Wurth Australia And Triple Eight Race Engineering | Red Bull Ampol Racing

Triple Eight Race Engineering Managing Director, Jamie Whincup said in a press release;

“We’re not here to make up the numbers this year, that’s for sure. We have two reigning champions in the seats of our cars, and we once again occupy the first two garages of pit lane, so it’s up to us to work hard as a team and ensure our drivers dig deep and achieve the best results possible.”

This is a statement that reflects our own passion and drive to be successful at Wurth Australia and reinforces our synergy with Triple Eight Race Engineering | Red Bull Ampol Racing.

The team plans which Wurth products they rely on throughout the 2025 season in their workshop. We work closely with them to establish systems that support their needs while demonstrating the quality and performance of our products. Their purchasing team enjoys the convenience of ordering their consumables via the Wurth App .

In a closing statement to the media, Jamie Whincup thanked Wurth “for entrusting us to represent their brand to the best of our ability”.

Red Bull Ampol Battles Bathurst, Eyes Finals Redemption

Triple Eight Race Engineering arrived at Mount Panorama as the undisputed benchmark for Chevrolet, fast, clinical, and sitting in the box seat for both the Peter Brock Trophy and the championship. Broc Feeney and Jamie Whincup in the #88 Camaro were chasing a Bathurst breakthrough, while Will Brown and Scott Pye in the #1 car had rediscovered form and looked ready to pounce.

Qualifying for the 2025 Bathurst 1000 was a showpiece for Ford’s resurgence, with Brodie Kostecki storming to his third consecutive Bathurst pole in the #38 Shell V-Power Mustang, clocking a blistering 2:04.0413 to head Cameron Waters and Chaz Mostert in an all-Ford top three.

The Mustangs looked far more settled over the mountain, leaving the Chevrolets scrambling for balance; Broc Feeney was best of the Camaros in fifth after several lurid moments in the Esses, while teammate Will Brown could do no better than twelfth. The result underlined the shifting dynamic between the marques, the Blue Oval finally holding the upper hand in qualifying speed, but as Bathurst proved again, outright pace is only half the battle.

For a while, everything in the race went to script. Whincup’s opening stint was pure class, assertive off the line, methodical through traffic, and clever enough to short-fuel for track position. When the first round of stops cycled through, the #88 led the race, with the #1 sister car in second, confirming that Triple Eight had found something in the setup window that others hadn’t. Feeney’s pace was relentless and controlled, extending the gap and managing tyres as if he’d been doing this for a decade.

But then the mountain reminded everyone who’s really in charge.

Rain arrived on Lap 62, turning the race into a survival trial. Visibility dropped to near zero across the top at times, and grip became more of a rumour than a reality. Feeney brushed the Forrest’s Elbow barrier but kept his head, piecing together an extraordinary recovery to finish sixth.

“Jamie did an awesome job first up and we pulled a big lead in the dry and felt extremely competitive,” he said. “If it had stayed dry, it was going to be a battle between the Bulls.”

Brown and Pye had shown similar promise. Starting twelfth, they moved steadily forward through the dry phase, Pye’s stint in the changing conditions hinting that a top 10 was possible. But the chaos of Safety Cars and slow zones turned the race into a lottery. Brown’s late-race off at Griffin’s Bend ended the charge, and they were eventually classified seventeenth, two laps down.

Whincup, ever the pragmatist, summed it up bluntly: “It was one of those days when Bathurst reminds you who’s in charge.” He knew they had the speed to win but not the luck or timing to match.

The fight for victory at Bathurst turned into a four-way epic that will live in the mountain’s folklore. In the closing laps, Matt Payne’s Grove Ford, James Golding’s PremiAir Camaro, David Reynolds’ Team 18 entry, and the Erebus young guns Cooper Murray and Jobe Stewart traded blows in treacherous wet conditions that made the track more roulette wheel than racetrack.

Murray’s daring move up Mountain Straight to grab the lead was pure audacity, but Golding’s lunge at Griffins Bend later in the race pushed the Erebus car off the podium and reshuffled everything. Payne slipped through the chaos to seize the top spot, Reynolds charged from nowhere to attack in the final laps, and Golding crossed the line first only to be demoted by a five-second penalty. When the spray settled, Payne and Tander stood on top, a perfect mix of youthful nerve and veteran cunning that conquered the wildest Bathurst in years.

Despite the frustration, Feeney retained his grip on the championship lead over Bathurst winner Matt Payne’s while Brown stayed third on 719.

It means both Triple Eight cars head into the Finals Series firmly in the hunt, their margin built on the same consistency that has defined their season.

The 2025 Bathurst 1000 won’t be one the Bulls cherish, but it might be one they learn from. They came armed with the fastest cars in the dry and left with scars from the wet, proof, again, that Mount Panorama doesn’t play favourites. The mountain decides, and this year, it chose someone else.

Podium

(1) Matt Payne / Garth Tander, Grove Racing. (2) David Reynolds / Lee Holdsworth, Team 18. (3) James Golding / David Russell, PremiAir Racing

Championship – Finalists

1. Broc Feeney – 3150 points.

2. Matthew Payne - 3120

3. Will Brown – 3096

4. Cam Waters – 3078

5. Brodie Kostecki – 3066

6. Chaz Mostert – 3057

7. Anton De Pasquale – 3048

8. Thomas Randle – 3039

9. Ryan Wood – 3030

10. Kai Allen – 3021