MOTORSPORT: Bathurst to go international in 2020

The Bathurst 500 could back on the calendar next year as a new international race meeting is added at Mount Panorama for 2020.

A long-distance event at the iconic track was one of the central pillars to the winning bid for the fifth event at Bathurst in an open tender which has just been decided by Bathurst Regional Council.

The international focus for the event will include an appearance by S5000 single-seaters, as well as Le Mans sports cars and a three-way battle for Touring Car Masters supremacy.

The winning Bathurst bid was mounted by the Australian Racing Group, which scored a significant victory over Supercars in a head-to-head battle for the fifth event.

Supercars pitched with a Goodwood-style event headlined by a Supercars test day for Australia’s premier touring car category, while ARG went for a box-of-chocolates approach with a range of categories which will share billing at Bathurst.

“Our focus was to bring the world to Bathurst,” Matt Braid, director of the Australian Racing Group, told carsales.

“We’re excited about the prospect of seeing new cars and drivers linking up to tackle the challenging circuit,” the new Bathurst mayor, Bobby Bourke, said in announcing council’s decision.

“Council undertook a detailed tender process to select the successful bid and we’re confident the fifth event will bring dedicated motorsport fans to the circuit in December each year, as well as attract new fans to the sport.”

ARG is already pitching the December event as a ‘grand final’ for Australian motorsport, as well as pushing the focus on categories which will bring drivers, teams and cars from overseas.

“We look forward to bringing a significant international focus to Bathurst with competitors coming from all over the world to race in the S5000, TCR, Touring Car Masters, LMP3 and TA2 categories in what will be the grand finale of the global motorsport calendar each year,” says Braid.

He denies suggestions that ARG is now lining up to tackle Supercars for the dominant role in Australian motorsport, even though it has had a strong run of successes recently in launching new categories, winning management rights for others, and getting its headlining TCRT and S5000 categories onto the undercard for the Australian Grand Prix in 2020.

“That is not our intention, to control everything. We are focussing on what is best for the categories we have,” Braid told carsales.

“While all that we’ve done was very considered under a long-term strategy, it’s been very pleasing to see how fast it’s been achieved. And some opportunities have presented themselves sooner than we expected.”

Braid is reluctant to go into details on the winning Bathurst bid, but did rule out an Australian leg of the TCR world championship in 2020. Instead, the focus is on a two-driver enduro that is already being called the Bathurst 500 by some people.

“A 500km race is one of the distances being considered, but is nothing is confirmed,” Braid says.

He also puts a stronger emphasis on S5000, the V8-powered open-wheelers which fire up for the first time this weekend at Sandown Park.

“We will have S5000 with international drivers against Australian and New Zealand drivers. It will be the first time in a very long time there have been high-powered open-wheelers at Bathurst. Everyone wants to race there.

“We’ve also got LMP3 sports cars with the Asian Le Mans Series.”

“That will be international as well. With Australia, New Zealand and the USA.”

Braid says ARG is expecting bumper fields in all categories.

“We regard them all the same. From our point of view, TCR is the most internationally relevant and expected to have the biggest numbers. It will be the most significant as an international component.

“Having the S5000s there will also be big.”