How a kangaroo almost cost Allen Finals
By Thomas Miles
Date posted: 12 October 2025
In the shadow of an epic Bathurst 1000, there was an equally thrilling race to make the inaugural Supercars Finals, with “Skippy” playing an unexpected role in Kai Allen’s stunning drive to Finals.
Grove Racing had two reasons to celebrate, as not only had Matt Payne and Garth Tander won the Great Race, but rookie Allen secured a ticket to the Finals in extraordinary circumstances.
During the final three laps, the Blue Lake Boy needed to find a way past Aaron Cameron for eighth place, while Andre Heimgartner critically lost sixth to Broc Feeney on the final lap.
That move, plus Allen’s last-lap heroics, shot him 18 points clear of Heimgartner and swung the 10th and last Finals ticket.
As a result, Allen joins Anton De Pasquale, Ryan Wood and Thomas Randle, who also secured berths at Bathurst.
However, all of Allen’s good work pushing a wounded car forward in a crazy race almost came undone by an unwelcome visitor.
“I could not see a thing, and even going down Conrod, I was stressed with 2m of visibility in front of me,” he told Auto Action.
“At one stage, when I was doing 260km/h, a kangaroo jumped in front of me and just missed it. I reckon I missed him by about 20cm, which is ridiculous.
“It was like driving down the old pine trees in Mount Gambier!
“If I hit him, the poor bugger, it would have destroyed him and my car, so luckily he crossed at the right time. I got lucky.”
Perhaps the Mountain Gods were on Allen’s side after some incidents threatened to push his Finals dream off course.
The likes of Brodie Kostecki, Will Brown and Jack Le Brocq all pushed the #26 Mustang off track at different stages in the second half of the race.
Despite the hit from the DJR driver causing significant damage to Allen, he never gave up to the bitter end.
“I felt like a bit of a target getting absolutely demolished left, right and centre,” he joked.
“But we kept on fighting, and when Brodie hit me, the damage was quite phenomenal, but we just kept chipping away and got there.
“I gave it my all and did not leave anything on the table.
“I was driving to get the best result and knew I had to get Aaron on the last lap to make it.
“I got him with three laps to go but made a silly mistake in the chase, which made life a lot harder.
“But I still passed him on the last lap.
“I am so proud of the whole team and my side of the garage because we did everything we could to get there.”
Overall, Allen was honoured to be a part of the team that had won the Great Race.
“The mountain does not disappoint! What a race and to see Matty, Garth and the whole team winning is very special,” he said.
“To be a small part of a Bathurst-winning team is really touching.
“It is phenomenal to see the effort the whole Grove family, team, partners, sponsors and everyone put in to help us go racing.”
Supercars Finals Bathurst Qualifiers
7Q Anton De Pasquale +173
8Q Ryan Wood +139
9Q Thomas Randle +81
10Q Kai Allen 0
11 Andre Heimgartner -18
12 Nick Percat -37
13 Cameron Hill -51
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