The 2018 Supercheap Auto Bathurst 1000 was a motor racing event for Supercars, held on the weekend of 4–7 October 2018. It was staged at the Mount Panorama Circuit in Bathurst, New South Wales, Australia and featured of a 1000 kilometre race. The event was the thirteenth of sixteen in the 2018 Supercars Championship and incorporated Race 25 of the series. It was also the second event of the 2018 Enduro Cup.

The race was won by Craig Lowndes and Steven Richards driving a Holden Commodore ZB for Triple Eight Race Engineering.2018 Supercheap Auto Bathurst 1000, racing.natsoft.com.au, as archived at web.archive.org

Report Background The event was the 61st running of the Bathurst 1000, which was first held at the Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit in 1960 as a 500-mile race for Australian-made standard production sedans, and marked the 58th time that the race was held at Mount Panorama. It was the 22nd running of the Australian 1000 race, which was first held after the organisational split between the Australian Racing Drivers Club and V8 Supercars Australia that saw two "Bathurst 1000" races contested in both 1997 and 1998. It was the 20th time the race had been held as part of the Supercars Championship and the sixth time it formed part of the Enduro Cup. The defending winners of the race were David Reynolds and Luke Youlden.

Shane van Gisbergen entered the event as the championship leader, 55 points clear of DJR Team Penske's Scott McLaughlin. Van Gisbergen's Triple Eight Race Engineering team-mate Jamie Whincup was third in the points standings, 338 points from the lead. In the Teams' Championship, Triple Eight held a 656-point lead over DJR Team Penske. In the Enduro Cup standings, Triple Eight team-mates Jamie Whincup and Paul Dumbrell led the pairing of Van Gisbergen and Earl Bamber by 24 points.

Entry list Twenty-six cars were entered in the event. As in 2017, there were no additional "Wildcard" entries entered in the race. Four drivers would make their first start in the Bathurst 1000 - two-time Le Mans 24 Hours winner Earl Bamber, Super2 drivers Will Brown and Bryce Fullwood, and 'main-gamer' Anton de Pasquale. Teams Matt Stone Racing and 23Red Racing would also make their debuts in 'the Great Race', however the former contained many crew members from the former Stone Brothers Racing outfit and the latter was a continuation of Lucas Dumbrell Motorsport under new owners. It was the last start in the Bathurst 1000 for Paul Dumbrell and Jason Bright.

Drivers Team (Sponsor) Car Drivers Team Car 1 21 2 23 5 25 6 33 7 34 8 35 9 55 11 56 12 78 } 14 97 17 99 18 230 19 888

Results Practice + Practice summarySessionDayFastest lapNo.DriverTeamCarTimePractice 1Thursday230WetPractice 2Thursday17WetPractice 3Thursday56WetPractice 4Friday9DryingPractice 5Friday23WetPractice 6Saturday9DryWarm-UpSunday17DrySources:

Qualifying Driver Team Car Time Gap 1 1 2:04.1093 2 9 2:04.2647 +0.1555 3 17 2:04.2861 +0.1769 4 97 2:04.3818 +0.2725 5 25 2:04.4759 +0.3666 6 888 2:04.5702 +0.4609 7 6 2:04.5794 +0.4701 8 8 2:04.6380 +0.5288 9 99 2:04.6942 +0.5849 10 33 2:04.8567 +0.7474 11 55 2:04.9133 +0.8040 11 12 34 2:04.9719 +0.8627 12 13 7 2:05.0357 +0.9265 13 14 11 2:05.0644 +0.9552 14 15 12 2:05.1789 +1.0696 15 16 23 2:05.3195 +1.2102 16 17 56 2:05.4607 +1.3514 17 18 2 2:05.4655 +1.3562 18 19 5 2:05.5106 +1.4013 19 20 14 2:05.5656 +1.4563 20 21 18 2:05.7075 +1.5982 21 22 21 2:05.8433 +1.7340 22 23 35 2:06.0375 +1.9283 23 24 230 2:06.0429 +1.9336 24 25 19 2:06.1324 +2.0232 25 26 78 2:06.4374 +2.3281 26 Source:

Top 10 Shootout Driver Team Car Time Gap 1 9 2:04.0589 1 2 1 2:04.0683 +0.0094 2 3 99 2:04.3498 +0.2909 3 4 97 2:04.5385 +0.4796 4 5 17 2:04.5494 +0.4905 5 6 6 2:04.7517 +0.6928 6 7 8 2:04.7673 +0.7084 7 8 25 2:05.0034 +0.9445 8 9 888 2:05.0835 +1.0246 9 10 33 2:05.1717 +1.1128 10 Source:

Race Driver Team Car Laps Time/Retired Points 1 888 161 6:01:44.8637 9300 2 2 161 +6.292 18276 3 17 161 +9.408 5258 4 55 161 +10.253 11240 5 97 161 +27.421 4222 6 33 161 +30.010 10204 7 8 161 +36.542 7192 8 34 161 +37.233 12180 9 12 161 +47.112 15168 10 1 161 +56.433 2156 11 11 161 +1:19.074 14144 12 5 161 +1:35.009 19138 13 9 161 +1:39.105 1132 14 78 161 +1:47.776 26126 15 19 161 +1:52.397 25120 16 7 161 +1:54.823 13114 17 14 160 +1 lap 20108 18 21 159 +2 laps 22102 19 230 159 +2 laps 2496 20 35 159 +2 laps 2390 21 18 157 +4 laps 2184 22 56 152 +9 laps 1778 23 6 148 +13 laps 672 24 99 143 +18 laps 366 NC 23 69 Accident 16 NC 25 33 Mechanical 8 Source:

Championship standings

Drivers' Championship standings Driver Gap 1 Shane van Gisbergen 3276 2 Scott McLaughlin 3257 -19 3 Jamie Whincup 2872 -404 4 Craig Lowndes 2787 -489 5 David Reynolds 2567 -709

Teams Championship Team Gap 1 Triple Eight Race Engineering (1, 97) 6117 2 DJR Team Penske 5539 -578 3 Tickford Racing (5, 55) 4066 -2051 1 4 Brad Jones Racing 3921 -2196 1 5 Erebus Motorsport 3886 -2262

Enduro Cup Drivers Gap 2 1 558 2 498 -60 1 3 498 -60 2 4 480 -78 4 5 456 -102

Note: Only the top five positions are included for three sets of standings.

Broadcast The event telecast was produced by Supercars Media and carried domestically by Fox Sports Australia (via Fox Sports 506), a paid service which covered all sessions including support categories, and Network 10 (via free-to-air channels 10 and 10 Bold), which covered select sessions from midday Friday onwards. The 2018 race was broadcast by Foxtel in 4K resolution, a first for Australian sports.

Fox Sports Network 10 Host: Jessica Yates, Russell IngallBooth: Neil Crompton, Mark SkaifePit-lane: Riana Crehan, Andrew Jones, Mark Larkham, Greg Murphy Presenters: Aaron Noonan, Matthew WhitePundit: Rick KellyRoving: Scott MacKinnon, Kate Peck

References