Jules Gounon survived a late puncture to take a first Bathurst 12 Hour win for Bentley amid an ongoing threat of rain, alongside Maxime Soulet and Jordan Pepper.
The #7 Continental was in the fight all afternoon, leading at both the race's half and three-quarter marks during a see-sawing battle with the #999 GruppeM Mercedes.
It ultimately came down to the final round of stops, with Gounon lucky to stay in the fight after suffering a puncture down the Conrod Straight before taking a lead he'd hold until the end.
The Raffaele Marciello/Maximilian Buhk/Felipe Fraga AMG then had a late tyre drama of its own when a puncture inside the final 10 minutes led to an unscheduled stop.
Marciello briefly dropped to third before fighting back to second on the penultimate lap, but was then dumped to sixth after the race thanks to a 30-second penalty for not switching the car off while fitting a new tyre.
That promoted the Tom Blomqvist/Alvaro Parente/Ben Barnicoat McLaren from third to second, and the #888 Mercedes of Shane van Gisbergen, Jamie Whincup and Maximilian Goetz to third.
As Soulet sprinted out front after the ninth-hour restart, there was some spirited racing behind the leader. Goetz, struggling in second on stint-old tyres in the #888 Mercedes, came under fire from Buhk in the #999 entry.
They went side-by-side down to Murrays at one point, with Goetz lucky to hang on to the spot. The GruppeM car finally got past on the 9.5-hour mark when Buhk barged his way into second at The Chase.
Twenty minutes later, the car made its penultimate stop, but did not take tyres in a bid to grab the lead.
It worked when Soulet stopped right on the 10-hour mark to hand over to Gounon, who emerged behind the Mercedes.
As the penultimate stint wore on, Gounon worked his way to the back of Marciello, but could not find a way past. With a little over an hour left, the battle spilled back into the pitlane when Marciello made his final stop, which pressed new leader Gounon into action.
The Frenchman set a fastest segment in sector one and went green in sector two before his right-rear tyre let go on the run down Conrod.
The damage was minimised by being close to pit entry, which meant the Bentley could be serviced and returned to the track ahead of the Mercedes - with Marciello's cause not helped by being stuck behind the #12 EBM Porsche on his out-lap.
With half an hour to go, Gounon had settled into an 8s lead and his greatest threat to victory was a lingering threat of rain.
But, despite strong winds and a cool change in temperature, the rain held off until the exact moment Gounon crossed the line to take an emotional victory.
Punctures proved costly for the lead Mercedes crews. First to lose out was the #77 Craft-Bamboo car, which lost third place to an unnecessary stop with 25 minutes to go.
Then the #999 Mercedes suffered a failure inside the final 10 minutes, which briefly dropped it to third, before Marciello stormed back past Blomqvist at Murrays on the penultimate lap.
But officials hitting the car with a 30s post-race penalty for Marciello having the engine running during the stop.
That left the #999 in sixth, with the #888 moving up to the final spot on the podium. The #911 Absolute Porsche finished fourth and the #77 Mercedes fifth, followed by the #999 Mercedes and the #912 Porsche.
The second 59Racing McLaren of Fraser Ross/Dominic Storey/Martin Kodric finished an outstanding eighth overall, and as the clear winner of the Silver class.
Pro-Am honours went to the #4 Gove Racing Porsche driven by Ben Barker, Stephen Grove and Brenton Grove, which finished 10th.
The Invitational Class winner was the #91 MARC II of Nick Percat, Broc Feeney and Aaron Cameron, while the #13 RHC Jorgensen/Strom BMW of Daren Jorgensen, Brett Strom and Danny van Dongen won Class C.
