THE local fauna has taken centre stage for the opening hour of Sunday’s Bathurst 12 Hour on a day where the cars are trying to leave their mark on Mount Panorama.
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The #42 BMW M3 entry brought out the day’s first yellow flag just 19 minutes into the race when Anthony Gilbertson struck a kangaroo on the exit of Forrests Elbow.
The impact left heavy damage to the front of the car and saw it roll several hundred metres down Conrod Straight against the outside wall.
Following the 16 minutes under yellow to remove the car leader Markus Winkelhock didn’t lose his rhythm. By the end of the opening hour the German had grown his lead out to 20 seconds to Wolfgang Reip in the Nissan GTR.
He had also produced the hour’s fastest lap, a 2:03.5839.
It was a clean rolling start to get the day’s racing underway.
Out the front of the field Winkelhock’s pole-sitting Audi R8 held his spot and started to put distance back to the chasing Nissan entry, which got by the JBS Lamborghini on the opening lap.
Winkelhock in the leading Audi had grown the advantage as great as six seconds before the yellow flag arrived.
Mark King almost beat the BMW to the punch at bringing out the day’s opening yellow flag when he spun his RX8 GT out at The Cutting earlier in the lap. He was able to get the car moving once again.
The remainder of the opening hour of racing saw some more minor incidents back in mid-field.
Richard Gartner made contact with the outside wall at Reid Park when trying to make space for the approaching Winkelhock and was forced into the garage. On the previous lap Pete Storey spun his Aston Martin around at The Cutting. Neither incident sparked another yellow flag.
The remainder of the top five was made up of the Erebus Motorsport Mercedes driven by Jack LeBrocq and Chris Mies in the Hallmarc Audi entry. The pair were some of the biggest winners to come from the opening stint of racing having started fifth and seventh respectively.
