James Courtney has questioned the implementation of the new sporting regulations that will be introduced into the V8 Supercars Championship next year.
Last Friday, V8 Supercars announced that two 60km races, including a 15 minute ‘half time’ break will be held at six rounds throughout the year. The first 60km race will carry no championship points.
Meanwhile, double file restarts will replace the traditional single file restarts in every event next year.
CLICK HERE for a look at all of the category’s key sporting regulation changes for 2013.
Courtney, the 2010 V8 champion and current Holden Racing Team driver, says that the first half of the 60/60 format is likely to create processional racing.
“The first race really means nothing,” Courtney told Speedcafe.com.
“In that first race, everyone is going to drive around and keep their car clean and do that first 60km rolling around behind each other. You’ll get a lot of guys sitting on their hands.
“The 15 minutes between them is too close as well, and there’s no points up for grabs. It will be a waste of time. They would have been better off having a bigger gap between the races and having points awarded for both.
“The second race will actually be a race – everyone will be hell for leather trying to get in there. That will be exciting.”
Courtney also queried the regulator’s decision to introduce double file restarts. The Holden star says that
double file restarts are certain to create carnage.
“We’ve been testing at Winton and there is a huge amount of debris on the side of the track – and there’s hardly any cars running,” Courtney said.
“On a race weekend when we run the soft tyre, the amount of junk that’s on the outside of the circuit is horrendous. I think it’s going to promote quite a bit of carnage.
“In NASCAR and other categories, they don’t have as much tyre debris. I think it is definitely going to promote crashing. It seems that’s what they want, that’s what the fans come to see, so I think they are going to achieve that.”
The 2013 V8 Supercars Championship kicks off at the Clipsal 500 on February 28-March 3.
