Latest / Rusty's Garage / The Motorsport Brief | Ryan Walkinshaw on Toyota’s Supercars project

Transcript

The Motorsport Brief | Ryan Walkinshaw on Toyota’s Supercars project · Rusty's Garage

• 0:02
  A listener production.
• 0:05
  The latest on Toyota's supercars project as we eagerly await for the Supra to break, cover and more on this edition of the Motorsport Brief.
• 0:15
  G'day everyone, Rusty here in the garage.
• 0:17
  Ryan Walkinshaw is standing by in Europe for this edition of the Shortcast.
• 0:21
  We will get to him in just a moment.
• 0:23
  A quick mention for our most recent F of the Shortcast with the Motorsport Network's James Allen.
• 0:29
  That is a nicely timed catch-up with the 2025 F1 season about to launch into an all-important second half.
• 0:37
  His thoughts on whether Fred Vasseur will stay at the helm of Ferrari
• 0:42
  His standout of the year, the underachiever of 25.
• 0:46
  Plus, Lewis Hamilton's chances of winning a GP this season.
• 0:50
  And can Oscar Piastri win the title?
• 0:53
  We think he can, but we're trying not to get too excited.
• 0:56
  If you're on a road trip or a long commute and you want something more...
• 0:59
  feature orientated check out adrian coppin before you go who's that he's the promoter of the australian rally championship it's a two-parter that looks at his own driving career bringing emerging stars down under to compete working for motorsport australia and sro in this part of the world in an administrative capacity plus a little known plan to bring the wrc to sydney and bathurst a few years back check that out when you get a moment
• 1:27
  Now, you can find Ryan Walkinshaw's feature ep in our library.
• 1:30
  You've got to search back a couple of years there.
• 1:33
  And separately, I've had him on a sister pod here at Listener talking about the success of his automotive business.
• 1:39
  We did that in recent years too.
• 1:41
  There is a pretty impressive new facility, as you might have seen on his socials.
• 1:46
  We'll talk about that today.
• 1:47
  It is evening here, morning for you.
• 1:50
  Thank you for coming back on, mate.
• 1:51
  No, thanks for having me back on.
• 1:53
  That facility looks fantastic.
• 1:55
  What are we talking, 100,000 square metres, automotive production lines.
• 1:59
  I think the race team's going to be there too.
• 2:01
  Ryan, we might have lost the big plants in Holden and Ford, but I love that there is still good things coming out of our part of the world.
• 2:09
  What more can you tell us about it?
• 2:11
  Yeah, well, it's two years into the build.
• 2:14
  It's an enormous project.
• 2:15
  The total cost of the project's over $100 million.
• 2:19
  It's a purpose-built facility purely for Walkinshaw Group.
• 2:22
  It'll house between six and eight production lines for different manufacturers.
• 2:30
  It'll house our world-leading engineering and design studios.
• 2:36
  We have about 100 to 120 engineers working from there.
• 2:39
  About 1,000 to 1,400 staff in total at maximum capacity.
• 2:44
  And the race team will be moving there as well.
• 2:47
  Yeah, so everyone's going to start moving in from end of August.
• 2:49
  So keys get handed over end of August, which is really exciting.
• 2:53
  First production line will move over beginning of September and then we'll start staggering those in towards the end of the year.
• 3:00
  And then in April is the planned date for the race team to move and then it'll be all full.
• 3:06
  So you're right, we've lost the big manufacturing plans with Holden and Toyota and Ford stopping manufacturing in Australia.
• 3:13
  I always look back to when I got a phone call from Mark Bernard about 15 minutes before the announcement went out that Holden was going to close down the plant in Elizabeth.
• 3:23
  And I remember him saying that, you know, this is what's happening and it's time for you guys to start planning how you close down your business.
• 3:31
  And, you know, I was too young to retire, so we had to go and double down.
