GOING from the rear of the grid to claim the chequered flag, having brilliant car speed but crashing in qualifying - Chaz Mostert knows better than most just how unpredictable the Bathurst 1000 can be.
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That is why the Tickford Racing star is not making any bold predictions about who will win this year's Great Race.
Instead Mostert is tipping speed, errors and some gung-ho racing from those who will make up the grid at Mount Panorama. He expects to see it from both championship leader Scott McLaughlin and others who have endured a much tougher 2019 to date.
"I think you can't count anyone out there, I won it from the last row on the grid and definitely I didn't count myself in to win it that year," the 2014 Bathurst victor said.
"There are a lot of cars capable of winning it this year and I think there's a lot of room for error too in the first [enduro] race.
"There are a lot of guys in the championship that obviously the championship has got away from this year, if you win Bathurst it's the one that kinda erases the memory of your championship, it's the one you want to win if you can't win the championship.
"A lot of guys will go gung-ho, Scotty's in a position where he's got enough points he's going to be going gung-ho, so it's going to be on for young and old."
Mostert has enjoyed a solid season to date - with one race win and 11 additional podium appearances in his #55 Mustang he sits third in the championship.
He is on track for a career best finish in the series - a fifth from 2017 his current mark. But with the amount of points on offer to the victor in endurance rounds and the unpredictability of Mount Panorama, Mostert knows plenty of challenges lie ahead.
For the second year running he will have James Moffat as his co-driver, a strong combination which led to a fourth placing at the Mount in 2018.
Mostert just hopes this year is more like his successful 2014 campaign than 2015's when he had that horror crash in Friday qualifying.
"Fourteen [2014] was pretty good, for me I was just a young kid in my second Bathurst and seeing all the legends like Whincup and Lowndesy and Frosty all up there fighting for the win. They just made a few more gaps for me after turn one, J Dub [Jamie Whincup] he forgot to put some fuel in or something," Mostert laughed.
"After 14 after all my dreams coming true of winning at the mountain, I just got a little bit lost in 15 and made a little bit of a mistake and paid a big price for that.
"I probably had one of the quickest cars in 15 going to there, we talk about it a million times generally the fastest car at the mountain doesn't always get on the top step."
But as disappointing as 2015 was, Mostert now feels it has helped him. It also did nothing to dampen his enthusiasm for racing at Mount Panorama.
"First year after 15 after I came back after the big crash it was kinda inspiring to see how many messages were on the wall where I did crash," he said.
"It's one of the things that made me grow a lot as a person, you've got to look at the negatives and turn them into a positive.
"As soon as you rock up there on the Monday or Tuesday and you see that big Mount Panorama sign, it's quite cool that it's the one race meeting.
"You get there and you're obviously not on track til Thursday, but it's just exciting. You see the fans there, you smell the campfires, you see the tinnies on people's lawns out at the campsites and the heritage of the place has been like that for many years.
"I just love the place."
