Mark Winterbottom: Karting, Ford Titles and the 2013 Bathurst 1000 Win

Mark Winterbottom is an Australian racing driver who rose from karting and Formula Ford to a long career in V8 Supercars. He won the 2015 championship for Ford, took the 2013 Bathurst 1000 alongside Steven Richards, and later became a co-driver in the endurance rounds. Born on 20 May 1981, he has scaled back to endurance events since 2025.

How did Mark Winterbottom start racing?

Winterbottom began in motorbike racing, competing in club-level 50 cc events before moving up to the 80 cc class. Those early fields included riders such as Anthony Gobert and Chad Reed, and he raced whenever his football schedule allowed. He also took a dirt Mini-Speedcar to the NSW and ACT State Championships and won both.

Soccer was a serious part of his youth. He started playing at six, was competing with a state-level team, Blacktown United, by the age of eleven, and then made the decision to give up the sport at eleven so he could concentrate on motor racing. From that point on, cars and bikes were the only real focus.

From karts to a Ford title and a Bathurst win, Winterbottom built a career on endurance-ready consistency.

How successful was Winterbottom in karting?

Karting was where Winterbottom built his reputation. He entered his first kart race in the Cadet class at Wollongong in New South Wales and kept racing karts until he was 21. Over that stretch he won ten Australian Kart Championships and 25 state Kart Championships, and his national titles included six Clubman Light crowns, three Junior National Lights and one Junior Clubman.

His international results came in patches. In 1998 a family holiday in America brought a last-minute entry in a karting event nearby, and he went on to win the Knoxville State Championship title race. In 1999 he was invited to the Suzuka Champions Kart race in Japan, and in 2001 he was crowned Australian Formula A Kart Champion.

What did Winterbottom achieve in Formula Ford?

Winterbottom moved into open-wheel racing in 2001 with a debut in the Victorian Formula Ford Championship. He won four races from six rounds, missing one round because of karting commitments, and finished runner-up. That result earned him the Ford Kart Stars Scholarship Championship, which gave him a Ford-supported drive in the 2002 Australian Formula Ford Championship.

In 2002 he finished second in the national series with two round victories, five race wins and two pole positions. The title went to Jamie Whincup, who later became one of his main rivals in V8 Supercars. Winterbottom was presented with the 2002 Avon Formula Ford Rookie of the Year Award for the season.

How did his touring car career begin?

Winterbottom entered touring cars in 2003 with Stone Brothers Racing (SBR) in the Konica V8 Supercar Series. He won the series title in his debut season, with five round victories and six pole positions. Two of his race wins came from rear-of-field reverse grid starts, and an engine failure at the fifth round at Phillip Island cost him a clean sweep of the championship.

That same year he made his V8 Supercars debut at the Sandown 500 and the Bathurst 1000 with SBR, sharing a BA Falcon with Mark Noske. They finished 11th at Sandown, qualified 16th at Bathurst and then retired at three-quarter distance while running third with engine problems. He also received the Mike Kable Young Gun Award that season.

Winterbottom then joined Larkham Motor Sport for the 2004 and 2005 seasons. His debut season there included a fifth-place finish at Bathurst and a sixth at Sandown, and his best qualifying result in 2005 was fifth at the Darwin round. The low point was the China round, where a loose drain cover punctured the chassis floor and damaged his seat, but he was not hurt.

Why was the move to Ford Performance Racing important?

In 2006 Winterbottom joined Ford Performance Racing (FPR) to drive the number 5 Ford Credit Falcon, a seat he held for the 2006 and 2007 seasons. It tied him closer to Ford Australia, whose support had run through his karting and open-wheel years, and it made him the lead driver of one of the category's major Ford teams.

His first V8 Supercars round win came at the 2006 Betta Electrical 500, co-driving with Jason Bright. He added second places at Pukekohe and Surfers Paradise, climbed from 22nd to third in the standings by midseason, and finished third in the Drivers' Championship in only his third full season in the category. He took nine top-ten finishes that year.

In 2007 he finished fifth in the championship. His highlight was a first solo round win at the Desert 400 in Bahrain, which kept FPR unbeaten at that international round. He also earned four poles, including his first at Pukekohe Park, and that run of qualifying form gave him the 2007 V8 Supercars Pole Award. He also went off late while leading the Bathurst 1000.