• 3:35
  and try and find a new niche to work in that wasn't just, you know, scooping up Commodores here in Australia that were being manufactured over in Adelaide.
• 3:43
  So fortunately, at that point, we thought it was going to be the demise of our group.
• 3:48
  And, you know, it turned out to be the best thing that ever happened for us.
• 3:50
  It opened the doors to lots of different manufacturers.
• 3:52
  It forced us to realize what we're really good at doing, which was the really, really high-end engineering and design and manufacturing processes for
• 4:04
  for automotive manufacturers and adding value by being able to do niche programs between a thousand and ten thousand units a year for manufacturers that were too small in scale to give interest to them considering the cost they would have to apply to that program but we could do it for much cheaper and do it much faster and that's where we've
• 4:23
  discovered we had a lot of value and from there we've just continued to grow so it's an exciting project moving into this new site but what I really think the site demonstrates is just how far we've come as a business and I remember 14 years ago which actually feels like yesterday which is quite terrifying
• 4:42
  walking into HSV after my dad died and we thought that was a good little business.
• 4:47
  But it was a small manufacturing plant doing roughly 2,500 units a year with a couple of hundred staff and now we're doing close to 15,000 units a year and that'll ramp up to 20,000 units a year in this new facility with well over a thousand staff.
• 5:02
  So that building is almost a bit of a beacon for
• 5:08
  just how far we've come as a business and how successful we've been over some pretty turbulent waters with the automotive industry in Australia over that period.
• 5:18
  Great stuff.
• 5:18
  What a good story.
• 5:20
  Before we go into the motor racing side of things, are you getting a bit more kind of government support around this project?
• 5:25
  And if I know you, pivot is a crap word, but you've pivoted so successfully there.
• 5:30
  But I imagine that there's potential for growth here with perhaps other manufacturers or other areas as well, is there?
• 5:37
  Yeah, well, we're known for automotive programs, but what people don't know is we do an enormous amount of engineering work in the background as well.
• 5:43
  And we do get some small government grants.
• 5:46
  Those are normally applied by our OE partners.
• 5:50
  At the end of the day, they fund their programs.
• 5:53
  It's a cost-plus program.
• 5:55
  business model that we operate in most cases.
• 5:59
  And so a lot of those grants go to our customers to be able to support the production lines, so the investment to capital, tooling and things like that, as opposed to directly to Walkinshore Group.
• 6:09
  We have a little bit of a grant for the manufacturing side, but yeah, most of that has been an investment from Walkinshore Group, the vast, vast, vast, vast majority of it.
• 6:19
  What we look to do going forward is try and continue to diversify.
• 6:23
  So we've been focused heavily on automotive.
• 6:26
  We took a little sort of skirmish into the caravan business for a little while, which wasn't a great industry to be in.
• 6:32
  And thankfully, we sold that business end of last year.
• 6:35
  But where we do add value is in providing great engineering services at top level to people who could require them.
• 6:42
  That's not just automotive.
• 6:43
  That's also mining.
• 6:45
  That's defense.
• 6:47
  We're really pushing into those two areas quite heavily at the moment and getting a lot of traction.
• 6:52
  Also moving into trucking and hauling, we're doing engineering programs for truck companies as well.
• 6:58
  Doing a lot of work in hydrogen.
• 6:59
  We will have a hydrogen fueling system station at our new facility in the future because we've got a lot of development programs for manufacturers coming to us in the next couple of years.
• 7:11
  Developing hydrogen powertrains and converting ice engine vehicles into hydrogen vehicles as well.
• 7:17
  We're quite diverse from what we're already doing.
• 7:19
  Everyone knows us for what we're doing on the road car side of things, but behind the scenes and stuff we don't really regularly talk about.
• 7:24
  You know, we've got a lot of things and a lot of different pies at the moment.
• 7:27
  So growing those different markets is really important to us.
• 7:30
  There's enormous value we can add to mining companies and in defense as well.
