Bas Leinders recalls McLaren’s defining 2016 Bathurst victory: “It wasn’t luck

As McLaren returns to the Meguiar’s Bathurst 12 Hour grid in 2026, the story inevitably circles back to 2016, the year the marque secured a victory that helped define its modern GT3 identity.

By early 2016, McLaren’s GT programme was already well established, but it was still missing one result that truly anchored its credibility at the very top of GT3 racing. The McLaren 650S GT3, introduced the year before, had built on the foundations laid by the MP4-12C GT3 and had already won races at a high international level during 2015. What it lacked was a flagship endurance victory on a circuit that left no margin for weakness. That stage was provided by the Bathurst 12 Hour.

Back to The Mountain, ten years on

This weekend, Bas Leinders returns to Mount Panorama as sporting director and team manager of the #95 Optimum Motorsport McLaren 720S GT3, shared by Garnet Patterson, Ben Barnicoat and Marvin Kirchhöfer. A decade ago, he was part of the leadership group that guided the Tekno Autosports McLaren 650S GT3 — driven by Shane van Gisbergen, Álvaro Parente and Jonathon Webb — to one of the closest victories in Bathurst history.

“I had only joined McLaren GT a few weeks earlier,” Leinders recalls of 2016 in an exclusive interview with GT REPORT. “So I wasn’t completely aware of where the potential of the car was situated. The year before I was team principal at Marc VDS with the BMW Z4, and from the outside you could see the McLaren had potential. But they didn’t manage to extract the full potential in the race.”

Arriving in Australia, his role was initially supervisory within a joint effort between McLaren GT, Garage 59 and Tekno Autosports.

“When I arrived and spoke with [Tekno Autosports general manger] Steve Hallam, he said, ‘You can organise it here, you know what to do.’ Fairly quickly we noticed, especially with the driver line-up we had, that there was real potential to win.”

There was, however, a clear benchmark.

“The Nissan was super fast, they were just flying. So we knew we needed a little bit of luck. We felt a podium was realistic. But to actually win, we knew we had to beat that Nissan.

“In the end it wasn’t luck — it was strategy that won the race.”

Finding the right balance at Bathurst

Bathurst demands compromise more than almost any other GT3 circuit. The car must brake confidently into The Chase, remain stable across the mountain and still defend its position along Conrod Straight.

“It was a good combination,” Leinders says of the 650S GT3. “The car was stable under braking and strong in the fast corners. It was also quite decent on the straight — not as fast as the Nissan, but competitive.

“You could choose to have a very stable car in the corners and set a quick lap time, but then everyone would pass you on the straight. And you’re not going to pass them in the top section. So it was about finding the right balance — being able to stay in front on the straight while having a car that was drivable.”

That balance would prove decisive not over a single lap, but across twelve hours shaped by safety cars and attrition.

The moments that defined 2016

The 2016 Bathurst 12 Hour was attritional from the outset. Several leading cars were eliminated early, including a Lamborghini on the opening lap and the 2014-winning Ferrari later in the race. Incidents, safety cars and changing track conditions ensured that no car could simply control the race from the front.

Against that backdrop, the Tekno Autosports McLaren 650S GT3, driven by Shane van Gisbergen, Álvaro Parente and Jonathon Webb, stayed in the fight through consistency rather than dominance.

“There were two key moments — one where we could have lost it, and one where we definitely won it,” Leinders explains.

The first came during a brake change under safety car conditions. The regulations required a very specific procedure.

“We started the brake change, but there was confusion about removing the tyres and placing them behind the line. I said, ‘Put the tyres back on and go.’ If we had continued and restarted the procedure, we would have lost a lap.

“So we sent the car back out to catch the train. Once we had done that, we boxed again and completed the brake change properly a lap later. We didn’t lose a lap.”

Despite that, the McLaren remained competitive. Van Gisbergen set a new race lap record at 2m01.567s as the race moved into its final phase. A sequence of late safety cars and a well-timed final pit stop brought the Tekno entry back into contention for the lead in the closing hour.

The second key moment arrived in the final phase of the race.

“There was another safety car a little over an hour from the end. We were near the rear of the queue. Straight away Shane went on the radio and said we should box for fuel.

“At that time there was no minimum pit stop time for fuelling. Now there is — but back then there wasn’t. So we topped up with fuel, which allowed our final stop to be very short.”

As rivals were forced into longer stops in the closing stages, the McLaren cycled into the lead. One final splash-and-dash followed.

