Brown Claims Bathurst Podium and Enduro Cup Crown Heading Into the Finals
Will Brown and co-driver Scott Pye have finished second in a dramatic 2026 Repco Bathurst 1000, a result that locked away the Ryco Enduro Cup for the Red Bull Ampol Racing pairing and moved Brown up to fourth in the championship ahead of the Finals Series.
Race 30 - P2
Brown showed speed all week at Mount Panorama, qualifying fourth before setting sixth in the Top 10 Shootout to secure a third-row start for Sunday's 161-lap Great Race. Pye took the start and got the Mustang away cleanly, managing his fuel in a tight lead group so Triple Eight could make an early track-position play. A sharp first stop on lap 26 vaulted Brown from fifth into the lead of the Bathurst 1000, and Brown felt that early in the day the car had what it took to fight for the win. The middle of the race brought a challenge the crew had to manage, with heavy tyre blistering costing the #888 Ford some of its edge through the long green-flag stints. Despite that, the Mustang remained firmly in podium contention as the race ran without a single Safety Car for more than 150 laps – the longest green-flag run in Bathurst 1000 history.
After his final stop on lap 143, Brown was locked in a fierce fight for position over the closing laps, defending hard enough to collect a black-and-white flag from race control. Brown admitted the car he was racing was "hard to catch and harder to pass" once it got going, and that he tried everything to hold it off before finally being passed. The race's only Safety Car, with five laps remaining, set up a three-lap sprint to the flag. Brown made the most of the restart to climb back onto the podium, and a final-lap twist at the front promoted him to second, just 1.18 seconds from victory. Brown described it as a "massive day" but a bittersweet one, explaining that all you want to do is win Bathurst – yet the team came away with the Enduro Cup, the points that come with it heading into the Finals, and fourth in the championship, exactly where they wanted to be after a tough start to the season up until Ipswich. With the Enduro Cup secured and fourth in the standings, Brown now heads home to Brisbane for a week before the Finals Series begins on the streets of Surfers Paradise – a circuit where he knows how to race fast.
"We've set ourselves up really well here for the Finals, for the Gold Coast. We're going back to Brisbane now for a week then heading down the M1 to somewhere where we know how to race fast and race well – we're going to have a crack at this Championship!”
The 2026 Supercars Championship resumes at the Boost Mobile Gold Coast 500 on 23– 25 October.