Monday 23rd January 2017

V8 Supercars at Gold Coast: Time for Coffee?

The V8 Supercars world is changing for 2017, so here's a reminder of the glorious (and quite recent) past

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Here's a fact for you: V8 Supercars is not called V8 Supercars any more. Yep, Australia's premier motorsport series, one that's admired the world over, is no longer just V8s. For 2017, as part of the new Gen2 Supercar rules, four- and six-cylinder engines are permitted, along with coupe bodies. So it's just Supercars. Seriously.

The racing will (hopefully) still be close and the tracks will remain spectacular, but it's hard to escape the feeling that something will be lost when the grid is no longer exclusively four-door V8s. They just make for cool touring cars, don't they? Without a Ford factory effort for 2017 as well (as was in 2016, in fact), it looks like being a very different season.

Perhaps we're being overly pessimistic, and hopefully V8 Supercars - sorry, Supercars - will continue to thrive as it always has. The V8s are remaining for 2017 at least. But with those Holden final editions announced last week though, it did make us rather wistful for the classic Ford v. Holden battles.

Of course there are almost innumerable race vids to choose from, all of them worthy of your attention. This particular one is notable for a great drive by Shane van Gisbergen, then a fairly unknown Kiwi driver but now one who goes into 2017 as defending champion.

There are bumps and scrapes throughout yet the duel with Jamie Whincup is largely fair; the street circuit looks really intimidating and the speeds high too, all accompanied by some proper V8 thunder. If the next generation of Supercars is anywhere near as good as this, then fans across the globe can rest easy.

Watch the vid here.

[Sources: Wikipedia, Supercars.com]

[Fishy Dave]

Sad times, the V8 Supercars are/were my highlight of racing on TV. Motors TV do a decent 2 part highlights programme each winter, worth searching for as I'm sure it will still be available as a repeat. Each time I watch this it prompts a scouring of classifieds for Monaro and VXR8......