Supercars Gen 3 (2022)

[one five five]

Originally Posted by AnnoyedMoose

Don't get why it's such a big deal if one or even both of the cars isn't being made anymore. The days of people buying cars because they see it on the race track are long gone and these cars have nothing to do with their road counterparts other than the shape.

It’s a big deal because Supercars themselves have sold Gen3 to the public on it being market relevant and how the cars look like the road cars.

Supercars stakeholders have also previously said they didn’t want the series to look like a “used car lot” referring to running old unsold models

How long after this year will “Chevrolet Racing” be a thing in Australia running the old Camaro?

[chunterer]

Presumably the commercial guys are working overtime behind the scenes to try and rope in one or two more manufacturers?
Nissan or Toyota I guess are the most obvious targets as both have big v8 coupes they could use and are well known locally?

[AnnoyedMoose]

If the public were that bothered they would be supporting TCR in droves. They're not so whatever the money behind SuperCars might want or say it's irrelevant and just shows how out of touch they are. After all the best selling "cars" in Australia (and most countries) these days are SUV's, 4x4s and pickup trucks. The public doesn't care about cars anymore.

[V8 Fireworks]

Originally Posted by chunterer

Nissan or Toyota I guess are the most obvious targets as both have big v8 coupes

What?

It seems logical to include the turbocharged six cylinder Nissan Z and Toyota Supra as they are the direct competitors to the Ford Mustang, though the Lexus LC500 or RCF are certainly great vehicles.

Originally Posted by AnnoyedMoose

If the public were that bothered they would be supporting TCR in droves.

Formula 1 is more popular than V8 Supercars in Australia now -- noting the Australian GP with a sellout status that exceeds rival ATCC street races -- and it includes brands like Mercedes-Benz, Honda, Renault, Alpine, McLaren, Aston Martin, Alfa Romeo and Ferrari. Ford will be joining the series in 2026, however.

Even at the Australian GP, grandstands tend to be more full for Formula One sessions than ATCC sessions, for whatever reason -- even though both categories are included in the program and therefore the race ticket.

Originally Posted by Mixer

I also don't get why people who are TCR fans worry about this so much. Many of the cars running around in TCR are old shapes.

At least there are vehicles there for Audi, VW, Alfa Romeo, Peugeot, Renault or Honda enthusiasts to cheer on at all.

The ATCC offers little to engage the enthusiasm of Alfitsis & Tifosi, Honda enthusiasts, Renault enthusiasts etc, unlike Formula One or TCR.

If I was the organiser of the Adelaide 500, I would consider making the ATCC a support category and bringing in FIA WEC as the headline race with a 6 hour race. I imagine hosting fees are much more reasonable than Formula One.

[Mixer]

Originally Posted by V8 Fireworks

The ATCC offers little to engage the enthusiasm of Alfitsis & Tifosi, Honda enthusiasts, Renault enthusiasts etc, unlike Formula One or TCR.

Just a pity none of them show up.

It's not far off becoming the GRM show like S5000, which is a concern.

Let's see if they can get more than 20 entries in one of them once they are in a mainland round.

[Tourer]

Originally Posted by V8 Fireworks

Formula 1 is more popular than V8 Supercars in Australia now -- noting the Australian GP with a sellout status that exceeds rival ATCC street races.

Even at the Australian GP, grandstands tend to be more full for Formula One sessions than ATCC sessions, for whatever reason -- even though both categories are included in the program and therefore the race ticket.

You've put forward the same argument that F1 is more popular than Supercars in Oz before, using the same logic based off crowd at the AGP. Again this time, it doesn't fly. AGP is a one-off event, the only time to see the Fi World Championship live in Oz, Supercars is a national series with many rounds. Supercars street circuits are shorter than Albert Park, with less crowd space & could sell out but still have less crowd than the AGP. Given the marquee nature of the event, if the AGP didn't exceed crowd size at Supercars events there'd be something very wrong. "more popular" would actually be assessed across a range of measurements & right now I couldn't tell you which would come out on top - be an interesting discussion but basing a judgement on one event doesn't stack up. If you REALLY wanted to do that though, you'd compare TV audience for the AGP with TV audience for the Bathurst 1000 - on that basis, Supercars is "more popular" - very flawed reasoning.

