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Manthey EMA Dominate Chaotic 2024 Bathurst 12 Hour

The #912 Porsche “Phenomenal” in changing conditions throughout the day

Matt Campbell, Ayhancan Guven, and Laurens Vanthoor have won the 2024 edition of the Repco Bathurst 12 Hour in a dominant performance for the #912 Manthey EMA Porsche.

The car was unstoppable in the wet conditions during the middle part of the race, with Campbell and Guven overcoming a drive-through penalty through outright pace in the wet. More importantly, the car was always in the right place at the right time, with the Manthey EMA team doing great work in the pit stops to jump other cars with strategy, or quick tyre changes.

“That feels awesome!” said Campbell after the race. “Hats off to everyone at Manthey EMA Racing. We were always running up the front.

“To Larry and Ayhancan, they did a fantastic job… The second win [for Campbell and Porsche], it’s unreal.”

Campbell had a comfortable 13 second gap coming out of the final pit stops as the track finally dried out enough for slicks, but a late safety car to recover the #701 Vortex 1.0 at Griffin’s Bend bunched the top 8 back together. With 30 minutes remaining, and all the lapped traffic out of the way, it was a straight shootout as the race went back to green.

From the restart though, Campbell shot away, gapping Jules Gounon in the #75 SunEnergy1 Mercedes by 2 seconds at the end of the first lap. The gap stabilised, with Gounon holding the gap while simultaneously keeping the #13 Phantom Team75 Bernhard Porsche of Jaxon Evans at bay. The gap ebbed and flowed in traffic, with the lower classes ultimately playing a major part in the outcome of the race.

With about 16 minutes left, Campbell managed to squeeze ahead of the #230 Method Motorsport McLaren Artura GT4 – Tom McLennan behind the wheel – heading over Skyline. Gounon, with the train following him, couldn’t do the same, with the GT4 holding up the group all the way down to the Elbow. This gave Campbell a 6 second buffer, and lit a spark in the chasing group as they squabbled for the podium.

In that group behind Gounon were Evans, the #22 Wash-It Audi of Christopher Haase, the #46 WRT BMW at the hands of Maxime Martin, Cameron Waters in the #222 Scott Taylor Motorsport Mercedes, and Mikael Grenier in the #888 National Storage Tripe Eight Mercedes.

As the drying line widened, the chasers were emboldened, with Evans throwing a daring dive at The Chase to attempt to steal second away. Gounon held firm, shutting the door on the Porsche on the exit, which encouraged Martin and Haase to buy in. Martin tried to send the #46 BMW around the outside of the whole pack at the final corner, but ran too deep and dropped back, while Haase undercut Evans in the Porsche, muscling the #22 Audi up the inside into Hell Corner, and into third place.

Despite the best efforts of the chasing pack, no one could reel in Campbell, who ran out the winner by a comfortable 2.6 seconds.

After a chaotic middle section of the race, interrupted by numerous safety cars and the onset of weather, the race finally started to calm as the field returned to green with 3 hours, 40 minutes remaining. The rain had finally started to ease, with the leading #912 Manthey EMA Porsche of Campbell shooting away at the restart, jumping out to a three-second advantage over the #77 Craft Bamboo Mercedes of Maxi Goetz. Goetz struggled in the still very wet conditions, preventing Gounon, Mikael Grenier, and Jaxon Evans from mounting a challenge to Campbell. By the time Gounon had passed Stolz – around the outside of Mountain Straight – Campbell was out to a 12-second lead.

The battle behind, from second down to 9th place, were separated by only 6 seconds, while Campbell lapped almost 2 seconds faster than the field. Campbell handed over to Guven just before the 3 hour mark, before an odd incident brought out the first Full Course Yellow of the race.

The #111 MRA Motorsport MARC II was shown facing backwards just beyond the dipper, with Axle Donaldson at the wheel. Replays showed that Donaldson had gotten help getting into that position, with contact from the #47 Supabarn Mercedes sending him around. Under FCY, Axle reversed the #111 all the way down towards the Elbow, executing a quick j-turn, and was back facing the right direction. The time from the call of the FCY to the race going back to green, less than a minute.

