage in lap 117 relegated the No. 911 entry down a lap. Thanks to a clever pit stop strategy, the team was able to make up lost ground during a safety car phase. In the end, the gap to the podium was just 1.529 seconds after 314 laps.
Race result
1. Gounon/Soulet/Pepper (F/B/ZA), Bentley Continental GT3, 314 laps
2. Parente/Barnicoat/Blomqvist (P/GB/GB), McLaren 720S GT3, 314 laps
3. Van Gisbergen/Whincup/Götz (NZ/AUS/D), Mercedes AMG GT3, 314 laps
4. Jaminet/Pilet/Campbell (F/F/AUS), Porsche 911 GT3 R, 314 laps
7. Werner/Preining/Cairoli (D/A/I), Porsche 911 GT3 R, 314 laps
9. Bamber/Vanthoor/Lowndes (NZ/B/AUS), Porsche 911 GT3 R, 312 laps
10. S. Grove/B. Grove/Barker (AUS/AUS/GB), Porsche 911 GT3 R, 312 laps
11. Calvert-Jones/Dumas/Evans (USA/F/NZ), Porsche 911 GT3 R, 311 laps
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