Supercars is set to mandate that primary drivers start the race at next year’s Sandown 500 and Bathurst 1000.
The Commission has agreed to the rule change and it is now awaiting Supercars Board approval, reports The Daily Telegraph.
Teams have had the choice of whether primary driver or co-driver starts the race ever since such a demarcation was made official in 2010.
Typically, it is the co-drivers who line up on the starting grid, particularly at Sandown, in order to create strategic flexibility.
This year at Mount Panorama, for example, David Russell was on pole position in Brodie Kostecki’s Erebus Motorsport Camaro and Jamie Whincup alongside him in Broc Feeney’s Camaro.
It was a similar story three weeks earlier at Sandown, when Erebus team-mates Jack Perkins and Russell shared the front row after Will Brown had scored pole in Car #9.
The mayhem of the 2022 Bathurst 1000 sparked debate about whether it should be mandated that primary drivers start in order to reduce the chance of early carnage, but there was no rule change this year.
However, that would not be the only benefit of forcing primary drivers to start.
Another is that the big names are in the cars for one of the biggest moments of the season, namely the start of the Great Race, when television audiences should be high.
2019 Bathurst 1000 winner Scott McLaughlin, though, believes the ban on pairing primary drivers should be scrapped altogether, a call which former Triple Eight team boss Roland Dane supports.
The 2024 Sandown 500 takes place on September 20-22 and the Bathurst 1000 on October 10-13.
In 2025, The Bend will host an enduro, although there could yet be three if Sandown International Motor Raceway receives a stay of execution from developers.
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