Campbell pushes Porsche to Bathurst 12 Hour glory

Australia’s Matt Campbell has steered Porsche to a second mountain victory by completing a dominant drive alongside Ayhancan Guven and Laurens Vanthoor to win the 2024 Bathurst 12 Hour.

After 12 hours, 275 laps and 1705km of racing, the #912 Manthey EMA Porsche was the dominant figure all day despite serving two drive-through penalties.

Campbell survived a late-race restart to claim the breakthrough win, 2.6s ahead of reigning champions SunEnergy1 Racing of Kenny Habul, Jules Gounon and Luca Stolz, who fell just short of a hat-trick.

As Campbell blazed to glory, the fight for the rest of the podium positions went down to the wire as Gounon clung onto second, while Christopher Haase went from fifth to third with some opportunistic racing in the #22 Audi to jump Jaxon Evans and give co-drivers Liam Talbot and Kelvin van der Linde a trophy.

It was double delight for Manthey EMA with the sister #911 driven by Alessio Picariello, Yasser Shahin and Harry King recovering from a trip to the gravel to steal Pro Am.

Tony D’Alberto, David Wall, Grant Denyer and Adrian Dietz drove the Lamborghini to Silver success, GT4 went to Adam Christodoulou, Mark Griffith and Daniel Bilski, while Invitational was taken out by Adam Hargraves, Cedric Sbirrazzuoli and Daniel Jilesen.

After the #701 Vortex of Julien strangely got stuck on the kerb brought out the Safety Car, the race came down to a 30-minute sprint to the chequered flag.

The roles were reversed from 2023 with Gounon hunting down Campbell, but the Aussie stayed cool under pressure to get his second 12 Hour win and second big win of 2024 having recently won at the Daytona 24.

With 52 minutes left, Campbell started his final stint with a handy 19s lead over Gounon, who was able to jump Evans when the Kiwi was getting his tyres warmed up.

But all the strategy situations and these gaps became irrelevant with just 45 minutes left when the #701 of Boillot brought out a race-changing Safety Car.

The Vortex lost it at Griffins Bend before strangely getting stuck on the kerb.

Suddenly the roles reversed from last year with Campbell leading the way with Gounon up his trumpet, while the likes of Evans, Martin and Haase could not be discounted.

The grandstand finish hit top gear with just 30 minutes remaining and the added element of a drying, single-fire track.

Unlike previous restarts Campbell could not pedal away from his rivals with Gounon applying the blowtorch.

But the speed of the Porsche down the Mountain and switching on the tyres proved to be the difference with the #912 powering to a 1.5s lead from Griffins Bend onwards.

Within a lap Gounon went from being on the attack to on the defence with Evans, Martin and Haase on his tail.

The fight for Pro Am was also tight with Jamie Whincup and Ross Gunn running nose to tail until the #27 received a drive through penalty for a Safety Car infringement.

But Whincup’s grip on the lead only lasted another lap with the damaged #88 Mercedes unable to keep the #911 Porsche of Picariello behind.

Despite losing ground in the two laps following the restart, Gounon was able to stop Campbell from pulling away and held the lead around 2s.

But his momentum was killed by getting stuck behind the lapped #230 of Tom McLennan which allowed Campbell to double his gap to 6s.

As a result Gounon, Evans, Martin and Haase were all bunched up within just 1.5s, meaning who will stand on the podium was still anyone’s guess.

With seven minutes left the battle hit top gear as all four started squabbling.

Evans had a lunge on Gounon but could not make it stick and it backfired by the time they got to Murrays where both Martin and Haase joined in.

Martin went around the outside of Evans but could not carry the speed, dropping to fifth which allowed Haase to pounce.

He and Evans ran side by side up Mountain Straight and the Audi prevailed by being on the inside at Griffins Bend.

The #888 of Mikael Grenier was the fastest car on track and threatened to join them and make a late pursuit for a top five spot.

Gounon put in a late charge to half the gap but it was too late as Campbell completed the dominant performance in style.

Image: Peter Norton EPIC Sports Photography

2024 Bathurst 12 Hour provisional results

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