This is an exclusive post-event Supercars.com column by championship-winning Race Engineer Scott Sinclair. Sinclair will preview and debrief each round of the 2026 Repco Supercars Championship from his own perspective.
I love how the Australian sporting calendar clears itself for this weekend every year, shining the spotlight firmly on Bathurst.
Having re-watched the 2025 epic over the last few days, I'm as excited as ever about how this year's race will unfold. Sunday is the headline, but the journey to the start line is an important part of the story too.
Does qualifying matter?
Of course it does, but that won't stop you hearing "it's a long race on Sunday" after an underwhelming qualifying result.
Objective number one for the weekend is getting into the Shootout. Over the last 25 years, 84% of race winners have started inside the top 10.
Friday's 40-minute session, with endless new tyres to use, is not to be missed. Last year, the top six were covered by just 0.097 seconds across a lap of more than two minutes. That's 4.1 metres — six cars separated by less than a single car length.
Surprisingly, the corner with the biggest time spread in qualifying is the last one, despite it appearing simple on paper. I can only surmise that drivers with a good lap already in hand ease off so they don't spray it, while others make one last attempt to claw back time they've left out there. Between the two, the gap from fastest to slowest is exaggerated.
35 seconds of 'free time'
Those who make the Shootout then have 24 hours to stew on how they'll execute the perfect lap — a lap with a surprising amount of 'free time'.
After Turn 1, it's 15 seconds of straight-line driving up Mountain Straight, with the only real task being selecting the next gear. From Forrest's Elbow to the end of Conrod Straight, it's nearly another 20 seconds at full throttle. I've often wondered what's going through a driver's mind during that time. Are they cursing or celebrating the corners they've completed, or solely focused on what's to come?
James Courtney gave me one answer. During a Shootout many years ago, the broadcast cut to his pedal camera, at which point his left foot started swinging across the footrest like a windscreen wiper. Back in the garage, I asked what was going on. His reply: "As I drove past one of the big screens, I saw the camera was on my feet, so I started waving at you with my foot."
Speed alone won't win it
Across the last 25 Bathursts, the winner had the fastest car on only 13 occasions. While the winners are typically ranked in the top three for pace, speed alone doesn't get it done.
Track position is worth so much at Bathurst because overtaking is hard, and it gets harder the longer a battle drags on. I raised this before The Bend, but I think its importance is continually understated. It's also why qualifying matters.
On equal tyres, you've got about a one-in-seven chance of making the pass on each of the first two laps after you catch someone. It keeps falling from there, to about one-in-fourteen per lap from the sixth lap on. More than half the cars that catch someone at Bathurst never get past in that stint.
The umpires of pit lane
Pit lane is the next piece of the puzzle. Over the last 10 years, the eventual winner has averaged the third-fastest stationary time in the pits.
Like umpires in other sports, pit crews rarely get noticed when they do a good job, but they certainly do when things go wrong. It's a long day: the crew needs to be ready at a moment's notice, completing at least 12 stops across their two cars.
An uneventful lead-up matters too. In recent times, I can't recall a car having a reasonable crash in practice and going on to win. The late night spent repairing a damaged car comes at a cost. And with one crew servicing both cars, even your teammate's crash takes its toll on both cars come race day.
While we're talking teammates, in the last 10 years, the eventual winner has not once had to double stack. In all 18 stops where the winner and their teammate came in on the same lap, the winner was the first car in. History backs the long-held notion: when the Safety Car comes out, you need to be in front of your teammate.
Is there a form guide?
If there is, it's flaky.
As the official lead-in to Bathurst, The Bend is where you'd typically look to shape one. This year, it told us very little. Some fast cars and pre-race favourites found trouble early, the weather hindered outright speed, and we learnt basically nothing about the co-drivers' race pace in the dry.
Despite Toyota winning at The Bend, it's hard to know where they'll land this weekend. The same goes for the Camaros. They've been quick in race trim in all three Gen3 Bathursts, but whether that happens again remains to be seen.
For me, the #17 of Brodie Kostecki and Todd Hazelwood and the #19 of Matt Payne and Will Davison start the weekend as favourites, based on their seasons to date and recent endurance form. They're also the only two cars where both drivers are previous Bathurst winners.
George Commins' late withdrawal from engineering the #17 is a setback however, given teams aren’t permitted to send data off-site across the weekend.
The Finals sub-plot
While the focus is on who wins the race, the fight for the last Finals spot adds another layer to the story. Five drivers are separated by just 87 points — the equivalent of roughly eight finishing positions on track.
Whoever secures 10th isn't likely to go on and win the championship, but there's still plenty at stake. Thomas Randle is the only one of the five with a teammate already in the Finals, making it all the more important for the other four teams, who'll desperately want to be represented. Their sponsors would be rapt with the extra exposure. And based on last year's Gold Coast round, surviving through to Sandown can take nothing more than staying out of trouble.
Like last year, the battle for both the race win and that 10th spot in the championship will almost certainly come down to the last lap. Bring it on!
Scott Sinclair is one of the most respected voices in pit lane, famously engineering James Courtney to the 2010 championship with Dick Johnson Racing. Sinclair also spent stints at the Holden Racing Team and Kelly Racing, spent time on the Supercars Commission, and recently joined Supercars as a data analyst.
The views in this article do not necessarily express the opinions of Supercars, teams or drivers.