• 7:36
  So that's two big avenues where we're going to focus on.
• 7:40
  And then finally is international expansion.
• 7:44
  Got a few opportunities in new markets that we haven't operated in either before or for a very, very long time.
• 7:51
  Well before my dad passed away.
• 7:53
  So that's another thing which is keeping us very, very busy.
• 7:56
  And why I've been flying around an enormous amount this year and spending a little bit less time than I normally do in Australia.
• 8:01
  Because I've been in a few different other countries working on getting those programs signed off.
• 8:06
  I don't know when you sleep.
• 8:07
  Clearly, I mean, this is all being done in balance or in addition to the fact that just under 12 months ago, you announced a massive project with Toyota on the supercar side.
• 8:18
  We always appreciate here, Ryan, that, you know, some stuff will be confidential for now and so on.
• 8:22
  But fans will be eager to know how that's progressing.
• 8:25
  What can you tell us about SuperGR?
• 8:28
  And we're so excited about the thought of that car hitting the track.
• 8:31
  Yeah, no, I'm pretty excited.
• 8:32
  I was in Australia last week for the Townsville event and dropped down to Melbourne for a few days afterwards to go and see the new facility and have a few meetings.
• 8:40
  And also, you know, one of the main reasons I wanted to go down there was to go and see where we are with the prototype.
• 8:45
  And it's coming along well.
• 8:47
  It's very nearly ready to go.
• 8:50
  It's got a dummy engine in.
• 8:51
  Engines are still in process of being developed, but we're hoping to have the prototype hitting the track in the next four to six weeks, which is very, very exciting.
• 9:03
  It's a big program.
• 9:04
  And look,
• 9:06
  It's an enormous program on its own.
• 9:09
  When you're also trying to dovetail that program into trying to have a competitive attack on the Supercars Championship, that's when it becomes really, really complicated because, you know, we are still small teams in Supercars and you only have a certain amount of people that you can really allocate to going racing and also developing a program like this.
• 9:25
  So the amount of work that goes into it is really enormous because...
• 9:29
  you know, you already, these people are already working at maximum capacity pretty much, just running the normal supercar season to try and be competitive.
• 9:36
  And then all of a sudden you've got to take 50% of their time that normally would be allocated to making sure that our cars are fast on track and say, okay, but I actually need to go and develop this, this new race car for, for next year.
• 9:47
  And it needs to be perfect.
• 9:48
  It needs to be reliable and competitive, um, particularly with the Toyota brand associated with it.
• 9:53
  Um, you know, it's, it's, it's a, it's a huge operation and, um,
• 9:57
  Fortunately, we've got some really, really good people.
• 9:59
  Carl Fo has been leading the program with a little sort of skunkworks team with a couple of the guys, and it's been really, really, really successful so far in what we've aimed to accomplish.
• 10:08
  There have been a couple of delays, as is always the case with these things, but fortunately we always put in enough fat in the program to make sure that we manage to hit our timelines at the end.
• 10:18
  So we're very comfortable.
• 10:20
  Everything's moving pretty much on track.
• 10:23
  and we're really excited to actually get the car on track and start testing it.
• 10:25
  And I think it's going to be quite exciting for the fans to actually see the first GR Supra zooming around a racetrack for the first time, and I'm pretty excited about that too.
• 10:33
  Good stuff.
• 10:33
  How are you going with the juggle with the two big partners in the sense that, I mean, it looks on paper as though you're still going super well with Ford, but you'll obviously, you know, farewell them.
• 10:42
  And at the same time, you're bringing in another, you know, big partner in Toyota here.
• 10:46
  And, you know, the sentimental part of me here, Ryan, would love you to kind of close the Ford chapter in a similar way at Adelaide to what you did with Holden all those years ago.
• 10:55
  I don't know if I'm dreaming, but that would, and how difficult is it to do that with two such massive projects?
• 11:01
  Yeah, well, Greg, if you're dreaming, then so am I, because that's exactly what we hope to do.
