2013 International V8 Supercars Championship

2013 V8 Supercars

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The 2013 International V8 Supercars Championship will be an FIA-sanctioned international motor racing series for V8 Supercars. It will be the fifteenth running of the V8 Supercar Championship Series and the seventeenth series in which V8 Supercars have contested the premier Australian touring car title. The championship will start in Adelaide on 28 February 2013, with the running of the Clipsal 500, and finish with the Sydney 500 on 1 December. The series' calendar will also expand, travelling to the United States for the first time for a race at the Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas.

The 2013 season will see the introduction of the "Car of the Future", a revision to the regulations designed to cut costs to A$250,000 per car through the use of "control" parts. Nissan and Mercedes-Benz will enter the series, with four Nissan Altimas being prepared by Kelly Racing and three Mercedes-Benz E63 AMGs being run by Erebus Motorsport, who purchased Stone Brothers Racing during the off-season. Holden teams will compete with the new VF Commodore, which replaces the VE Commodore.

Jamie Whincup will start the season as the defending drivers' champion.

Scheduled events

The 2013 calendar was released on 15 October 2012. The season will consist of thirty-two races to be held at fourteen venues in Australia, New Zealand and the United States, plus an additional non-championship round to be held at the Melbourne Grand Prix Circuit in support of the 2013 Australian Grand Prix.

Race	Event	Circuit	City / State	Date
1	Clipsal 500 Adelaide	Adelaide Street Circuit	Adelaide, South Australia	28 February—3 March
2
3	Tasmania Challenge	Symmons Plains Raceway	Launceston, Tasmania	5—7 April
4
5
6	ITM Auckland 400	Pukekohe Park Raceway	Pukekohe, New Zealand	12—14 April
7
8	Perth Challenge	Barbagallo Raceway	Perth, Western Australia	3—5 May
9
10
11	Texas 400	Circuit of the Americas	Austin, Texas, USA	17—19 May
12
13	Skycity Triple Crown	Hidden Valley Raceway	Darwin, Northern Territory	14—16 June
14
15
16	Sucrogen Townsville 400	Townsville Street Circuit	Townsville, Queensland	5—7 July
17
18	Coates Hire Ipswich 300	Queensland Raceway	Ipswich, Queensland	27—28 July
19
20
21	Winton	Winton Motor Raceway	Benalla, Victoria	23—25 August
22
23
24	Sandown 500	Sandown Raceway	Melbourne, Victoria	13—15 September
25	Supercheap Auto Bathurst 1000	Mount Panorama Circuit	Bathurst, New South Wales	10—13 October
26	Armor All Gold Coast 600	Surfers Paradise Street Circuit	Surfers Paradise, Queensland	25—27 October
27
28	Phillip Island 400	Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit	Phillip Island, Victoria	23—24 November
29
30
31	Sydney 500	Homebush Street Circuit	Sydney, New South Wales	29 November—1 December
32

Calendar changes

• The Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas will host a round of the championship on May 17–19.
• The Hamilton 400 held its final event in 2012. It will be replaced by a round at Pukekohe Park Raceway, which last hosted a round of the series in 2007.
• After returning to the calendar in 2012, the Sydney Motorsport Park will not host a race in 2013.
• The events at Symmons Plains, Barbagallo, Hidden Valley, Queensland Raceway, Winton and Phillip Island will all feature a new three-race format. Three 120-kilometre races will be held across each weekend, with the first on Saturday being split into two 60-kilometre halves with a fifteen-minute break in between, with the grid for the second race to be determined by the finishing order of the non-points first race. The remaining two races to be held on Sunday.
• The Yas Marina Circuit was initially scheduled to host the Yas V8 400 in support of the 2013 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, but with the Grand Prix support bill expanding to include rounds of the GP2 and GP3 Series championships, the round was removed from the V8 Supercars calendar.

Teams and drivers

The following teams and drivers have been confirmed for the 2013 series.

