Bas Leinders had a winning start to his McLaren career with the overall win at the Bathurst 12 Hours on his first outing as Sporting Manager.
It marks a second consecutive major endurance race win for the Belgian after the victory of the Marc VDS team last July with Leinders in charge, his last race outing for the now defunct GT racing outfit.
There was little outwardly to suggest any major changes to the 2016 Liqui Moly Bathurst 12 Hours in its first year in the hands of V8 Supercars Events.
A healthy 15% increase in paid attendance year on year was a good headline figure with 37.000+ for the race weekend and with the campsites at the top of the Mountain opened for the first time in the race’s history.
SRO’s Stephane Ratel and Benjamin Franassovici were both at Bathurst as part of a low key start for the Intercontinental GT Challenge. The now three race Series comprises the Aussie enduro, the Spa 24 Hours and Sepang 12 Hours after the planned standalone event at CoTA was cancelled due to a lack of entries. The Challenge features manufacturer nominated teams with either locally entered cars or travelling European teams – McLaren, Audi, Mercedes Benz and Bentley entered for Bathurst.
The adoption of the timeservice.nl online live timing for the race was a huge success with great feedback from paddock, media and fanbase alike. The system, paid for and installed by Bathurst City Council will remain in place year round with plans afoot to allow the public to time themselves in walking or running the great track with a print-out to show progress and sector times!
