Bathurst Hour 4 Update: Rain Causes Chaos

Will Davison & Garth Tander continue to lead the Bathurst 1000km race as rain has caused incident in the last two hours of the race.

Mark Winterbottom & Steven Richards had to retire after their car caught fire after failed repairs to the battery.

Just after our first segment report, the Ford Performance Racing Ford Falcon came flying into the pits with flames pouring from the rear. Unable to reach their own pit stall – other teams clambered to assist with fire extinguishers to put the fire out, which was caused by the recently changed battery coming lose and knocking the fuel line in the rear of the car.

Other cars started to fall foul of technical issues as well, such as the sister HRT Commodore driven by Craig Baird & Paul Dumbrell, which had to go to the garage which has lost them several laps.

The second safety car was called for a small amount of debris on the circuit, and also to rescue the car of David Sieders and Andrew Fisher.

After that stop, on account of not pitting, Triple Eight’s Craig Lowndes found himself in the lead ahead of SBR’s Alex Davison.

Shortly after, the forecasted rain started to fall, and Troy Bayliss went off in the Triple F Holden Commodore. This created the third safety car – and with few cars pitting despite the rain falling, cars found themselves trying to manouvre around a wet circuit on slicks at the restart – Alex Davison was quick to pass Lowndes and assume the lead.

Lowndes immediately became the first to pit for wets, as Will Davison’s HRT Commodore passed brother Alex’s SBR Falcon for the lead – as Alex fell back, he contacted James Courtney’s No.17 Ford Falcon – which span 180 degrees and had to join behind the pack – and has since had to head to the garage.

Owen Kelly then crashed out the #39 Supercheap Auto Holden Commodore causing another safety car – which gave Will Davison the opportunity to pit for wets and still keep his lead.

The race has now restarted, with Davison still in the lead from Cameron McConville & Jason Richards in the #12 Team BOC car and team mates Brad & Andrew Jones in the #14 Team BOC Holden.

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