NO driver combination on the grid for this year’s Bathurst 12 Hour can boast more laps of Mount Panorama than the BMW Team SRM entry which includes Mark Skaife, Tony Longhurst and Russell Ingall.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Yet for all the laps that trio – all former Bathurst 1000 winners – have done of Mount Panorama, they may still feel like rookies behind the wheel of the BMW M6 GT3.
According to Ingall, whose resume includes 18 starts in the Bathurst 1000, the BMW is vastly different to the Supercars he is more familiar with.
“We know the track very well, but all of a sudden that is irrelevant because driving this GT3 car is so different,” Ingall said.
“Brake markers aren’t relative anywhere you go, corner speed is so much faster, it’s like starting again. All that 25 years of racing a Supercar, the hard drive, all of a sudden you are starting off, which is good, it’s a challenge.”
Though Ingall, Skaife and Longhurst have had test days and got laps in the BMW at Challenge Bathurst in November, they will still use Friday’s practice session to reacquaint themselves with the Mount.
The fourth driver for the #7 BMW, German DTM star Glock, will also need time to adjust given he will be making his racing debut at the 6.213 kilometre circuit in the 12 Hour.
Still, Ingall knows that the team are a chance of snaring a podium in the BMW come Sunday’s race.
“It’s all about handling, corner speed and the braking is phenomenal,” Ingall said.
“You are braking nearly 80 metres later than we do in a Supercar at some of these corners, it’s just insane.
“Every single part of the focus of this program is about the 12 Hour. We are putting a lot into it and there’s a lot of experience there.
“When you look at the experience between the three of us, then we’ve got one of the best German pilots in Timo Glock who’s currently racing the DTMs.
“He’s a super fast driver, an ex-Formula 1 driver, we mix that in with it as the ring-in gun, it’s looking good and we are taking it very serious.”
We’ve learnt a lot about the style of car that it is and the way to coax it to go fast.
- Mark Skaife
Like Ingall, six-time Bathurst 1000 winner Skaife is expecting a challenge different to that of a Supercar.
But he also feels the team is in with a winning chance.
“We’ve learnt a lot about the style of car that it is and the way to coax it to go fast,” Skaife said.
“It’s obviously very fast in areas that are un-Supercar like and the opposite, it’s obviously slower in a straight line and with a lot more aero.
“So it’s a much different device, different style of car, different drive. [But] It’s much easier to drive, it’s nice on old tyres, there’s not much difference between us and the superstars, so we’ll see what it’s like.”