The call back to Green flag running caused chaos, with Felipe Fraga in the #130 Gruppe M Mercedes and Mikael Grenier in the #888 National Storage Mercedes making contact on the exit of the Chase. Grenier was lucky not to barrel back across the race track, with Kelvin van der Linde in the #22 Wash-It Audi, Jaxon Evans in the #13 Phantom Team75 Bernhard Porsche, and the #46 WRT BMW of Maxime Martin having to take evasive action!

The #130 Gruppe M Mercedes was pinged a drive-through penalty for the contact, which ended up putting them on the very tail of the lead lap, and out of the fight for the win.

The next round of pit stops were underway, with first Gounon bringing the #75 SunEnergy1 Mercedes in, then the Craft Bamboo #77 Mercedes and #22 Wash-It Audi making their stop. This left the #222 Scott Taylor Motorsport Mercedes as the leader of the race, slightly off sequence, before another use of the Full Course Yellow changed the front of the race.

This time, debris from the #44 Valmont Tigani Racing Audi caused the FCY after a piece of the bootlid came off the car up Mountain Straight. While the debris was cleared, the #222 dove into the pits, and popped out 9 seconds ahead of Guven in the #912 Porsche, putting the #222 Mercedes in the effective lead of the race.

The rain returned and heavier this time, and the conditions proved more difficult for those on older tyres. The #222 Mercedes had triple stinted their wets at this point, noting that the warmer wets lost less time at the beginning of the stint, but as the rain pounded down, the fresh wets on Guven’s #912 brought the Porsche closer and closer, before Guven made the move into The Chase with just over 2 hours left.

Further back, it was Bastian Buus in the #13 Phantom Team75 Bernhard Porsche who was making moves in the wet. Firstly, sending a move on the inside of Luca Stolz in the #75 SunEnergy1 Mercedes at the Kink of The Chase, before raging on to the back of the third-placed #22 Audi of Kelvin van der Linde. The pair of them caught up to Randle in the #222, while the #77 Craft Bamboo Mercedes pitted to play their hand to the end of the race.

Both van der Linde and Buus passed the struggling Randle, before van der Linde brought the #22 Audi into the lane. The rain started to clear again with two hours left, as teams made their penultimate stops ahead of the last stanza of the race.

Guven was the first to do so, popping back out on track exactly one minimum-pit-stop-time behind the #13 Porsche of Bastian Buus, now leading the race. Buus pit with 90 minutes remaining, with the two Porsches almost neck-and-neck as the #13 exited the pit lane. Knowing the importance of track position, Guven dived around the outside of the Cutting to take the position of the effective lead of the race.

Everyone tried to delay their last pit stop to as late as possible, wanting the track to dry out all the way for slick tyres. Guven pulled out to a 7 second lead over Buus in the #13, with Stolz in the #75 a further 14 seconds back, and the #22 Audi and #46 WRT BMW, Marciello at the wheel, battling for fourth.

WRT was the first to jump, pitting just before the hour remaining mark, for slick tyres. On his first flying lap, Maxime Martin was three seconds faster in the first sector alone than those still on wets, forcing the rest of the field into the lane.

Manthey returned the #912 Porsche out in the lead, with Sun Energy1 Mercedes jumping the #13 Phantom Team75 Bernhard Porsche in the stops. The stage was set for a tight conclusion, before the final safety car of the race compressed the pack back together.

Ultimately, Campbell was too good on the restart, breaking away and never being headed in the #912 Manthey EMA Porsche.

Earlier, the race started steadily with a smooth run in the first hour, from darkness to dawn. The early running of the race saw long trains of GT3 cars, with the top 11 cars still within 10 seconds after the sun broke across the circuit. It was the polesitters in the #32 WRT BMW that lead the early running, until the Manthey EMA team put the #912 into the lead after the first round of stops, by running a lap longer than their competitors. Vanthoor setting a purple sector 1 and 2 on his in lap to close the gap, while the BMW’s battled with the #130 Gruppe M and #75 SunEnergy1 Mercedes battled away.

That battle continued through the stint, as the group dive-bombed traffic and needled at each other, trying to force a pass. Rossi was especially impressive, shaping up to pass Gounon on multiple occasions until a minor mistake at Murray’s Corner allowed Weerts through at Hell Corner.

Liam Talbot, Brad Schumacher, and Kenny Habul all completed their stints in their respective cars during this period of the race, clearing their required drive time and allowing the Pro drivers in the cars free reign to run the rest of the race.

