{"id":571527,"date":"2026-03-29T06:33:16","date_gmt":"2026-03-29T06:33:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/571527\/"},"modified":"2026-03-29T06:33:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-29T06:33:16","slug":"sro-gt-news-ojeda-lucchitti-win-dramatic-gt-finale-at-phillip-island","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/571527\/","title":{"rendered":"SRO GT news: Ojeda\/Lucchitti win dramatic GT finale at Phillip Island"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" fetchpriority=\"high\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/SRO-PI-Speedcafe-GTWC-045-e1774756923689.jpg\" alt=\"Ojeda\/Lucchitti win dramatic GT finale at Phillip Island\"\/><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tJayden Ojeda and Paul Lucchitti won the final GT World Challenge Australia race at Phillip Island while drivers came to blows behind. Image: InSyde Media<\/p>\n<p>Supercars rookie Ojeda led from pole position and never looked back, building an impressive lead early on over the Ferrari of Jaxon Evans and Mercedes of Brendon Leitch.<\/p>\n<p>Lucchitti and Ojeda rebounded from a DNF on Saturday and brought the Tigani Mercedes-AMG home 3.3s ahead of Elliot Schutte and Evans, with reigning champion Brad Schumacher rounding out the podium alongside Broc Feeney.<\/p>\n<p>Ryan Wood worked his way past Feeney at the race start and attempted to work his way around the outside of Leitch.<\/p>\n<p>Will Davison had an enormous slide in the middle of Turn 1, while simultaneously, contact from Leitch sent Wood sliding sideways off the road.<\/p>\n<p>All drivers continued with minimal damage, but not before Josh Hunt was spun at Turn 2, drawing the safety car.<\/p>\n<p>After the restart, Ojeda continued to lead while Davison came together with Paul Stokell at Turn 10, taking the Ferrari out of the race.<\/p>\n<p>A heart-stopping moment came when Leitch almost collided with the rear of Evans as the lead group entered the pit lane.<\/p>\n<p>Schumacher took over the Team MPC Audi from Feeney, but the combination of 15 seconds success penalty, and a slight hold up in the pit lane behind Shane Smollen meant that Steve Brooks was able to undercut the pair in the Audi vacated by Wood.<\/p>\n<p>As Schumacher attempted a recovery mission from seventh position, he worked his way past Smollen at Turn 2, resulting in the Mercedes ending up in the gravel.<\/p>\n<p>The safety car was drawn to recover Smollen\u2019s car, with the green flag coming back out with just under four minutes remaining.<\/p>\n<p>Lucchitti\u2019s lead evaporated, setting up a grandstand finish as Mark Rosser was the fastest car on the circuit in fourth place.<\/p>\n<p>Rosser\u2019s speed ultimately ended in trouble, when a late dive at Turn 4 on the final lap resulted in heavy contact with Sergio Pires.<\/p>\n<p>A frustrated Pires climbed from the stricken Mercedes, slamming the door in disgust as Rosser crossed the line in sixth position.<\/p>\n<p>Rosser was subsequently handed a 40 second penalty, dropping him and Thomas Randle to 10th place.<\/p>\n<p>The battle for the Trophy class was not without trouble.<\/p>\n<p>Alex Gardner and Lee Stibbs won the class in ninth outright, despite Gardner exploring the gravel trap in the mid-part of the race.<\/p>\n<p>Gardner led home Stokell and Matt Stoupas in 12th, while Luke Youlden and Nathan Halstead failed to finish from opening lap damage.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/t.cfjump.com\/92797\/b\/294243\" rel=\"nofollow sponsored noopener\" data-bid=\"1\" data-no-instant=\"1\" target=\"_blank\"><br \/><img decoding=\"async\" style=\"border: none; vertical-align: middle;\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/294243.gif\" alt=\"\"\/><br \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jayden Ojeda and Paul Lucchitti won the final GT World Challenge Australia race at Phillip Island while drivers&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":571528,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,131633,50558,806,805,803,804,254712,85],"class_list":["post-571527","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motosport","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-gt-world-challenge-australia","tag-jayden-ojeda","tag-motor","tag-motor-sports","tag-motosport","tag-motosports","tag-speedseries","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571527","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=571527"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571527\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/571528"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=571527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=571527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=571527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}