Extraordinary finale cannot cover up a glaring Bathurst 1000 problem

After a third snoozer of a Bathurst 1000 in four years, something needs to change in the Gen3 Supercar.

Hear me out.

Sunday’s race was on the verge of going safety car free for the first time since 1991 before Chaz Mostert crashed at Forrests Elbow with five laps to go.

Yes, the three lap dash to the end was sensational, and gave us the grandstand finish every fan had been hoping for.

But 18.3km of brilliance does not offset 981.7km of ... whatever that was.

Sure, last year’s edition was an all-time classic, but that was more or less triggered by the terrible weather conditions that set in over Mount Panorama in the latter part of the race.

But 2023, 2024 and nearly all of 2026? Sheesh.

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Drivers all weekend were complaining about a bad batch of brakes that meant they didn’t have the confidence when they jumped on the anchors.

But it didn't really matter anyway. The aero package meant it was tough to follow other cars, and if they managed to be close behind up and down the long straights, the Camaro in particular seemed to have an advantage.

Look, I get it. Not every race can be a classic. We see crap games week in, week out in the AFL and NRL.

But when your showpiece event, which attracts the casual fans, regularly offers little reason for them to stay tuned, something needs to change.

In 2023, the blame was put on the soft tyre, which Supercars elected to run at Mount Panorama to ensure the then-new Gen3 cars remained quicker than the second-tier Super2 category, which ran the older-style cars.

It’s still as ridiculous a sentence to write now as it was then. Instead of pushing hard, the drivers were nursing the soft tyres to maximise the fuel stints.

In 2024, there was a distinct lack of strategic variation. There was also only one safety car to bunch up the pack.

The 2025 race was punctuated by safety cars, but there was still a feeling everyone was more or less waiting for the forecast rain to hit.

And when it did, the race turned into a thriller.

A lack of safety cars can be attributed to the reliability of this Gen3 car and the professionalism of the drivers.

Long gone are the days when simply reaching the finish line is an achievement. Now, it’s expected.

The drivers, too, are the best they’ve ever been. They simply do not make mistakes. The worst driver in Sunday’s race would more than likely have been able to go blow-for-blow against Brock, Moffat, Johnson et al at their best.

Late in Sunday’s race, the amount of tyre marbles – pieces of rubber that flick off the tyres – that had settled off the racing line was incredible. Any driver that slipped up and ended up on the marbles would have booked themselves a one-way ticket to the concrete wall.

But they just didn't, which is a testament to them.

The pace of the race was blistering. The average speed was about 170km/h all day, and to be able to maintain that level of concentration is mind-boggling.

I’m not an engineer and I don’t have the answer to all the problems.

But hopefully, someone who is, does.