A return to early February, the return of the Pro class...looking forward to the 12 Hour getting back to its prime. Manthey and WRT have confirmed their entries, looking forward to see which other international teams will make the trip next year.
Reports that Valentino Rossi might drive one of the WRT BMWs; that would be huge!
Hopefully the roads to the track are better by then! Otherwise the overseas drivers might get halfway and think "oh hell no" and go back to the airport :P
Really looking forward to this now! Rossi has been confirmed and Red Bull are bringing an RB7 over for demonstration laps!
Entries so far:
# 32 Pro BMW M Team WRT BMW M4 GT3 Dries Vanthoor/Charles Weerts/Sheldon van der Linde
# 46 Pro BMW M Team WRT BMW M4 GT3 Valentino Rossi/Maxime Martin/Augusto Farfus
#101 Pro-Am Harrolds Volante Rosso Motorsport Mercedes-AMG GT3 Ross Poulakis/TBA
#222 Pro-Am Scott Taylor Motorsport Mercedes-AMG GT3 Craig Lowndes/Scott Taylor/Alex Davison/Geoff Emery
#888 Pro Triple Eight Race Engineering Mercedes-AMG GT3 Shane van Gisbergen/Broc Feeney/Maximilian Gotz
#999 Pro GruppeM Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 TBA
Pro Manthey EMA Porsche 911 GT3 R TBA
Danny Ric is meant to be doing the demo laps too.. pretty awesome! ;D
Liam Lawson will be driving the RB7 this weekend...a little disappointing that it'll only be doing one session but cannot wait to see a modern F1 car at the Mountain.
It's not a massive field for the 12 Hour and not much variety in terms of manufacturers, but still hoping for a good race. There's definitely a number of Pro-Am combinations that could take outright victory over the Pro Class; even Mostert's Audi in the Silver class could take the win if they play their driver strategy well.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_Bathurst_12_Hour#Entries
going through the schedule... wondering what exactly we're going to get in the 30 min B12 demonstration on Fri @ 21450? and Sat @ 1325 and 1700? guessing perhaps cars will have cameras on them doing laps for tv for over the weekend? or maybe we'll get lucky and have more than just the 1 f1 session after all?
As of this point I am still managing my way through the Rolex 24 Hours at Daytona (no spoliers, please) but I am REALLY looking forward to the Bathurst 12 Hours. That place half a globe away just draaaaaaawwwwwws my attention.
Quote from: Sonic on January 31, 2023, 07:04:55 PM
going through the schedule... wondering what exactly we're going to get in the 30 min B12 demonstration on Fri @ 21450? and Sat @ 1325 and 1700? guessing perhaps cars will have cameras on them doing laps for tv for over the weekend? or maybe we'll get lucky and have more than just the 1 f1 session after all?
Based on all the articles the F1 is only doing the Saturday 1325 demonstration session. IIRC the end-of-day ones last year were for road cars, so possibly the same this year.
Will have a drink for you on the campsite Mike!
Quote from: Kytabu on February 01, 2023, 03:47:23 PM
Will have a drink for you on the campsite Mike!
WHy thank you, Kye! As I sit here typing, looking out the window at the snow covered ground and barely two digit ferenheit temperatures, your gesture warms my heart. :)
Time to finish watching Daytona before then, though! My VCR is going to get a workout today!
Pretty quiet race so far. Watching on TV, those opening laps are awesome as the sun rises.
Looking like a battle between the two Merc's and Porsche for top honours.
I must say, Rossi has been impressive. He comes with a big name so will always garner more attention, and he's done well!
Awesome finish - especially impressive as it didn't happen because of safety cars. Shame it couldn't go for a few more laps.
Quote from: SetonFan on February 05, 2023, 05:50:34 PM
Awesome finish - especially impressive as it didn't happen because of safety cars. Shame it couldn't go for a few more laps.
Why? Isn't 12hrs long enough for a 12hr race?
Quote from: LG on February 05, 2023, 07:17:31 PM
Quote from: SetonFan on February 05, 2023, 05:50:34 PM
Awesome finish - especially impressive as it didn't happen because of safety cars. Shame it couldn't go for a few more laps.
Why? Isn't 12hrs long enough for a 12hr race?
With Engel closing in on the top 2 at a second a lap it would have been fascinating to see what happened next.
Quote from: SetonFan on February 05, 2023, 09:25:26 PM
Quote from: LG on February 05, 2023, 07:17:31 PM
Quote from: SetonFan on February 05, 2023, 05:50:34 PM
Awesome finish - especially impressive as it didn't happen because of safety cars. Shame it couldn't go for a few more laps.
Why? Isn't 12hrs long enough for a 12hr race?
With Engel closing in on the top 2 at a second a lap it would have been fascinating to see what happened next.
So you mean a woulda, coulda shoulda situation.
Maro drove well but paid the price for a move that was never on.
A intriguing race up front that changed during the day but was really a race between about 4-5 cars at most.
Also, set a new distance record at over 2000km! that is a huge amount of racing in 12 hours and with not a lot of safety cars.
4hrs straight at the end, and to finish as it did was great. Proper endurance.
I must say, the winning Merc wasn't one of the two I had pegged earlier in the day. Well done to them.
The Mostert Audi also did well to claw back for the Pro/AM win. From memory they were 3 laps down on the class leader? And to think that class included the Whincup/Stanaway/Ibrahim entry.