The first Safety Car interruption of the race came just before the 3 hour mark, with a big spray of dust settling to reveal the #701 Vortex 1.0 in the gravel trap at McPhillamy Park.

Julien Boillot was at the wheel, with replays showing him losing the rear over the hump at McPhillamy, and spinning rear-first into the gravel, coming to a safe stop. Boillot was lucky not to hit a wall, and was extracted from the gravel and back into the race.

That safety car set off a chain reaction, with frequent safety cars for incidents in the second quarter of the race.

The first confirmed retirement of the race was the #91 Wheels/FX MARC II, who was leading the Invitational class at the time. Hadrian Morrall lit up the rears on the exit of Griffins Bend, firing the car across the circuit and into the wall on driver’s right, just in front of the leaders, bringing out another Safety Car.

Shortly after the race was back to green running, the two leading Pro-Am cars made contact at McPhillamy Park, with the #911 of Yasser Shahin ending up parked in the McPhillamy Park Gravel trap.

Shahin was extracted from the gravel but did deposit much of it on the circuit on his way back to the pits, which caught out Julien Boillot in the Vortex, who had an innocuous spin at The Dipper.

It felt like it was almost a matter of time before something happened, with a number of close calls as the tightly-packed Pro field squeezed past the slower traffic over the mountain.

Eventually the frenetic battling of the Pro cars boiled over, with traffic the cause. The first major casualty of the race was the #32 WRT BMW, exited the race in spectacular fashion. While attempting to pass the #56 Nineteen Corp Ginetta G55, Weerts squeezed the Ginetta too close to the inside wall at the Cutting, clipping the front of the GT4 car, sending the BMW climbing the outside wall.

Charles was confirmed to be shaken, but okay, after a big crash that took out the pole-sitting car with still more than half the race to run.

Just after half race, the 6th Safety Car was called to recover the #10 Matt Stone Racing MARC IRC GT, which was seen in the barriers in the Esses. John Hollinger was into the wall hard, with replays showing that he got help from the #2 KFC Audi of Ricardo Feller.

Feller got pinged for a 2-minute Stop and Hold penalty after being adjudged to be responsible for the contact.

While the Safety Car was out, the rain began to fall in earnest, bringing everyone into the lane to switch to Wets. A mistake by the Manthey EMA team saw the #912 break the minimum pit stop time for a driver change, with them being handed down a pit lane drive-through penalty for the infraction.

As Campbell shaped to take the penalty, another Safety Car was called to recover the #702 TekWorkx MARC IRC GT which came to a stop at The Cutting with damage. While Feller was already in the lane serving his 2-minute stop and hold, Campbell hadn’t committed to pit entry before the FCY was called, with race control telling the team that they would have to serve the drive through again under green flag conditions.

The rain stopped and a dry line formed while the field was under Safety Car, with cars struggling for grip on the wet tyres while the track dried. The exception was the #912, which cut down half of the time lost by the drive-through penalty within 20 minutes and the transition to Slick tyres, at which point yet another Safety Car was called.

The #10 Matt Stone Racing MARC IRC GT, now with Cameron Hill at the wheel, was returned to the track after repairs. Unfortunately, the car ran straight on at Griffins Bend on it’s out lap, getting buried in the tyres and bringing out another Safety Car. During the Safety Car period, the rain began to fall again, turning from a light drizzle when the track went green to a torrential downpour two laps later, with most of the field diving back in for wets.

Cameron Waters in the #222 Scott Taylor Motorsport Mercedes tried to tough it out on slick tyres, but aquaplaned at the top of the Mountain and gingerly limped back to the pits, losing over 40 seconds on the additional lap.

Which left Campbell back in the lead in the #912, who had motored through the field in the conditions. Just as he took the lead, there was another Safety Car interruption.

Jack Le Brocq had a monster moment in the #48 M-Motorsport by Erebus Mercedes, aquaplaning on the exit of McPhillamy and entering Skyline backwards, making heavy impact on the left hand side of the car.

From that point, Manthey EMA were in control of the race, with track position, a car suited to the wet conditions, and the ability to attack the restarts hard and build a buffer. With just over three and a half hours remaining, the team was in the box seat, and despite a late safety car interruption, were never headed in their quest for Bathurst victory.

