Rossi, BMW leap to the lead after wild opening to 12 Hour

THE second Safety Car in the opening two hours of the race has tipped the complexion of the 2026 Meguiar's Bathurst 12 Hour.

After an opening stanza that was dominated by Mercedes-AMG, Team WRT have cycled their way to the head of the queue after capitalising on a well-timed BMW M Safety Car intervention.

The #46 entry of Valentino Rossi currently leads the race, with the sister #32 BMW M4 of Charles Weerts in second, and the Grove Racing Mercedes-AMG of Will Davison in third after a frantic second restart.

Thomas Randle was given the enormous responsibility of leading the field to green in the #222 Scott Taylor Motorsport Mercedes, leading an all-star cast of European aces.

Maxi Götz (#77 Mercedes), Luca Stolz (#75 Mercedes), Alessio Picariello (#911 Porsche), Christopher Haase (#55 Audi), Marco Mapelli (#93 Lamborghini), Augusto Farfus (#46 BMW), Chris Mies (#64 Ford), and Philip Ellis (#6 Mercedes) all started their respective entries within the top 10.

Immediately Randle came under fire, as Götz went around the outside of Hell Corner, and a fast-starting Stolz made it three-wide up Mountain Straight for the second year in a row.

It was Götz who led the first lap for Craft-Bamboo after nipping up the inside of Randle at Griffins Bend, whilst Stolz was forced to fall back to sixth as he attempted to get back into line from the outside.

Mapelli nearly got tagged into a spin at Hell Corner by a hard charging Farfus, who launched from seventh on the grid to fourth on the opening lap, whilst Kelvin van der Linde also picked up damage on the #32 BMW

Another big mover in the opening stanza was Jaxon Evans in the Arise Ferrari, who soared from 18th on the grid to 10th in the opening two laps.

Sergio Pires went the other, as the Geyer Valmont Racing Bronze driver fell back from eighth on the grid to 18th as he let the professionals get on with their race.

It was much longer after that when the first intervention from the BMW M Safety Car came, when the #64 HRT Ford Racing Mustang struck wildlife on Conrod Straight.

Fortunately, Chris Mies was unscathed, but it was a disappointing and sudden end to Ford's debut in GT3 era Bathurst 12 Hour.

Several cars would take an early chance to stop, including the #911 Absolute Racing Porsche, the #26 Arise Ferrari, and the #75 SunEnergy1 Mercedes, with Kenny Habul chewing through driving time in a Safety Car period that would be extended.

The crowd-favourite KTM went on a wild ride into Murray's Corner with a suspected failure, with David Crampton flinging the #50 through the pit entry runoff in a vain attempt to avoid the wall.

Before the field went back to green, Habul would pit again to top off on fuel, with the race going back to green at the completion of the 11th lap.

Götz bolted away in the lead with a good restart, whilst on cold tyres Randle found himself coming under pressure from Haase in the Jamec Racing/Team MPC Audi, however Randle started to creep back towards the #77 as his tyres came up.

At the back end of the top 10 Kai Allen spent several laps heading a train of cars that was bottled up behind the #89 Team KRC BMW of Cunfan Ruan.

On lap 15, Ruan was lucky not to throw the BMW into the wall on the run to Forrest's Elbow when he ran wide, with Allen, Garnet Patterson (#95 McLaren), Jordan Love (#99 Corvette), Picariello, and Maro Engel (#888 Mercedes) all capitalising at The Chase.

Allen immediately set the fastest lap of the race in clean air on lap 18 at a 2:03.0957s, going a second quicker than any other car on the corresponding lap.

The first of the leaders to blink was Mapelli at the end of lap 28, just over an hour and 20 minutes into the race, with the first of the Pro contenders in Philip Ellis boxing on lap 29.

Götz pitted from the lead at the end of lap 31, which Love also attempted to do, only to skate off on pit entry and be forced to go around again.

Randle pitted next time around as the BMWs continued on, and they were gifted a huge free kick as the Safety Car came out when Mark Rosser backed the #268 Audi into the wall hard at Skyline.

Farfus, van der Linde, and Allen all made their first stops for the day under yellow, whilst the cars who pitted under the first Safety Car cycled to the front after making another stop under yellow.

The #2 Pro Corvette has also leapt forward, as has the #61 EBM Porsche, and the #26 Arise Ferrari, all of whom also pitted under the first Safety Car.