• 11:04
  So at the moment, we've got both Chas and Woody in the 10, and that's all that matters going into the final few rounds.
• 11:10
  And we know that we're pretty good at street circuits.
• 11:14
  Our one bogey track recently has been sand down, so that's something we need to make sure we really work on and try and not chip over ourselves at that track so we can make sure that we've got at least one, if not both of our cars in Adelaide with a chance to fight for that championship.
• 11:28
  And as I said when we first moved over to Ford,
• 11:31
  You know, there's a little bit of poetry, I think, in how we moved away from Holden.
• 11:37
  The way that we got dumped by Holden from losing the Holden Racing Team contract back in the day, continued with them and then moved over to Ford.
• 11:45
  And, you know, for the last two seasons at least, Chas was the most competitive Ford driver on track.
• 11:52
  And I think there will be something quite poetic if we can finish off this season, you know, doing right by Ford and accomplishing the goal that we set out all those years ago, which is winning a championship for the Blue Oval.
• 12:04
  So that's absolutely our priority this year.
• 12:06
  It will be a very special send off.
• 12:07
  and exactly the way that we would want to end that chapter in our relationship with Ford.
• 12:12
  He's been great partners to us.
• 12:14
  And also then allow us to open the door with our heads held high to a new, exciting relationship with Toyota.
• 12:20
  So I'm really, really excited for the end of the season.
• 12:23
  And obviously next season is going to be pretty special, moving over to Toyota and having two new race cars on track.
• 12:30
  partnering up with BJR, who are gonna be our second team for Toyota as well.
• 12:35
  And it's a really, really exciting opportunity for us to try and be competitive in our own rights, have control over our own destiny, which is always a problem when you're not a homologation team.
• 12:43
  You're always putting your hopes on another team, doing the best job they can to make sure that you're gonna be as competitive on track.
• 12:51
  And we have got burned by that in the last couple of years with engines and with aero, which has been frustrating.
• 12:59
  having that control over our own destiny, having a good team to support us in BJR as well, it's a really, really good opportunity for us to go and try and fight for championships again consistently over many years.
• 13:10
  So that's the focus.
• 13:12
  Is a stable driver lineup kind of another element to all of that?
• 13:16
  Is that the wish, I guess, to go into that?
• 13:18
  Yeah, no, absolutely.
• 13:20
  And we've got Chazzy and Ryan signed up for a couple of years still.
• 13:23
  So, yeah, we're really happy with those two guys.
• 13:25
  I mean, Chaz is Chaz.
• 13:26
  Everyone knows who Chaz is.
• 13:27
  He's...
• 13:28
  arguably the best driver in the category and certainly off track he's the most popular driver in the category.
• 13:35
  He's a very very special person, very very talented driver and fantastic for the team and he's been one of the real catalysts for our resurgence as a team over the last sort of five years.
• 13:45
  You know making this one of the teams with one of the best coaches in pit lane.
• 13:48
  You know part of that is driven by Chas and his personality and then you've got Woody who
• 13:54
  Last year showed a lot of speed, but it was a bit of a rough diamond.
• 13:59
  Got caught up in a lot of trouble and some of it his own doing, some of it not his own doing.
• 14:02
  But this year you've seen a real maturity from Ryan.
• 14:05
  He's won his first race finally.
• 14:06
  He should have probably won another two races that weekend if he hadn't been unlucky.
• 14:11
  And, yeah, he's becoming really consistent in his qualifying and his race craft is improving.
• 14:16
  And, you know, I keep saying, I've said it since the first day we signed him, I think you're going to see Ryan Wood winning championships in the future in this category.
• 14:23
  And fingers crossed it's with Walker Trondrelli United, not someone else.
• 14:27
  That's a great endorsement.
• 14:28
  Greg Murphy would probably say that his timing, being there in WA when Ryan had those breakthroughs around qualifying and racing on the Saturday and so on, that that timing was a bit fortuitous.