The Pro-Am battle went down to the wire, with the #27 Heart of Racing Mercedes, the #88 Triple Eight Racing Mercedes and the #911 Shell V-Power/The Bend Porsche seemingly glued at the hip for large parts of the race. The Heart of Racing crew were the first to fulfil their Am-driver time requirement, with Ian James getting in the car just after half race, and doing his stint largely under light rain and safety car conditions. Both Yasser Shahin in the #911 and Prince Jefri Ibrahim in the #88 had their last stint later in the race, with Yasser being handed the car in the overall lead just as the rain began to pound down. Due to the extended safety cars, Ross Gunn couldn’t capitalise on his time against the Am’s, only just sneaking past into Pro-Am lead before the next round of stops.

The three cars were nose-to-tail on the final restart; the #88 Triple Eight Mercedes with Whincup at the wheel ahead of Ross Gunn in the #27 Heart of Racing Mercedes, then Picariello in the #911 Shell V-Power/The Bend Porsche. Whincup’s car was visibly wounded, with race tape holding the front splitter together, leaving him as a sitting duck on the restart, as first Gunn, then Picariello rounded him up. But, Gunn was handed a drive through penalty for weaving under Safety Car after the lights had gone out, dropping him from the lead and leaving the race in the hands of Picariello and the #911 Porsche, from which they were never troubled. It was a double win for Manthey EMA, who was also supporting the #911 along with the pro-class #912.

Gunn did manage to reel in Whincup to take second for the Heart of Racing team on their Bathurst debut, while Whincup held the #88 together enough to bring that car home third.

Silver Cup went the way of the #93 Wall Racing Lamborghini Huracan, who had an almost entirely anonymous run to 12th overall. The car ran flawlessly and wasn’t involved in any accidents or incidents, with Adrian Deitz, David Wall, Grant Denyer and Tony D’Alberto taking the first class win for Lamborghini on The Mountain. The early leader in that class, the #44 Valmont Tigani Audi, finished second after running into issues after half race, while the #47 Supabarn Mercedes finished third in class.

GT4 was won by the #19 Nineteen Corp Mercedes AMG, as the cleanest runner in the class. The #19 did very well to avoid the Pro battles through the middle part of the race, while the other GT4 runners either hit walls, cars, or both. The #230 Method Motorsport McLaren finished second, while the sister car, the #25, finished third after damage hitting the wall at the Grate in the rain. The #56 Ginetta was in the wars all day, starting the race with a broken driveshaft that caught fire, getting tangled with the #32, before hitting the wall on the way down the mountain, coming to an unfortunate end at the top of Conrod Straight.

Invitational honours went to the #20 Localsearch T2 MARC IRC GT, in a battle of last man standing. The #20 spend significant time repairing the car in the garage after a hit at the top of the mountain, but outlasted damage and problems to every other car in the class. The #702 TekworkX MARC IRC GT was in and out of the garage and at one point on the flat bed, but finished second, while the #10 Matt Stone Racing MARC IRC GT rounded out the podium, despite two significant hits on the wall requiring recovery. The only other invitational finisher was the #701 Vortex 1.0, over 60 laps down, but nonetheless being classified at the finish in their debut at The Mountain.

The #111 MRA Motorsports MARC II retired in the pits, as did the #2 KFC Audi, who struggled with bearings coming loose in the rear of the car, causing the car to crab. Eventually, the problem became too severe to continue, with the car retired a few hours from home. Also retiring was the #77 Craft Bamboo Mercedes, after a hit under The Tree at Reid Park. Daniel Juncadella had just been installed in the car to take it home to the finish, before a small slide and hit against the wall broke the rear tow link, forcing the retirement of the car 2 hours from the finish.

The win for Campbell is his second overall win, and the first for both Laurens Vanthoor and Ayhancan Guven. Laurens wins on his 7th attempt over a decade, while Ayhancan becomes the 26th driver to win the Bathurst 12 Hour overall on their first attempt.

Laurens Vanthoor becomes only the third driver to win both the Bathurst 12 Hour and the Spa 24 Hour races overall, after Jules Gounon and Bernd Schneider. Matt Campbell becomes the first driver to win the Daytona 24 Hours Overall and the Bathurst 12 Hour in the same year, after becoming the first to win both events at Daytona this year.

FINAL RACE RESULT >>

Pics: Andrew “Skippy” Hall

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