The Bathurst 1000 was chaotic, with rain transforming the race into a survival battle.
Matt Payne and Garth Tander won, turning an 18th-place start into a memorable victory.
James Golding was penalised, elevating David Reynolds and Lee Holdsworth to second place.
Eric Thompson at Bathurst
A race for the ages? Nah. A race full of chaos, carnage and heartbreak – that’s just Bathurst. The Great Race giveth and the Great Race taketh away – there’s been lots of that over the years. The Mountain will decide who wins theBathurst 1000 – that’s pretty close.
I don’t think there’s an apt one-line description for what happened at Mount Panorama on Sunday. For the first 50-odd laps it looked like the Great Race was going to be a rerun of the 2024 snooze fest. Nothing could have been further from the truth.
Once the rain came the Great Race turned into the greatest-ever race. As the spots of rain turned into a deluge you felt something in the Mountain stir and the drivers responded. The race became a battle for survival with at times almost ballet-like car control and not all survived.
To win on that most unforgiving circuit you need the perfect car, the ability to wring everything out of it, a fearless attacking mindset, an instinct for survival and be a little crazy. If it was a movie, it’d be called True Grit featuring the gritty New Zealander Matt Payne and his talented and trusty sidekick, the gristled Aussie battler Garth Tander.
There were heroes and heartbreak everywhere. Supercars star in the making, Kiwi Ryan Wood, seemed destined for a fairytale win until his Mustang cried enough, coughed and died behind the safety car – another heartbreak and agony that belongs in Bathurst’s ever-increasing ledger of could-have-beens.
He wasn’t the only one the Mountain bit hard during that rolling epic punctuated by seven safety cars. The list of drivers who were put into their place by the vengeful Mount Panorama Gods was long and illustrious.
Payne had ice in his veins and with the wily old fox Tander, turned an 18th-place start into a victory that will be argued, dissected and revered about in pubs, racetracks and pit lanes for decades to come.
Matthew Payne drives the No 100 Penrite Racing Ford Mustang GT during the 2025 Bathurst 1000. Photo / Getty Images
To win Bathurst, you need speed, yes, but you also need nerve, luck, and the Mountain to smile upon you – for Payne and Tander, all three aligned for them and the rest of the field were put to the sword.
This wasn’t a tidy stopwatch contest; it was a ceaseless knife-fight for track position through rain spray, fog, crashing cars, safety cars and fading light. The middle hours of the race were pure spectacle with tension, dice-rolling strategy, tyre calls and heart-in-the-mouth moments across the top of the Mountain all precariously balanced on a knife-edge.
James Golding may have crossed the line first, only to be demoted by a five-second penalty for nudging Cooper Murray off the track. This elevated David Reynolds and Lee Holdsworth to second and confirmed Payne and Tander as victors of the wildest race in years. Bathurst doesn’t care about scripts; it cares about judgment at 280km/h in the wet. On that count, Payne was flawless when it mattered.
Matthew Payne and co-driver Garth Tander celebrate their victory at Bathurst. Photo / Getty Images
And then, the legacy piece. Tander’s sixth Bathurst crown, 25 years after his first, sealing his status among the Mount’s immortals. It wasn’t just experience; it was mentorship and composure, a master guiding a shining star. Payne’s post-race admission that it was “absolutely insane” barely covers it. He managed the storm, dodged the carnage, and pounced when the gods cracked the door open. This was the Great Race in full, ungovernable bloom.
A once-in-a-lifetime Bathurst? Absolutely. It was messy, magnificent, and merciless. The Mountain reminded us that greatness isn’t neat, it’s noisy and difficult to achieve. If you love motorsport for its human traits of judgment, courage and heartbreak, the 2025 edition gave you everything.