• 14:40
  But having an influence of someone like that around the team at that time, even if it is perhaps geared more to Woody, is...
• 14:47
  is so beneficial, isn't it?
• 14:48
  Is that something that you've paused to ponder?
• 14:50
  Because I saw a great photo of Zac Brown with Tony Canaan at the weekend on the McLaren IndyCar site and so on.
• 14:56
  And those sort of influences are immensely powerful, aren't they?
• 14:59
  Yeah, I think they are.
• 15:00
  And for a young driver, having that sort of mentorship is really, really important.
• 15:04
  It was fortuitous because I was actually in Perth that weekend as well.
• 15:06
  That was the first time I'd been to Perth in about five years.
• 15:08
  So it was only because I couldn't go to Darwin because I had another engagement abroad that I had to go to.
• 15:14
  So,
• 15:15
  It was great being there to see Woody's first win.
• 15:18
  Obviously, Greg being there, Greg's been a big supporter of Woody and been mentoring for ages as well.
• 15:22
  And Greg doesn't come to the track that often, but for the fact that he was there for that particular round and Woody was so phenomenally competitive over those three races, it was very, very special seeing.
• 15:31
  on the top step of the podium, getting out of the car.
• 15:34
  And, you know, it was pretty emotional for everyone in the team, to be honest.
• 15:37
  You know, we all love the guy a lot.
• 15:38
  He's a very, very great.
• 15:39
  He's a great character.
• 15:40
  He's a mini Chaz in a lot of ways, but also developing into his own character as well, which has got some differences and sort of, you know, pushing his own path forward.
• 15:48
  So, yeah, and Greg's been a great supporter of the team as well.
• 15:51
  Obviously, I've known Greg since I was a kid.
• 15:54
  He is a very good man.
• 15:56
  He's been very, very helpful in helping Woody become the driver he is today on and off track.
• 16:03
  We'll put the conversation in neutral for just a moment.
• 16:06
  More with Ryan Walkinshaw right after this here on Rusty's Garage.
• 16:12
  We're back.
• 16:13
  I'm talking to Scott Pedder later this week for a new feature episode on his career in rally, not just in the Australian Championship.
• 16:20
  The family business story, including its involvement in various areas of the sport over the years, from supercars to round Australia trials and more.
• 16:30
  Keep an eye out for that one when it drops.
• 16:31
  In the meantime, back to the chat with Ryan Walkinshaw here on the Motorsport Brief.
• 16:37
  The Enduro pairings, great mix there of youth and experience.
• 16:40
  Fabian Coulthard with Chas, Ryan with Jadon Ojeda.
• 16:43
  I mean, Jadon back with WRU for the first time in a couple of years there.
• 16:48
  When did that sort of become an option for you?
• 16:50
  And observing him in the GT side of things, I mean, fast but composed.
• 16:56
  That's a great youthful lineup with a lot of potential going into these Enduros, isn't it?
• 17:01
  Yeah, I think so too.
• 17:02
  And look, Fabian, you know exactly what you're getting on the team.
• 17:04
  He's been around on the squad for a very long time.
• 17:06
  He's a very safe pair of hands.
• 17:08
  Very good with partners and everyone in the team.
• 17:10
  Really engaged.
• 17:11
  No nonsense.
• 17:12
  A great character and a great person.
• 17:14
  And him and Chaz, I think, will be strong.
• 17:20
  And then you've got...
• 17:21
  Woody with Jaden and, you know, as you say, Jaden's come a long way in the last few years as well, you know, just missed out on supercars, but, you know, to be as competitive as he's being and as consistent as he's being in GT, you know, that's the telltale sign of someone who's a very, very good driver.
