Erebus is the only one of the four Chevrolet teams not part of a technical alliance envisioned by General Motors for this season.
Having lost its powerhouse and homologation team Triple Eight, the carmaker pushed for an all-in approach in the hopes of keeping Camaros near the front of the field.
Erebus, however, opted against joining the alliance, preferring to keep its independence.
A lean start to the season has cast a spotlight on the Erebus call to spurn the GM alliance, particularly given its highly inexperienced driver line-up of Cooper Murray (second year) and Jobe Stewart (rookie).
But Ryan is adamant that the satisfaction of independence trumps any perceived benefit of his young drivers accessing data from Matt Stone Racing, PremiAir Racing and Team 18.
“Yeah, 100 percent,” said Ryan when asked by Speedcafe if he stands by the decision to not join the alliance.
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“We had two young rookies in 2021 and we won the championship two years later and Bathurst the year after that. We back ourselves as an independent team.
“I’ve said to GM, once we really believe in their system, because they are only developing their system, we’ll consider it.
“But at the moment, [owner] Betty [Klimenko] is pretty passionate like I am about being independent. And it feels good to do it as an independent team.
“It’s just the way we are, it’s probably the way we’ll always be.”
Erebus currently sits last in the teams’ championship standings while Murray and Stewart anchor the drivers’ points in 23rd and 24th respectively.
While willing to accept this is a building season, Ryan has circled the Bathurst 1000 – a typically strong event for the team – as one it can win this year.
“As soon we left [Bathurst] last year it was a goal to win it this year,” he said.
“It’s what we do, it’s what we always target. We’re still going to target the next race, we’ll try and win today’s race.
“But you’ve always got to focus on [Bathurst] because it’s the biggest race of the year.”
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