Australia’s greatest endurance race is underway, and over the next rotation of the sun I’ll be updating you on the hectic happenings of the 2025 Bathurst 12 Hours.

Good news for Aston Martin fans, the no.14 car has been brought back from the garage and re-enters the race albeit a fair few laps down on the Silver class leader, just as Adam Christodolou’s Team Nineteen Mercedes GT4 goes back into its garage.

The no.36 Ferrari then pitted for a late brake change, the team hoping this could see the Arise car over the line with Alessio Rovera getting away shortly after, albeit losing a lap to the 91 car. 

Sergio Pires then brought the Tigani Motorsport no.44 Audi back into the pits with a clutch issue. It was already over 25 laps down after an impressive rebuild from earlier, and now lost a couple more laps as the issue was thankfully fixed quickly.

What theoretically is the penultimate round of pitstops commenced, with the Absolute Racing no.911 changing out Ayhancan Guven for Matt Campbell, who knows how to maximise the last hour of the race. All except the no.32 car would need one more stop, and WRT’s race leading BMW had a clean stop as Sheldon Van De Linde handed over the car to his brother Kelvin for the final hour.

The final stops commenced for the no.75 Mercedes, with Jules Gounon given the honours of completing the final stint, and Rafaelle Marciello given the same duty for the no.46’s final stint. 

It was the WRT BMW of Sheldon Van De Linde who lead from Arise Racing’s no.26 Ferrari with Chaz Mostert tasked with chasing the South African down. Lucas Auer was third with the Craft Bamboo Racing no.77, ahead of 75 Express Racing’s Jules Gounon. Then it was the second WRT car, no.46 ahead of the last Pro car in contention, Absolute Racing’s no.911 of Matt Campbell. Silver was still being led by Brendon Leitch for Wall Racing, Bronze was also still in the hands of Heart of Racing. Pro/Am was Arise Racing’s to lose with Alessio Rovera and GT4 was virtually guaranteed for the no.24 Mclaren Artura of Method Motorsport.

With Lucas Auer and Chaz Mostert needing to pit again, Jules Gounon and Rafaelle Marciello duelled it out for the final podium position, as Chaz Mostert fought hard with Kelvin Van De Linde for the lead, but eventually took the lead briefly before his final pit stop. 

The battle for second was resolved, Raffaele Marciello with a daring yet exhilarating move to get past Jules Gounon in the no.75 Mercedes, and into provisional second place. With just five minutes remaining the Craft Bamboo Mercedes of Lucas Auer pitted for its final stop confirming the 1-2 for WRT.

And that’s how it would stay. For the first time since 2018’s miracle victory, WRT have won the Bathurst 12 Hours. Brothers Kelvin and Sheldon Van De Linde become the second brothers to win the race alongside Augusto Farfus who put in some crucial stints during the middle of the race. It’s a 1-2 for the Belgian outfit, with the no.46 of Raffaelle Marciello, Charles Weerts and Valentino Rossi take second ahead of Kenny Habul’s no.75 Express Racing Mercedes. 

Wall Racing took consecutive class victories in Silver, Bronze was won by Heart of Racing and the Pro/Am victory went to Arise Racing’s no.36 Ferrari of Alessio Rovera. GT4 was a foregone conclusion by the end, the no.25 Mclaren Artura taking victory by a number of laps of Team Nineteen. And finally, the KTM Xbow GT2 finished the race in fifteenth overall.

A brilliant race that was masterminded by WRT from the start, and there’s no doubt in my mind they’re the greatest GT racing team in the world right now. Wins in the 24 Hours of Dubai, the 6 Hours of Dubai and now in the Bathurst 12 Hours, a race they’ve come so close too in recent years mean they’re undefeated in 2025. We could be looking at an historic year of domination in GT racing this year. 

As we leave Australia, the message being sent is clear:

To the LMGT3 field of 2025, be afraid. Be very afraid…

thumbnail credit – Ted Barrett, CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0, via Wikimedia Commons