• 17:38
  um you know we're very excited to see how it goes with woody i think they've got similar driving styles as well um and you're it's having a bit of a useful lineup together which i think has got a lot of a lot of potential um i think they're going to surprise some people i mean i don't want to you know i'm going to touch some wood here and not get too ahead of myself but um i actually think it's a really really exciting little lineup they've got there and they might surprise a few people come bathurst
• 17:59
  I'm conscious you're busy.
• 18:00
  Let's bounce through a few to finish because I don't want to hold you up here.
• 18:03
  I'm never too busy for you, mate.
• 18:04
  That's very kind of you.
• 18:05
  A few followers have asked about your thoughts on the potential scrapping of the rule around primary drivers starting the Bathurst 1000, which was brought in last year.
• 18:13
  What do you think?
• 18:15
  Yeah, look, I kind of see both sides of the argument.
• 18:18
  You know, you've got, it's the biggest start of any race across the season.
• 18:23
  And when people are tuning in at 10.30 in the morning, you know, they want to see the stars of the show starting the race.
• 18:32
  But I can also see from a team's perspective and from a purely competitive angle, sometimes you don't want the main driver to start.
• 18:40
  You know, it does kind of solidify your strategy from the start of the race.
• 18:45
  And it kind of puts everyone on a very similar strategy from the start of the race because pending no real...
• 18:51
  if it's a green race, you know, you're almost certainly going to have very, very similar strategies across the teams on how they go forward with their, with their co-drivers and main drivers.
• 18:59
  And what makes Bathurst exciting is you do have this constant mix of, you know, main game drivers and co-drivers battling out against each other.
• 19:08
  And, you know, that's when you get the excitement of the overtakes is when you get the mistakes happening, which cause safety cars and bring the excitement into the event as well for the fans.
• 19:16
  And it opens the doors to different strategy options that the teams can play with that, you know,
• 19:21
  if the ball falls in the right direction, can put you in the mix for the fight at the end of the race or completely out of it.
• 19:29
  So for me as a competitive person that wants to win Bathurst, I think that being able to choose your driver for the beginning of the race is important and I think adds to the spectacle.
• 19:40
  And I think it potentially adds the spectacle a lot more than the excitement that fans get of just seeing all the main game drivers start the race.
• 19:48
  And after two laps, they've forgotten that they've started the race as all the main game drivers anyway.
• 19:51
  So, you know, if it does come and get cemented into place that we are going to be able to choose our drivers again, I think that would probably be a good return to what we've had previously.
• 20:02
  So I think it does add value.
• 20:04
  Agree wholeheartedly.
• 20:05
  He's barely got his feet back under the desk.
• 20:08
  There's been a positive reaction from the constituents to James Warburton's return to the top job of supercars.
• 20:13
  If you had a wish list, what would be the top thing you'd love to see him maybe sign off on or do this time around?
• 20:20
  Yeah, well, listen, before we start that, what I want to say is that I think, you know, Shane Howard did a really, really good job as CEO, coming in and steering his ships through some, you know, I've been on the board for the last three years or so.
• 20:31
  I've seen a lot of what's been going on in supercars, and I think Shane has been an incredible captain of the ships through some really turbulent waters.
• 20:39
  You know, we've had new owners coming on board, a lot of change, we've managed to really, really enhance the product.
• 20:45
  We've got the Adelaide 500 back.
• 20:48
  We've really, really done a lot of good stuff over the last few years, which sort of gets forgotten quite quickly.
• 20:56
  But I do think that getting someone like James on is a good step forward for the category as well.
• 21:01
  He's a proven CEO in the categories.
• 21:04
  I think he did, what, four years previously?
• 21:06
  and did a lot of good in that period of time.
• 21:08
  I like James a lot as well as a person.
• 21:09
  I think he's a good leader of the business.
• 21:12
  In fact, I remember as soon as I heard that there was going to be a change at CEO level, the first thing I did was message Barkley and say, James Warburton's just left seven, so make sure you give him a call.
• 21:21
  So big supporter of James.
