Evans gives Ferrari 2025 opener

Jaxon Evans kept a charging Jayden Ojeda at bay in a nail-biting GT World Challenge Australia opener at Phillip Island.

Evans and Elliott Schutte controlled the entire 34-lap race, but they only just held on with Ojeda and coming within 0.2593s.

Ojeda started the final stint down in sixth, but flew home and came so close to a first-up win.

There was also high drama in the battle for third which ended up going to consistent Kiwis Brendon Leitch and Tim Miles.

Broc Feeney and Brad Schumacher looked destined to be on the podium after a quick pit stop, only for a final lap puncture to deny them silverware.

This saw the #888 fall to ninth as Dorian Boccolacci and Shane Smollen secured fourth, while Liam Talbot and Declan Fraser impressively salvaged a top five after being sent from pole to the back of the grid due to being around 300g under fuelled.

Ben Schoots and Shane Woodman dominated the fight for Am honours as Renae Gracie suffered a penalty for a pit infringement.

“Obviously Jayden was coming home pretty fast, but this was down to Elliot’s hard work. He controlled the race from the start and managed the Safety Car restarts, so I just had to bring it home,” Evans said.

“It was pretty intense out there, the car was a bit loose, but this is awesome,” Schutte said.

After a thrilling qualifying, anticipation was high for a competitive opening race under perfect skies at Phillip Island.

Only 15 cars took part with no Grant Donaldson in the #111 due to gearbox gremlins.

With Fraser not enjoying pole, the contest for the lead was open and Pires made a mighty start and being brave around the outside of Doohan gave the Mercedes track position at Southern Loop to snare the lead.

However, it was not for long as Schutte used the Ferrari’s speed to fly past in the run up to Hayshed.

Right behind the leading pair was Schumacher, who survived two big divebombs from Rosser at Miller Corner.

Starting from the back, Talbot wasted no time in making a statement by posting the fastest lap of the race on his way from last to ninth in just three laps.

A hot pace was being set with just 2s covering the top five who were sprinting away from the pack.

Everything was condensed at the 16 minute mark when the Safety Car arrived to retrieve the #16 of Woodman, who spun at Miller Corner.

On Lap 14 it was third time lucky for Rosser at the same hairpin.

After two close calls, the #268 finally snared third from Schumacher with a well-executed dive at the end of the opening stint.

Due to being the opening race, no pit stop compensation time meant it was the only unimpacted race of the year.

The first drivers to box were the Am steerers on Lap 13 with Gracie leading Koundouris.

Three laps later as soon as the window opened all the Pro contenders followed each other into the lane.

It caused some chaos with Smollen having a close call on pit entry, but more drama was the come.

There was contact in the fast lane when Peroni was released into the path of King and the #268 was slapped with a 10s penalty for the clash.

At the end of all the drama, Evans remained in the lead in the #26 Arise Racing Ferrari as Feeney in the #888 Audi shot from fourth to second.

Peroni was third over King as Leitch in the #7 Kiwi Audi rounded out the top five.

The yellows returned just a handful of laps later at the 38 minute mark for the stopped Steven Brooks.

At the restart the fight for third on the track ignited between Peroni, Boccolacci, Ojeda and Leitch with the Mercedes factory driver the big winner.

Boccolacci was the big loser falling down to sixth as Leitch and Ojeda made moves up the order.

The Kiwi initially seized on the opportunity to snare fourth on the run up to Siberia, only for Ojeda to pick him off a handful of corners later.

Leitch lost momentum and touch with the top four that was split by just 1.2s ahead of the final 12 minutes.

Whilst a penalty was always going to drop Peroni out of contention, he did himself no favours by dropping a wheel in the dirt coming out of Siberia and falling from third to fourth.

This only helped Ojeda further as he completed his climb to the top three and he was not done.

The Mercedes driver went on the attack against Feeney and won the battle for second after some great door-to-door racing from Miller Corner to MG.

This left Ojeda with seven minutes to hunt down the 2s lead Evans had built.

He only needed half of that time to get it less than a second, setting up a nail-biting run to the flag.

But Evans rose to the challenge when he needed by posting personal best lap on the penultimate lap of the race.

Just half a second covered them when they took the white flag and Ojeda forced Evans to cover at MG.

But he could not quite get close enough as just two tenths was the difference in a grandstand finish.

The drama was not over as Feeney lost third in heartbreaking fashion with a final-lap fresh tyre seeing them slump to ninth.

The beneficiary was Leitch, who held off Boccolacci and was rewarded with a podium.

After a competitive opener, the second GT World Challenge race is at 13.45 AEST on Sunday.

GT World Challenge Australia Race 1 results

Pos Drivers Class Time

1 J.Evans/E.Schutte PA 01:00:08.9034

2 J.Ojeda/P.Lucchitti PA 01:00:09.1627

3 B.Leitch/T.Miles PA 01:00:14.9859

4 D.Boccolacci/S.Smollen PA 01:00:15.3527

5 D.Fraser/L.Talbot PA 01:00:21.5888

6 J.Love/S.Wyatt PA 01:00:21.9870

7 A.Peroni/M.Rosser PA 01:00:29.3807

8 G.King/S.Pires PA 01:00:37.7029

9 B. Feeney/B.Schumacher PA 01:00:41.0885

10 B.Schoots/S.Woodman AM 01:00:50.6379

11 T.D’Alberto/A.Deitz PA 01:00:55.1397

12 Renee Gracie AM 01:01:32.1206 

13 Steve Brooks PA 01:01:36.6040

DNF J.Koundouris/T.Koundouris AM 53:46.5781

DNF A.Pedersen/P.Pedersen PA 44:21.6335

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