AUDI FACTORY driver and triple Porsche Supercup Champion Rene Rast will replace Craig Lowndes at this year’s Liqui-Moly Bathurst 12 Hour.

The 29-year-old German will return to the Mountain with the Jamec-Pem racing outfit with one Bathurst start to his credit: he finished fifth in a Phoenix Racing Audi R8 LMS Ultra in 2014, sharing with Rahel Frey and Laurens Vanthoor.

Rast was announced as Lowndes’ replacement this morning on Sunrise by Garth Tander, who spoke with 7 Sport host Mark Beretta about the 2016 race, losing Lowndes and gaining the experienced and fast German replacement.

“We had to find a replacement driver to share the car.. the phone was pretty busy when Craig announced he was out yesterday,” Tander said.

“We’ve secured one of Audi’s top level factory drivers in Rene Rast. It’s huge shoes to fill, but when you talk about GT racing in Europe this guy is no. 1. It says a lot about the race and how it’s growing that Audi are prepared to send a guy like him out.

“There’s going to be 40 cars, 15 V8 Supercars drivers and some of the best drivers from around the world. It’s not just a 12-hour cruise around!”

Rast won the 2014 ADAC GT Masters series in Germany and has two starts in the annual LeMans 24 Hour classic – one of them with the factory Audi LMP 1 squad. Teaming with Marco Bonanomi and Filipe Albuquerque in an Audi R18 E-Tron Quattro, Rast finished seventh outright. He finished fourth in the LMP2 class the previous year driving for Sebastien Loeb Racing.

In 2015 Rast drove Audi race cars across the world: He raced in the IMSA United Sports Car Championship in the GT Daytona Class, the German VLN Series at the Nurburgring and in the Blancpain Endurance Series. He also was one of several drivers representing the brand at the FIA GT World Cup at Macau last November.