“We came out about 20 seconds ahead of Chiyo in the Nissan. He was catching us — around a second a lap. In the end we won by 1.2 seconds. We weren’t sure we were going to make it, but we did.”

The narrow margin gave McLaren its first Bathurst 12 Hour victory and delivered validation at one of GT racing’s most demanding events.

Bathurst as a reference point

The significance of the 2016 result extended well beyond Australia. Bathurst proved to be the starting point of McLaren’s most successful GT season to date. The form shown at Mount Panorama carried through into Europe, where McLaren and Garage 59 secured the Blancpain Endurance Series title with Rob Bell and Côme Ledogar, joined by van Gisbergen for all but the final round.

“I think 2016 was a very important year for McLaren in general,” Leinders says. “We won in Asia, we won GT World Challenge Endurance, we won sprint races. We showed speed, endurance and reliability.

“The accumulation of those successes was important for the future of the programme.”

One of the defining moments

For Leinders personally, the 2016 Bathurst victory remains among the high points of his career.

“Winning the 24 Hours of Spa as team principal in 2015 was a big moment,” he says. “But this was definitely a big one.”

He places the Bathurst triumph alongside championship titles and major endurance results.

“We had a podium at Daytona with Inception Racing — which is run by Optimum — and that was also really special. Then winning the GT World Challenge championship, and my personal wins in German Formula 3.”

What sets Bathurst apart, he suggests, is the leadership dimension.

“When you win a championship or a big race while trying to lead a team, maybe you feel even more satisfaction. Obviously, we are multiple people here — there’s no ‘I’ in team. But it’s definitely in the top five of my career achievements.”

A new car, the same reference

A decade on, Bathurst remains the reference point. As the GT3 field deepened, repeat success at Bathurst became harder to come by. Lessons from McLaren’s 2016 win fed directly into the development of the 720S GT3, and 2020 showed that the newer car could apply those lessons at Mount Panorama. A 59Racing-run 720S GT3, shared by Ben Barnicoat, Tom Blomqvist and Álvaro Parente, qualified third and finished second outright.

Meanwhile, Martin Kodrić, Fraser Ross and Dominic Storey drove the sister car to Silver class victory, delivering a strong overall performance among all-Pro line-ups. It was McLaren’s strongest Bathurst result since 2016 and a clear indication that the 720S GT3 remained capable of competing at the front on one of GT racing’s most demanding circuits.

Looking back at the development of the McLaren 650S GT3, Leinders sees a similar pattern later in the lifecycle of the 720S GT3.

“We saw something similar later with the 720S. It struggled a bit at the beginning. When we moved from Aston Martin to McLaren at Optimum, we started to have success in GT Open, GT World Challenge and IMSA Endurance. A year or two later, you could see more and more McLarens on the grid. People wanted to run McLaren.”

In GT3 racing, momentum is rarely instant. Platforms mature, data accumulates and confidence spreads through results. Major endurance races accelerate that process.

“Strong results in major races are very important for that,” Leinders adds. “I don’t work for McLaren anymore, but I still have a lot of history with them.”

The return in 2026

Ten years after that breakthrough, McLaren returns to Mount Panorama with the evolved 720S GT3 platform. Optimum Motorsport fields the #95 entry in the Pro class, with Patterson, Barnicoat and Kirchhöfer forming a line-up capable of fighting at the front.

“Expectations are quite high,” Leinders says. “Garnet is a local driver and knows the track very well. He’s shown strong pace in LMP2 and GT machinery. Marvin and Ben are both very quick in the McLaren. We have a driver line-up capable of being at the front.”

Balance of Performance — overseen by SRO technical director Claude Surmont — will inevitably influence the competitive picture.

“Historically SRO has done a good job balancing the cars. So we hope that will be the case here as well.

“Our aim is definitely to be on the podium. To win is difficult, but we are here to be in the mix.”

For McLaren, Bathurst has repeatedly marked turning points, moments where potential was tested against reality. In 2016, strategy turned opportunity into legacy. In 2026, the brand returns not chasing memory, but continuing a story that has long been intertwined with The Mountain.

David Gallagher contributed to this report.

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🎙️ Interviews | Tony D’Alberto confident after top-six qualifying for Bathurst 12 Hour | Cameron Waters after Bathurst 12 Hour pole | Bas Leinders recalls McLaren’s defining 2016 Bathurst victory | Alex Fontana on the mental challenge of Bathurst | Marco Mapelli prepares for Huracán’s final farewell at Bathurst | Bathurst king Jules Gounon and the art of going fast at Mount Panorama