• 21:23
  I think he's going to be able to take us now to that next level and drive the sport forward on and off track.
• 21:30
  But I think it's also important to remember that
• 21:32
  The reason that there is a sport today and the foundation has been laid by Shane to allow James to do that is also really, really important to note.
• 21:41
  And what do I want to see him do?
• 21:44
  I'd like to see more local events.
• 21:45
  I want to see more street circuits.
• 21:46
  I think that there's a reason why they are the most successful events.
• 21:50
  They're the exciting, sexy ones.
• 21:51
  I'd love to see a couple more of those in Australia.
• 21:54
  I'd love to see a proper return to Sydney in some way, shape or form with a street race.
• 21:59
  I'd love to see another couple of regional ones.
• 22:01
  It's a shame we lost Newcastle, but somewhere like a Geelong would just make so much sense for me.
• 22:07
  I'd like to see what we can do internationally, although I don't think that we need to really focus on that too much.
• 22:11
  It needs to make good commercial sense for the sport and for the teams and for the fans.
• 22:16
  You want to be able to have it so that it's in the same time zone.
• 22:19
  Having them in the Middle East is maybe going to be something which could work, but depending on timings, you may be racing, you know,
• 22:27
  at the early hours of the morning here in Australia.
• 22:29
  And from a team's perspective, you know, our sponsors are all local sponsors for the most part.
• 22:34
  You know, I've got one international, but the rest are local, my cars and our local sponsors want local eyeballs watching races in times when people are going to be locally awake.
• 22:42
  So managing that I think is really, really important.
• 22:45
  But I do think we do add a lot of value to Formula One events in general.
• 22:49
  I think there is a balance between focusing heavily on Australia, making sure we maximize the potential of our local events and deliver as much value as we can to our partners and to our fan base locally, whilst also slowly opening the doors to what we can do internationally, done in the right way, at the right circuits, in the right time zones, and for the right money.
• 23:10
  And the obvious thing is to support Formula One.
• 23:13
  We've seen how much value we're now adding to the Australian Grand Prix.
• 23:18
  We've always been an important part of that.
• 23:20
  But there is still, I think the way that we've got the formats now, they're very frustrating to manage from an operational side for the teams.
• 23:28
  We've had quite a lot of exciting racing at the Australian Grand Prix the last couple of years.
• 23:32
  And Formula One have noticed that.
• 23:34
  And they have noticed how the fans enjoy watching our racing.
• 23:36
  We've got the best touring car, most exciting touring car category in the world.
• 23:40
  And, you know, they are trying to find ways to spice up their events.
• 23:45
  And they do see us as an attractive option for that.
• 23:47
  So I would like to see that continue to be focused on.
• 23:51
  TV deal obviously, new TV deal coming into place.
• 23:54
  I know a little bit about that so I can't say too much, but there's some opportunities to enhance the sport in many ways there.
• 24:02
  I think the TV coverage as well.
• 24:04
  I think there's ways that we can start to manage that and maybe evolve it a little bit.
• 24:09
  I don't think wholesale revolution is what we need, but maybe a few changes in TV land, how we operate that.
• 24:14
  I think maybe it could be quite exciting.
• 24:18
  And from the team's perspective, very, very simple.
• 24:21
  We need things to cost less and we need to find ways to make more money to remain sustainable.
• 24:26
  You know, we're all, if we're doing a good job in supercars as a race team, you know, we're sort of breaking even.
• 24:32
  There's a lot of teams that are still not breaking even.
• 24:34
  And that does need to change because whilst...
• 24:37
  You know, we've managed to get through that for many, many years.
• 24:41
  You know, teams need to be at least in the black as opposed to the red on their P&Ls every single year.
• 24:46
  And, you know, there needs to be new opportunities that James needs to bring us, which allow the sport to grow and to increase their revenue, increase their profitability.
• 24:53
  We're also doing that to the teams as well.