Of course there are less in the grandstands for Supercars than F1 - F1 is the "main event", the reason for many being there, whereas Supercars is a support & like any support does not draw the same interest as the "main event". It is an important part of the program though and AGP was on record some years ago about the millions $ wise that Supercars brings to the event - which is why Supercars gets its own pit lane, so yes, smaller than F1 at the AGP (as you'd expect) but still significant.

If I was the organiser of the Adelaide 500, I would consider making the ATCC a support category and bringing in FIA WEC as the headline race with a 6 hour race. I imagine hosting fees are much more reasonable than Formula One.

They tried that - over 20 years ago. Staged the "race of a thousand years" at the Millennium (depending on how you just the actual millenium point of course). Was a pretty good event from all reports but lost something in the vicinity of $9 million back then. I very much doubt they'll be trying that again.

[S griffin]

I think V8 Supercars will be fine. The series is currently finding it's feet and the new gen cars seem to be working

[E.B]

Originally Posted by Tourer

They tried that - over 20 years ago. Staged the "race of a thousand years" at the Millennium (depending on how you just the actual millenium point of course). Was a pretty good event from all reports but lost something in the vicinity of $9 million back then. I very much doubt they'll be trying that again.

Dont forget back in the 1980's Sandown hosted the WEC a couple of times.... on the specially extended version of Sandown to give the track the FIA stipulated minimum length requirement for WEC races.... they added a Mickey Mouse section at the end of the back straight with a hairpin which did a little detour infield to rejoin the original circuit just before Dandenong Road corner. Horrible addition. That event didnt live up to expectations either. They called it the International layout! We had to live with it for years after

Edit: That International Layout:


ISTR the "race of a thousand years" ended up with Don Panoz (who acted as promoter with the SA govt), ended up taking the SA Govt, Tourism Authority and SA Motorsports Board to court, suing them for something in the $20 million range ..... they had signed a 10 year deal with Panoz to run the event annually but it did not get past a date being set for a second event. Cancelled by the Govt. Eventually settled out of court several years later.

Firmly against the event being a regular event was Cochrane who did not want to have the Adelaide 500 position weakened by an International event so close in timing to 'his' 500.

I agree with Tourer.... cant see any further bites at that cherry.

[Mixer]

Bit OT but I'm hearing solid mail of a Formula E appearance in the future, potentialy at EC and The Bend?

Just need to unlock some "environental" money?

[Langers]

Originally Posted by V8 Fireworks

They absolutely do. It's the real world unlike CFD, the reason F1 teams have problems with correlation is because they are not allowed to use full scale models. As long as it's a full scale car and the blockage ratio is low, it's as good as the real world and far more controlled than a runway.



If this is true why does TCR and BTCC homologation use a full-scale wind tunnel?! The idea that the ATCC organisers know something that other touring car categories do not, is with all due respect, dubious.

Unless there's a supervillain who has built a secret wind tunnel inside Ayres' Rock, there is no suitable facility in Australia. So it's a pointless argument to make.

[Langers]

Originally Posted by AnnoyedMoose

No different to gen2. There were multiple changes made to those cars to distribute loads better in crashes as more data was collected.

Quite why people expect Gen3 to be a perfect car in every respect from day 1 is beyond me. I can't recall any serious racing car where that was the case.

With 2020s spec advanced FEA available, there really isn't an excuse for not getting the crash structure right.

[Langers]

Originally Posted by chunterer

Presumably the commercial guys are working overtime behind the scenes to try and rope in one or two more manufacturers?
Nissan or Toyota I guess are the most obvious targets as both have big v8 coupes they could use and are well known locally?

Toyota is a flat "no".

https://www.speedcafe.com/torquecafe...upercar-entry/

[S griffin]

I'm not surprised, the series doesn't seem to be fashionable to Toyota. I would be surprised if we bet anymore makes at this time

[V8 Fireworks]

Originally Posted by S griffin

I'm not surprised, the series doesn't seem to be fashionable to Toyota.

Or Nissan or BMW or Audi or KIA or Genesis... What are the organisers going to do to right the ship?

It's hard to understand why Gen 3 was not introduced with a wide variety of vehicles from the get-go, instead of building 14 Camaros.

[v8supes]

I thought these new Gen cars were good. They sounded great, didnt look dissimilar to the previous generation of supercars. Of course around Newcastle its hard to see how they will race on faster tracks but i think the potential is there. Just wish we outside of Australia could watch this weekends races from Melbourne...