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Parties from Erebus, DJR and Triple Eight – through its wildcard driver Cooper Murray – converged on Paul Morris’ Norwell Motorplex on the Gold Coast for the media event.
Confirmation of Kostecki’s move to DJR took place in unison with news that Murray, 23, is set to take his role as Erebus’ next young star.
The event was the latest chapter in an extraordinary saga involving Kostecki and the team with which he graduated to Supercars in 2021 and sensationally won the championship last year.
Kostecki mysteriously missed the opening two events of 2024 following an apparent rift with team boss Ryan, before making a sudden return to see out the final year of his contract.
The 26-year-old today underlined his gratitude to Ryan and team owner Betty Klimenko and stressed their involvement in his DJR deal coming together.
“The discussions with Erebus about my future have been happening now for a little while,” Kostecki said when asked by Speedcafe about his DJR deal.
“It really started with them asking me what I want to do and they had their full support behind me and gave me their advice on things.
“It sort of started off pretty early on. Barry gave me my first opportunity, so to be able to get his advice on things was great.”
Asked about the seemingly miraculous mending of ways with Ryan, Kostecki said: “It’s probably no secret we’ve had our differences, but everyone has their differences throughout their time.
“It’s been great working with him this year. We won a championship last year, that’s something that doesn’t come easy in this sport. Not many get to do it, it’s so tough and so tight.
“It’s been great to have those discussions with him and Betty as well. We’ve still got a long road ahead towards the end of the year, but I’m looking forward to it with the enduros coming up.”
Morris, a long-time supporter of Kostecki, was key in the driver’s sudden return to the team ahead of the Taupo round in April and, according to Ryan, also had a role in the 2025 discussions.
Morris’ northern Gold Coast motorsport ranch proved the perfect neutral ground for the ceremonial handover of Kostecki from Erebus to DJR, complete with road going examples of Camaro and Mustang machinery.
“Sometimes in this sport you need to part ways,” Ryan said when asked about the process of Kostecki’s impending exit.
“Brodie has made a decision he wants to move on and we’re happy to get another young guy and give him an opportunity.
“It’s been an easy thing with Ryan (Story, DJR team principal) and the guys.
“Paul has given a lot of advice in the background, I’ve helped Brodie, we’ve worked together on this to make sure that we can go on and do this in a happy way and go on and win races again.”
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Barry Ryan also stressed that both parties have moved on from the still unexplained early-season issues.
“Obviously not happy with the way it was reported at the start of the year, but we know what happened, we can move on from that and we have,” he said.
“We’ve got four races to go and we know Brodie wants to win Bathurst more than anyone and no one ever wants to win Bathurst more than me. We’re deadset on winning Bathurst.”
The big winner is wily DJR boss Story, whose squad hopes the 2023 champion can lead it back to winning ways.
An August reveal of the deal defies expectations that Kostecki would not be contractually free to sign elsewhere, yet alone publicly announce a move, until much later in the year.
“I think it shows the camaraderie between some of the teams in pitlane that we could work together with Barry and Betty and Daniel (Klimenko) and the Erebus team to make the announcement today,” said Story.
“They know where they are going for 2025 and so do we.”
