Mixed yet promising start to the GT4 Australia season for Summer Rintoule at Phillip Island

Having switched to the McLaren Artura platform, Summer Rintoule and Jarred Hughes familiarized with the new car over the GT4 Australia season opener, and despite some challenges and bad luck from a difficult qualifying, the Method Motorsport duo achieved a top ten in the silver class in Race 2 at Phillip-Island.

Photo credits: Jack Martin Photography

Summer Rintoule and Jarred Hughes are getting used to their new McLaren GT4 from the Method Motorsport team and achieved a top ten in the silver class as a weekend's best at Phillip-Island to open their GT4 Australia's season.

Rintoule enjoyed a really strong 2025 campaign, finishing third in the Silver class championship standings with six podiums to her name.

Starting a new chapter in 2026 with the McLaren Artura GT4 after switching from the Mercedes AMG GT4 platform, the duo faced a learning-oriented weekend with some challenges, but showcased good potential straight from free practice, placing in the silver-class top five in FP1.

A wet qualifying however brought two tricky sessions, as Jarrod Hughes qualified the car P25 in Q1 with a 1:56.312 and Rintoule took over in Q2, slotting into P30 with a 1:56.182 time, which would force the team to to charging through the pack in both races.

Just like for the GT World Challenge Australia race, the weather conditions at the start of the first Monochrome GT4 Australia Series race were somewhat mixed, with intermittent wet patches on the track - but otherwise it was mostly dry, which meant that the racing line didn't offer optimal grip.

Hughes started his first race in the team's new McLaren from 25th position. He got off to a good start and gained several positions. Further up the field, things weren't going so smoothly, as one of the Porsches lost fluid after a slight contact and eventually had to retire. The fluid on the track brought out the first Safety Car, before any major crash could happen.

The restart took place with 44 cars remaining, and Hughes managed to work his way up to 17th overall. However, over the following two laps, he would drop back to 19th, before both Hughes and Souter, ahead of him, received a 5-second penalty for an infraction at the start of the race. As a result, they had to wait longer for the driver change.

The team pitted towards the end of the pit stop window and Summer Rintoule took over the wheel, rejoining the race in 18th place overall. She battled Koutsoimidis' Toyota but was initially overtaken by Lillis in the Porsche. At the start of the second half of her stint, Rintoule also managed to pass the Toyota, thus regaining her starting position. 18th place was also the team's final position, eleventh in the silver class.

Photo credits: Jack Martin Photography

Summer Rintoule started the second race from 30th place overall. However she immediately begun to move up the order with a strong start, closing in on the top-25 by the end of the first lap.

The start was generally calm, with only a few cars briefly sliding off the track, but they could recover without issues.

The following laps also remained largely uneventful. Especially in the mid pack, where Rintoule was driving, the positions seemed to be settled. Up front, however, the story is quite different: in the battle for second place, Harvey in the #227 Ford Mustang made contact with the car in front after 19 minutes, forcing it wide in the corner. While trying to use the newly created space to secure second place in the fast uphill section, his rival didn't gave up position easily and remained alongside him through the fast corners. The two cars finally collided in the next fast right-hander, with Harvey being spun around and crashed into the wall at high speed. He escaped uninjured, but the car was badly damaged and the safety car was deployed.

The race resumed with 29 minutes remaining, right in the middle of the pit stop window. Since this was anticipated, race control announced that the pits would open at minute 27. Rintoule, along with several other teams, pitted upon the restart: with this undercut, during which Hughes took over, the duo moved up to 12th place overall.

At the end of the pit stops, they were already in 10th place overall, behind Shearer in the #46 Porsche. The battle didn't last long, however, as Hughes overtook him after just 5 minutes. Hughes was now really getting into his stride, and after only another 5 minutes, he had caught up with and overtaken Murrey in the BMW. And that wasn't all. Another few minutes later, he briefly snatched the lead from Tracey, who was able to fight back and stay ahead.

Hughes still gained another position when Sorensen dropped behind him due to a penalty. After their stint, Rintoule explained that the McLaren was quite a different car from the Mercedes: “This thing is like a little go-kart on wheels, but it is definitely super fun to drive. Definitely still adapting to it here and there and still learning a whole lot about it. But today, apart from the first couple of laps where I accidentally made a little mistake, it was definitely a positive and ripping out some fast lap times toward the end.”

Along with several other teams, however, Method Motorsport was then investigated for an illegal pit stop, having entered the pits behind the safety car at the restart. The safety car period was therefore not yet considered fully over, as neither the race leader had crossed the line nor was the safety car back in its designated position in the pits. All the affected teams received a 20-second time penalty and as a result, Hughes and Rintoule dropped from 7th overall to 13th place after the race. They nevertheless still bagged an eighth place finish in the Silver class.

The next race is the “Liqui Moly GT Festival the Bend” from May 8th to 10th, where the team will aim to build on last year's successes there.