After half a day of hard racing over Australia’s most picturesque road course, Bernd Schneider, Alex Roloff, and Thomas Jaeger in the No. 36 Erebus Mercedes SLS AMG took the checkered flag to win the 2013 Bathurst 12 Hours Saturday.
Fighting through dense traffic, a record number of cautions, and a pair of sudden deluges, the Erebus Mercedes finished a lap ahead of its nearest competitor in a race, which delivered drama from flag to flag despite the seemingly large margin of victory.
While not the fastest car, the No. 36 Erebus crew made no errors and exceedingly fast pit stops to run first or second for most of the race.
Bernd Schneider told Bathurst12hour.com.au that he had heard a lot about the circuit, and found it “really impressive.”
“I have been racing for 40 years, it has been a long time since I have had to learn a new circuit,” Schneider said.
“It’s such a difficult place. On Friday when we had our first runs out there, we could not learn the circuit because of the traffic. You couldn’t learn the braking points if you always have cars in front of you.
“When I jumped in the car for my first stint today I was really happy because the balance was very good and very consistent.
“We have achieved something really special, especially since it’s the first time and such a difficult race.”
Teammate Thomas Jaeger said, “The team deserved it. We gave our best, we pushed every lap—the strategy was perfect, the mechanics did a great job. It’s a great win for us as drivers, for the team, and also for Mercedes AMG.”
Craig Baird, Matt Griffin, and Mok Weng Sun finished second in the No. 33 Clearwater Ferrari 458, recovering from laps lost to a safety car error, a pair of penalties, and a missing splitter to land on the podium.
The Bathurst 12 Hours GT race is sponsored by Creventic, the Dutch firm, which also sponsors the Dubai 24, Barcelona 24, and Hungary 12-Hour races. The race takes place on the amazingly beautiful Mount Panorama circuit in New South Wales, Australia, also used for the Aussie V8 Supercars Bathurst 1000.
Mount Panorama is a 3.85 miles (6.2-km), 23-turn loop of narrow public roads, which climb up the side of the mountain, wind across the top, and plunge down the 1.9 km-long Conrod Straight, through the tight switchbacks of The Chase and around the 90-degree Meguiar’s Corner and back to the start-finish line, covering 570 feet of elevation change. It is a fast and challenging course with blind corners and crests, and very narrow between concrete walls from Skyline to the Elbow as it twists over the mountain peak.
Fifty-one cars in nine classes entered the race, but most interest was directed at Class A, international GT3 cars from Mercedes, Porsche, Audi, Ferrari BMW, and Lamborghini.
The No.63 Erebus Mercedes SLS AMG GT3 started from the pole, followed by the No. 33 Clearwater Ferrari. Third was the No. 88 Il Bello Rosso Ferrari, carrying an extra 110.23 pounds of ballast for lapping faster than the 2:06 limit.
The Clearwater Ferrari took the lead on lap four, but didn’t hold it long, as a safety car was summoned—the first of 16 times—after a collision on top of the mountain. A Ginetta spun, pushing a Porsche into the path of the No. 88 Ferrari, causing it to brush the wall.
The No.88 car continued and actually took the lead under yellow, but the whack into the wall led to suspension failure several hours later, dropping it out of contention.
The safety car was called eight times in the first six hours, cutting the race into a series of sprints. Unfortunately the first several times out, the safety car picked up the wrong leader, and several cars were waved by, gaining a lap on the field. Happily all of this evened out over the 12 hours, but confusion about the rules cannot be tolerated in a world-class race. Be sure this won’t happen again in 2014.
The two Erebus Mercedes led much of the race, with the Clearwater and Il Bello Rosso Ferraris and last year’s winner, the No.1 Phoenix Racing Audi, taking turns at the front. The No. 5 VIP Petfood Porsche never cracked the top three, but stayed close throughout the race.
As attrition took its toll, the list of cars in actual contention shrank. The two Erebus Mercedes weren’t the fastest cars on the track, but mistake-free driving and incredibly quick pit stops kept the Erebus cars up front.
On lap 162 Mok Weng Su in the No. 33 Clearwater Ferrari got overaggressive coming across the mountaintop and punted the No. 9 Network Clothing Audi. This collision had serious repercussion; not only was Sun given a drive-through penalty, he also broke the car’s front splitter.
After nine hours, with 225 laps completed, only the Erebus Mercedes were on the lead lap, with the Clearwater Ferrari and VIP Porsche a lap back. This remained the situation for the next 90 minutes; it seemed the race had been decided.
Mount Panorama made sure that there would be more excitement. The course is famous for changing weather, and with 90 minutes left, rain hit hard on the top of the mountain. With everyone on slicks, cars were sliding everywhere, forming bow waves as they pushed over the flooded roads.
Stalled cars caused another caution period, so everyone pitted for rain tires. By the time the race went back to green, the rain was easing up and the was sun breaking through. On the restart Lee Holdsworth in the No. 63 Erebus Mercedes somehow slammed into the No. 60 1Cover Motionsport Lotus Elise, the Class I1 leader. Repairs cost the Mercedes 18 minutes, dropping it out of contention of the lead.
At the same time the Clearwater Ferrari was called for pit-lane speeding, costing the car second place.
The lead of the race was determined, barring disaster for the No. 36 Erebus car, but behind the Mercedes, the VIP Porsche and the Clearwater Ferrari were racing hard for second place. The Clearwater car was the fastest on the track, but it was running out of laps—and running into weather.
Another downpour lashed the course with 10 minutes left in the race. Everyone had to pit for rain tires, but even with the right rubber, Alex Roloff in the leading Mercedes nearly went off at Meguiar’s Corner.
Aussie V8 and GT star Craig Baird, at the wheel of the now-second-place Clearwater Ferrari, were lapping five seconds faster than the more cautious Roloff, but even at that pace 10 minutes was not enough time to make up a lap. Roloff and co-drivers Bernd Schneider and Thomas Jaeger took the win.
Class Winners
Bathurst is a serious multi-class event: cars were entered in nine different categories ranging from full-on international GT3 to Production/Performance cars like the BMW 130, plus three invitational classes for unclassified cars in three engine sizes.
Class B became a de facto Porsche class, and here the Hunter Sports Group 997 GT3 Cup car took the win with a ninth-place finish, 11 laps behind the overall victors.
Class C, for GT4 cars, went to nurburgring.com.au’s Lotus Exige S, in 19th overall, 40 laps back.
Class D for high-performance production cars was won by the GWS Personnel BMW 3351 which finished 29th, 85 laps off the winning pace.
Class E, performance production cars, was the domain of another GWS car, the team’s BMW 130i finishing in 26th place, 61 laps down.
Fastest of the invitational winners was the Mal Rose Racing Holden VY Commodore, basically an Aussie V8 machine, which finished twelfth overall, 20 laps down.
In 16th overall came the I1-class Team Peugeot RCZ Cup car, a further fifteen laps back.
Finally in I2, the Motorsport Services Seat Leon Supercopa won the class by completing 225 laps and coming home 20th.
The Creventic 24H Series continues with the 12 Hours of Hungary from Budapest’s 4.3 km, 13-turn Hungaroring circuit on April 6. This is the same track which hosts the Formula One Hungarian Grand Prix. Check the Hungaroring website or the 24H Series website for ticket information.
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