BATHURST 1000 specialist Warren Luff has shed light on a little-discussed but noticeable change that will come into play at the 2023 Great Race.
The larger fuel tanks installed in the Gen3 Supercars is set to allow for far longer stints this October than in recent years.
In the Gen2 era, a stint at Bathurst tended to hover around 22-23 laps in length.
That could become 30 laps in the new-generation cars, courtesy of the fuel tank capacity rising by more than 20 litres.
That creates two potential shifts.
One is that the minimum number of compulsory pit stops could be lowered from seven – this figure is yet to be confirmed by the category.
The other is that a co-driver could be able to complete the entirety of their 54-lap requirement in one double stint.
That could entice teams to have their primary driver start the race, then get their co-driver out of the way by virtue of a double stint, before having the primary take over for the run home.
“When we look forward to Bathurst there’s a few things that are going to be new for everyone there, besides just the car,” Luff, who’ll race for Team 18 on a loan deal, told the Castrol Motorsport News podcast.
“Obviously we’re doing it on the soft tyre this year and with the fuel capacity we’re going to get back to longer stints and everything like that.
“So how that soft tyre holds up for potentially, I think some of the talk was that we might be looking at 30-lap stints or something like that, which kind of gets us back to the old days of a 30-lap stint.
“It’s going to be very interesting but obviously exciting.”
The 2023 edition is the first Great Race which will be run on Dunlop’s soft compound tyre.
Despite the likely need to run further than the hard compound rubber had done in previous years, there is confidence that the soft will be up to the task based on evidence gathered so far this season.
With less weight and downforce to deal with, the Gen3 cars are putting less load through the tyres, which are still wearing but not experiencing steep drop-off in performance.
Dunlop has spoken of its openness to developing a new tyre for Gen3, but V8 Sleuth understands that the current range almost certainly will be retained for the 2024 season.