Further border hurdle cleared for Victorian competitors

Victoria will reopen to all vaccinated people coming from New South Wales next week, ahead of the four Supercars events at Sydney Motorsport Park and another at Bathurst.

From Tuesday, fully-vaccinated persons coming from a ‘red zone’ need only test negative to COVID-19 within 72 hours of departure and isolate until they return another negative result from a test taken within 72 hours of arrival.

That rule applies not only to Victorian residents but to anyone coming from red zones such as Greater Sydney and Bathurst Regional Council, where the remaining five events of the 2021 Repco Supercars Championship will be held.

Should those areas be downgraded to ‘orange zone’ status, the test-and-isolate requirement will not apply at all, so long as one is fully-vaccinated.

At this stage, NSW imposes 14 days’ worth of stay-at-home orders (lockdown conditions; ie the ‘five reasons’ rule) for those arriving from its southern neighbour state, even per an official COVID-19 Concerns Notice signed last night.

That is despite Premier Dominic Perrottet and his Liberal deputy Stuart Ayres, the state’s tourism minister, announcing this morning that NSW will open to fully-vaccinated arrivals from overseas on November 1.

Nevertheless, the Victorian decision will be a boost not only for Repco Supercars Championship personnel, but also support categories.

Speedcafe.com knows of a number of competitors who were non-committal to the rounds in NSW at the tail end of their seasons, given the onerous quarantine/isolation requirements which had applied on both entry and exit.

The vaccination mandate for relatively free travel back into Victoria is consistent with that which applies to anyone entering Sydney Motorsport Park, which in turn has been introduced to match NSW’s current public health orders.

The next Supercars event takes place at ‘Eastern Creek’ on October 29-31, while the Repco Bathurst 1000 will be held on November 30-December 5.

There will also be two more rounds of the Shannons Motorsport Australia Championships this year, at Melbourne’s Sandown on November 19-21 and then into South Australia at The Bend on December 10-12.

The entirety of South Australia is currently a ‘green zone’, although a permit must still be obtained to enter Victoria from that state.