The Trico Trans Am Series was set to headline the race weekend at Winton Motor Raceway.

Initially, the program was to feature Touring Car Masters, the TCR Australia Series, National Sports Sedans, Formula RX8, and the new Formula Regional-based AU3 Championship.

Touring Car Masters elected to condense its calendar to six events earlier this year, all of which are on the Supercars support card.

TCR Australia Series organisers recently announced their plans for a two-round calendar beginning at The Bend alongside the TCR World Tour in support of Supercars.

Race Winton was to mark the first time since 2023 that the V8 series had ventured to the Benalla circuit.

Speaking with Speedcafe, Australian Racing Group promoter Barry Rogers said the event could have gone ahead as planned until Trans Am organisers opted to go elsewhere.

“When we originally announced that we were doing it in conjunction with the Benalla Auto Club, when we first put it all together there was Trans Am, there was TCR, there was TCM, there was Sport Sedans, AU3, Formula RX8 and then obviously the first one to drop out was TCM,” Rogers told Speedcafe.

“So they disappeared but we thought it’s still achievable without them. Then TCR, you obviously know what’s been going on there, so that didn’t happen. Then [Tim] Macrow’s thing fell out and then there just weren’t the categories there to justify putting the event on. So that’s really what happened and that came to a head the last couple of weeks.”

Trans Am Series organisers are poised to announce a replacement event for Race Winton.

The series, which was owned and operated by the Rogers family, is now under a new ownership group – HCC Pty Ltd – headed by Mark Crutcher, Graham Cheney and Paul Hadley.

HCC Pty Ltd also oversees the sister TA2 Muscle Car Series.

“The Trans Am decisions are now made by HCC,” Rogers explained.

“I spoke to them at Darwin and said, look, we can still do it, but the cost to do it… we haven’t got the amount of people to share them with now so it’ll cost X to do it – or the other options are these.

“I spoke to Stephen White at the Benalla Auto Club and as much as they’re disappointed, they understand. We were doing it together.

“There was some risk obviously for them as well and they could see that the potential to make it pay for itself with the minimal categories there was probably going to be difficult so we sort of made that decision jointly.”

On Monday, ticketholders were advised of the cancellation and would receive a refund in the coming days.