The 2008 season was strong. He dominated the BigPond 400 at Barbagallo Raceway in Perth, taking pole and winning all three races, and he also won the City of Ipswich 400 at Queensland Raceway. Those results lifted him to second in the championship, just behind Whincup.

When did Winterbottom win his first championship?

The 2015 season was his breakthrough. Prodrive Racing Australia, the new name for FPR after Ford reduced its support, debuted the Ford FG X Falcon, and Winterbottom won all four races at the non-championship V8 Supercars Challenge held at the Australian Grand Prix. He followed with eight race wins in the middle of the year, including a clean sweep at the Castrol Edge Townsville 400.

The title was decided in the final round, the Sydney 500, where he beat Craig Lowndes. Later that year he won the Wilson Security Sandown 500 with Steve Owen, his ninth win of the year, and then finished second at the Supercheap Auto Bathurst 1000. The championship gave Ford its first title in five years.

Did Winterbottom win the Bathurst 1000?

Yes. He won the Supercheap Auto Bathurst 1000 on 13 October 2013 alongside his former teammate Steven Richards. That year he struggled to find early form and finished fourth in the championship with three race wins, although his teammate Will Davison finished third and helped FPR climb to second in the Teams' Championship for the first time.

Bathurst also brought frustration. In 2014 he came close to back-to-back wins late in the race before an incident with an attacking Craig Lowndes dropped him down the order. He recovered to fifth. The title hopes that season were stronger: he led the championship by 161 points after the June Triple Crown, but he won no races after the Darwin round. Shane van Gisbergen's win in the final race demoted him to third.

What does Winterbottom's championship record look like?

What happened in his later years at Tickford and Team 18?

Winterbottom stayed with the Ford team as it became Tickford Racing in 2018, then left at the end of that season after 13 years with the organisation. His record at that point stood at 412 race starts, 38 wins, 35 poles and 117 podiums. The final year was difficult, and he finished 12th in the championship.

He moved to Team 18 for 2019, which meant his first time driving a Holden. Team 18 recorded its first race victory in 2023 at the Darwin Triple Crown, and Winterbottom was the driver behind it. He was replaced by Anton De Pasquale at the end of 2024, after six years with the team. Contract talks with PremiAir Racing and Brad Jones Racing did not produce a full-time drive for 2025.

Did Winterbottom race outside Australia?

He did, mainly in Brazil. In 2014 and 2015 he appeared in the season-opening two-driver round of Stock Car Brasil for Voxx Racing. In 2014 he and Sergio Jimenez finished fourth at the Autodromo Jose Carlos Pace, and in 2015 he and Marcos Gomes finished second at the Autodromo Ayrton Senna. Gomes went on to win his own championship that year.

Winterbottom returned to the series in 2018 and finished 11th at the Autodromo Jose Carlos Pace with Atila Abreu, despite starting from the back of the grid. When his Tickford stint ended, he was offered a full-time place in the championship for 2019. He called the opportunity appealing but turned it down because the offer was not a binding contract.

Where does Winterbottom race now?

Winterbottom retired from full-season driving at the end of the 2024 Supercars Championship. He carried on as a co-driver for Tickford Racing in the endurance rounds, partnering Cameron Waters in 2025. The pair finished second at The Bend 500 that year. He currently drives the No. 6 Ford Mustang S650 with Waters in endurance events.

In 2026 he rejoined Waters at Tickford, but his most dramatic run came at the Darwin Triple Crown. Thomas Randle had felt unwell after qualifying, and Winterbottom was asked to race Randle's car in the final race. He received the news an hour before the start while he was working on commentary for the Super2 support race.

What else is Winterbottom known for?

Away from the track he has a wider public profile. He voiced Frosty Winterbumper in the Australian release of the 2011 Pixar film Cars 2, and in the same year he appeared as a contestant in season three of the Seven Network's Australia's Greatest Athlete. In 2015 he played in the EJ Whitten Legends Game, an Australian rules charity match raising money and awareness for prostate cancer, and he trained with Essendon Football Club before it.

His early schooling took place at Doonside Technology High School. His father, Jim Winterbottom, was a sprintcar champion and later chairman of the Sprintcar Control Council of Australia, so the sport was part of family life from the start.