• 24:56
  in some way, shape or form, because more events going forward, which is going to happen, I'm sure, you know, that does mean more cost, that means more investment.
• 25:03
  It's hard to go and argue more money from partners just for one or two more events.
• 25:10
  And, you know, you also have to hire more staff, you know, even the number of events we're apparently running, you know, most of our guys are pretty flat out all the time.
• 25:19
  And to add two, three, four more events potentially onto the calendar in the future, you know, that's when it starts getting very, very difficult for your key personnel.
• 25:28
  And turnaround times when you're away from tracks and so on becomes very hectic and that's when you get burnout.
• 25:33
  That means you need to hire more staff to be able to fill the gap and to be able to do rotations and stuff like that comes with more costs.
• 25:39
  growth does come with a cost we just need to make sure that that balances up as we go forward so james knows all that i've spoken to james about that sort of thing and he talks about it uh fluidly to everyone so i'm pretty excited to see what he does um i don't think it needs revolution the sport i think it just needs continued adaptation to changing markets changing dynamics changing uh interests from fan bases and um and a bit of evolution internally on how we can just do things better
• 26:06
  Well done, mate.
• 26:07
  Some great perspective there.
• 26:08
  Just quickly, if I've memorised it right, I think you mentioned Formula One there a moment ago.
• 26:14
  I think the Singapore Grand Prix and the US Grand Prix happen either side of Bathurst.
• 26:20
  He's going to be super busy with two guys in Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris going for the title.
• 26:24
  Can we twist Zach's arm to come to the mountain, do you think?
• 26:28
  Zach's been coming to the Mouths in most years since he's been a partner of WAU I don't think he's going to be coming this year unfortunately he's pretty busy with those guys and there's not much of a turnaround time in between and he's trying to win a drivers championship and a constructors championship again so I think you're going to find he's going to be quite busy with that I'm afraid I'm sure he'll be watching on
• 26:49
  But who knows, maybe end of the season if we're looking like we're going to have two cars potentially able to go and win the championship, I might be able to come down and watch that.
• 26:57
  Beautiful.
• 26:57
  Well, let's finish it on that note.
• 26:59
  Firstly, I love the fact that that awesome Jag that you and I spoke about last time on the pod is back on display where you are, which is tremendous.
• 27:07
  Very cool.
• 27:08
  supercars resumes of course august 7 with a fan event on the thursday night in ipswich with racing across the weekend there good luck for that for the enduros and for the playoffs thank you so much for coming on and chatting with us again today oh good mate thanks having me on
• 27:22
  While we're talking Toyota, well done to Oliver Solberg.
• 27:25
  After bursting on the scene some years ago and endeavouring to do his own thing, to not be in his dad's shadow, he's finally cracked it for a win in the WRC.
• 27:34
  He was with us for the Race of Champions in Sydney in March.
• 27:38
  That win in the WRC is being universally hailed, praised, very emotional, and it's been a tough road back for him.
• 27:45
  Good stuff.
• 27:46
  F1 resumes this weekend at Spa in Belgium.
• 27:49
  Legendary track, that one.
• 27:50
  And the start of what will be, as we said before, a gripping second half of the season.
• 27:56
  Oscar Piastri just ahead of Lando Norris.
• 27:59
  Less than 10 points in it at the top of the ladder.
• 28:02
  I'm going to be at Sandown for the GT Festival there over the weekend, which you can catch on the screens of 7.
• 28:07
  The latest round of the Shannon Speed Series.
• 28:09
  Brock Feeney in action in an Audi in the GT3 class.
• 28:13
  Trans Am joined the series with 24 cars entered, including James Moffat, Todd Hazelwood, James Golding and young Clay Richards, grandson of the great Jimmy Richards, joining the field there too.
• 28:26
  There's Aussie racing cars, GT4 and a whole lot more.
• 28:30
  That is it for today.
• 28:31
  We'll catch you next time.
• 28:32
  Bye for now.