The future of the 12 Hour was last week secured through a new deal between Supercars and the Bathurst Regional Council that extends it for “at least another decade”.
Supercars has promoted Australia’s International Endurance Race in a joint-venture with the BRC since buying out founder James O’Brien in 2015.
The structure has Supercars running the promotional and operational elements of the event, while Stéphane Ratel’s UK-based SRO provides assistance in administering the technical regulations.
With SRO having created its own Australian arm to operate the local GT3 and GT4 series, there have been suggestions SRO Australia would take on a greater role in the 12 Hour.
But event director Shane Rudzis says that such a change won’t be happening, at least not for 2026.
“Supercars will be running all motorsport elements of the event,” Rudzis told Speedcafe.
“It’ll be the same model we’ve had in the past, collaborating on technical elements with the SRO, especially around BoP with Claude Surmont and his team.
“Right now the model we’ve got works well and the focus is on how we review the regulations now that SRO is on the ground here with competitors used to their procedures.”
Bathurst 12 Hour future secured for ‘at least another decade’
Ratel flagged to media at the weekend’s Spa 24 Hours a desire to align the Bathurst event’s sporting rules with that of its European flagship.
There are various elements of the Bathurst event, including rules governing Safety Car restarts and the inclusion of a ‘Lucky Dog’ wave-around, that are adopted from Supercars’ own procedures.
“The difficulty we have is that the rules are very different,” Ratel told Sportscar365 of Bathurst.
“We get all the teams [asking] why it’s different. We would like to have a bit of the same [rules] that people are used to do what they do in Spa and we’d like to do the same thing.”
The SRO also locks down strategic elements of Spa such as stipulating a maximum stint length, which is tied to its BoP regulations.
Rudzis acknowledged the Bathurst rulebook will be reviewed to take into account the SRO’s desires and competitor feedback.
“We’ve been chopping and changing from the same rulebook going back 10 years, so it’s time to look and say, ‘what does everyone understand?’” added Rudzis.
“It makes sense to look at any quirks we have in the 12 Hour rulebook and whether we can simplify things.”
The review will also include a look at whether the class structure within the GT3 ranks – which in 2025 included Pro, Pro-Am, Silver and Bronze – can be simplified.
Rudzis affirmed, though, that classes for GT4, Invitational and Porsche Cup Cars will again be part of the format when entry information goes to teams in August.
“If they get three or four entries minimum then we’ll go ahead with that class, if not we’ll just merge them into Invitational,” he said.
The big challenge is to increase the event’s overall grid size after just 22 cars took the start in 2025.
It is hoped that pushing the event back two weeks to February 13-15 will help with that due to avoiding clashes with others in the region.
“The response in the past few days has been quite positive from returning teams and prospective new ones, but it’s hard to predict a grid size,” he said.
“Right now, the key thing about getting the date out there is everyone can look at it and try and make it work.
“I’m not going to predict a number, we all know what numbers we’d love, but we’re working together to entice teams to come over.”
The SRO announced at Spa that the Bathurst 12 Hour will once again open its Intercontinental GT Challenge season in 2026.
A formal extension of the agreement between Supercars and the SRO will not, however, be signed until after James Warburton officially takes up his CEO tenure on July 23.
Supercars pays a fee to the SRO for its involvement in the event, which includes assistance in recruiting international entries.
Warburton orchestrated Supercars’ takeover of the 12 Hour in 2015 amid a sharp rise in popularity of the event.
New GT3 cars likely to feature in next year’s race include the Ford Mustang and Chevrolet Corvette, which would add a welcome fresh element to the currently European-dominated grid.
Discussion about this post