Of the 23 cars at this year’s Bathurst 12 Hour, the lion’s share are outright contenders. The 2025 edition of the race features 19 cars of which 12 are Pro or Pro-Am entries. There are three strong Silver line-ups that could conceivably be a factor too.
Mercedes-AMG is the most well-represented brand with eight GT3 entries. The German marque brings two factory-backed teams this year in Team GMR and Craft-Bamboo Racing.
However, its the SunEnergy1 Racing team that will be the short-priced favourites in the eyes of most.
Kenny Habul and Luca Stolz each have two wins apiece while Jules Gounon has three.
Habul, Stolz, and Gounon won the race together in 2022 and 2023. Gounon’s first win, however, came with the Bentley-backed M-Sport team in 2020.
The team came up short of a three-peat in 2024, finishing second to Matt Campbell, Ayhancan Guven, and Laurens Vanthoor. Campbell and Guven return as a pairing in 2025 albeit with Alessio Picariello and Absolute Racing.
If SunEnergy1 Racing is the strongest line-up on wins, then the Team GMR trio of Maro Engel, Maxime Martin, and Mikael Grenier must be a close second.
Engel has come agonisingly close to winning the race on multiple occasions and is long overdue.
The all-Australian line-up of Craig Lowndes, Cameron Waters, and Thomas Randle has to be among the top Mercedes outfits. The team struggled with engine reliability issues in 2024 and has high hopes for this year’s race.
Ferrari has arguably its best chance to win the race since 2017 with the star-studded Arise Racing line-up of Chaz Mostert, Will Brown, and Daniel Serra.
Then there’s BMW Team WRT. The van der Linde brothers Kelvin and Sheldon are well-known quantities in GT3 racing – and with Augusto Farfus has to be among the favourites.
The sister entry of Valentino Rossi, Charles Weerts, and Rafaelle Marciello are equally capable. Like Engel, Marciello is overdue a win.
The Craft-Bamboo Mercedes-AMG of Maximilian Gotz, Lucas Auer, and Jayden Ojeda can’t be slept on either.
Outside the Pro ranks, there are a handful of dark horses.
The Shahin Porsche with Yasser and Sam stands a good chance of topping Pro-Am with Laurin Heinrich and Morris Schuring.
Then there’s the other Arise Racing Ferrari 296 with hometown favourite Brad Schumacher with Ferrari star Alessio Rovera, Supercars driver Jaxon Evans, and Elliott Schutte. Like any multi-class GT3 race, it’ll be about positioning themselves to have the fastest driver in at the end and make headway in the final hour.
The only Lamborghini in the field could be the race’s surprise packet with Am drivers Adrien Deitz and Grant Denyer joined by Bathurst 1000 regular Tony D’Alberto and Super Trofeo Europe champion Brendon Leitch.
Leitch has been as good as the likes of Mostert and Brown in GT World Challenge Australia and assuming he finishes Sunday’s race will no doubt be making some trademark divebombs.
So who is your pick? Cast your vote below in this week’s Pirtek Poll.
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