Team	Vehicle	No.	Drivers
Triple Eight Race Engineering	Holden VF Commodore	1	Jamie Whincup
		888	Craig Lowndes
Holden Racing Team	Holden VF Commodore	2	Garth Tander
		22	James Courtney
Walkinshaw Racing (HRT)		66	Russell Ingall
Tony D'Alberto Racing	Holden VF Commodore	3	Tony D'Alberto
Erebus Motorsport	Mercedes E63 AMG	4	Lee Holdsworth
James Rosenberg Racing (Erebus)		47	Tim Slade
Ford Performance Racing	Ford FG Falcon	5	Mark Winterbottom
		6	Will Davison
Charlie Schwerkolt Racing (FPR)		18	Alex Davison
Rod Nash Racing (FPR)		55	David Reynolds
Nissan Motorsport	Nissan Altima	7	Todd Kelly
		15	Rick Kelly
Brad Jones Racing	Holden VF Commodore	8	Jason Bright
		14	Fabian Coulthard
Britek Motorsport (BJR)		21	David Wall
Dick Johnson Racing	Ford FG Falcon	17	Steven Johnson
Tekno Autosports	Holden VF Commodore	19	Jonathon Webb
		97	Shane Van Gisbergen
Garry Rogers Motorsport	Holden VF Commodore	33	Scott McLaughlin
		34	Alexandre Prémat
Lucas Dumbrell Motorsport	Holden VF Commodore	TBA	Scott Pye

Team changes

• After switching from Holden to Ford after Round 1 of the 2011 season, Tony D'Alberto Racing will move back to Holden in 2013, where the team will receive technical assistance from Walkinshaw Performance.
• Ford Performance Racing will expand to a four-car operation with the acquisition of the #18 Racing Entitlement Contract held by Charlie Schwerkolt, which was used by Dick Johnson Racing to run James Moffat's car in 2012. The fourth car will be run as a satellite of the team, in the same way as the #55 Rod Nash Racing car is run.
  • In January 2013, British motorsport group Prodrive announced that it had sold its stake in FPR to Rod Nash and former touring car driver Rusty French.
• Lucas Dumbrell Motorsport will expand to a two-car operation after purchasing the #49 Racing Entitlement Contract from Paul Morris Motorsport.
• As a result of the deals between Schwerkolt and Ford Performance Racing and Paul Morris and Lucas Dumbrell Motorsport, Dick Johnson Racing will lose the use of the #18 and #49 Racing Entitlement Contracts and thus be reduced to a two-car operation.
• Kelly Racing will switch from competing with Holden Commodores to the Nissan Altima, running a re-sleeved version of Nissan's quad-cam aluminium 5.6-litre VK56DE V8 reconfigured to a 5.0-litre capacity. The team will be renamed to Nissan Motorsport.
  • In January 2013, Larry Perkins confirmed that he had sold his two Racing Entitlement Contracts to Kelly Racing. Perkins had previously leased these two RECs to the Kelly operation, and by purchasing them, Kelly Racing acquired full control over the licences.
• Triple Eight Race Engineering will lose title sponsor Vodafone at the end of the 2012 season. Energy drink company Red Bull will come on board as the new sponsor. The team will be known as "Red Bull Racing Australia", to differentiate from the Red Bull Racing Formula One team.
• Stone Brothers Racing was purchased by Australian GT Championship team Erebus Motorsport, and the team—along with satellite team James Rosenberg Racing—will end their association with Ford. Instead, the combined team will enter three cars based on the Mercedes-Benz E63 AMG. The combined Erebus—James Rosenberg outfit will not receive any factory support from Mercedes-Benz.

Driver changes

• Alex Davison will return to V8 Supercars after a one-year absence spent competing in the Australian Carrera Cup Championship. He will join Charlie Schwerkolt Racing, a satellite team of Ford Performance Racing.
• Dean Fiore will not race for Dick Johnson Racing in 2013, but will continue to lease the Triple F Racing REC to the team.
• Reigning second-tier V8 Supercar champion and New Zealand V8SuperTourer champion Scott McLaughlin will join Garry Rogers Motorsport full-time having raced with them in 2012 on the final day of the season as an emergency replacement. McLaughlin replaces Michael Caruso, who left the team after five seasons .
• Greg Murphy will leave Kelly Racing at the end of 2012. Murphy later announced that that he would retire from full-time racing and concentrate on securing a seat for the endurance races.
• Scott Pye, who placed second in the 2012 Dunlop V8 Supercar Series will join Lucas Dumbrell Motorsport.
• Karl Reindler will also leave Kelly Racing at the end of 2012.
• At the end of the 2012 season, Shane Van Gisbergen announced plans to leave the category in order to rejuvenate himself and consider his future. He later joined Tekno Autosports in January 2013.