The CAMS Australian GT Championship has announced their 2017 calendar and it’s good news for New Zealand motorsport. The Australian Endurance Championship (AEC) returns to Hampton Downs from October 27 – 29.
Two weeks later the travelling roadshow of the finest GT3 production cars in the world including Audi, Aston Martin, BMW, Ferrari, Lamborghini, Porsche, Nissan, McLaren and Mercedes, heads south to Highlands Motorsport Park in Cromwell. Highlands will host the final race of the season for the Australian GT Championship and the AEC from November 10 – 12.
Across the ditch in Australia, the calendar does not include any Supercars promoted events next season. The Australian GT will share the bill with Supercars at just two events, the Clipsal 500 and Australian F1 Grand Prix, after the two categories failed to come to an agreement regarding time slots.
The new calendar was unveiled to teams during the category’s post-season awards night at Highlands Motorsport Park, where manager Ken Collier declared that Australian GT is “no longer a support category.” Championship owner Tony Quinn believes the category has grown enough to stand by itself but refused to rule out a return to Supercars events in the future.
“Not going with Supercars is not a big thing to us,” Quinn told Speedcafe.com. “We are surviving regardless of Supercars. They are just an event company that put on events and if they don’t have room or accommodate our championship structure then we can’t go with them. It’s as simple as that.”
“I have the support of 90 percent of (the AGT) pit lane. They don’t have a problem with the fact that we’re not part of the Supercars show. They’re the stars of their own championships. We don’t need Supercars. In the five years since I’ve taken over the Australian GT Championship we’ve grown every year. We’ve created a monster and the drivers and teams are delighted to come back to Hampton Downs and Highlands for next year’s season finale. They’ve just had two great weeks in New Zealand racing at two great race tracks.”
Next year will see a new format for the AEC races in New Zealand. The Hampton Downs 101 lap race will become a five hundred kilometre race while the Highlands 101 will be raced over 501 kilometres to create the New Zealand 1001.
“The 101 brand has been a huge success but next year we’re going bigger and better with the New Zealand 1001,” says Quinn. “We’ve been doing the 101 in Highlands for four years now so the teams have got used to the strategy. I like to keep moving the bar and I like to challenge people and this will certainly shake things up in the Australian GT Championship.”
“The beauty of owning the event is we can make changes. We can do something different like the Le Mans start which is synonymous with the Highlands event now. It’s crazy really if you think about. Greg Murphy and I qualified fourth for the Highlands 101 on Sunday but we ended up leaving the pits in 20th! We lost nearly half a lap on the field but that’s fine. It’s part of what makes Highlands and the Australian GT Championship so special.”
“The new format will add roughly 20 laps to each race which may not sound a lot but it means there will be a third pitstop and two driver changes which will mean a change in strategy for the teams. It will also have implications for tyres and fuel and we’re getting rid of the compulsory timed pit stops which were used to handicap the faster drivers. It will be a true endurance test.”
GT cars are built to do 24 hour endurance races and at the Highlands 101 on Sunday, the fastest lap of the race was set on the penultimate lap by Kiwi driver, Dominic Storey. “The cars are only getting going after 101 laps,” said Quinn.
Quinn also said there are plans to fit all the cars with a digital display on the windscreen that will show what position they are in during the race every time they cross the finish line. “We’re also planning on live streaming all of the endurance events and we’ll hopefully have live television again next year.”
Comments